By Steven Matthews, Arundi Venkayya and Kelli Wynn
MY DAYTON DAILY NEWS

NEWS //Posted: 11:34 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 15, 2014

Richey with her feline children. Her death is an enduring shame on the state of American society.

DAYTON — In the months before Klonda Richey was attacked by dogs and mauled to death outside her home at 31 E. Bruce Ave. on Feb. 7, she spent much of her time building a “compound” to protect herself and her beloved cats from a neighbor she claimed was threatening her.

Richey installed surveillance cameras and an 8-foot fence around her property, and bought a handheld recording device. She planned to buy a handheld video camera as well.

Her plan: To use surveillance video from outside her house for evidence of her neighbor’s mixed-mastiff dogs charging her and to document threats she said the neighbor, Andrew Nason, 28, of 35 E. Bruce Ave., had made against her for about two years.

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Although she had been denied a civil stalking protection order against Nason by the Montgomery County Common Pleas Court, she wanted to file another one, said Doug Jahnke, who dated Richey off and on for the last three years and who knew her for more than 25 years.

“It was like a prison compound,” Jahnke said of her house. “In her words, ‘It was a combat zone.’ She was stressed. I have a note from her that says, ‘I’m tired of being stressed and living on high alert.’ There wasn’t any joy in her life anymore.”

Multiple attempts to reach Nason by phone were unsuccessful, and no one answered the door on numerous visits to the home.

Richey’s death has sparked criticism of the system designed to protect citizens from dangerous dogs and threatening neighbors. It illustrates an escalating conflict between neighbors that ended with a woman’s death.

To retrace the conflict between Richey and Nason, the Dayton Daily News examined video surveillance and hundreds of pages of police records, court documents and complaints related to Richey’s home and the home of her neighbor, Nason. The surveillance footage — obtained by WHIO-TV from Jahnke — shows encounters between Richey and Nason, and the dogs coming onto her property.

Richey clearly lived in fear for her safety and reached out on numerous occasions for help. The question is, does blame for her death go beyond the dogs who attacked her and rest as well with the system designed to protect citizens from vicious animals?

‘Nobody saw the event’

[dropcap]R[/dropcap]ichey’s body was discovered at 8:16 a.m., Feb. 7, when a passerby called 911. She had been mauled to death — her clothes shredded by the dogs — and died at approximately 3:15 a.m., according to Montgomery County Coroner Kent Harshbarger. Based on witness statements, Harshbarger said Richey probably died 15 minutes after she was attacked.

That means, her naked body lay in the snow for five hours until the 911 call came in.

It’s unclear why Richey was outside that early, but Jahnke said she hadn’t been feeling well and was sleeping odd hours.

“Nobody saw the event, but they heard things,” Harshbarger said in explaining the estimated timetable for when the attack occurred.

When Dayton Police arrived at the house, they were charged by the two dogs believed to be involved in the attack. Officers shot and killed the dogs.

Richey’s cause of death was ruled as blood loss due to extensive soft tissue trauma, Harshbarger said. The autopsy report is expected to be completed in six to eight weeks, he said.

It is unknown how many times Richey was bitten.

“We can’t quantify it because they overlap,” Harshbarger said. “There’s no way to put a range on it.”

She was pronounced dead at 8:37 a.m. — 21 minutes after the dispatch call came in.

The Dayton Police Department is still investigating. Nason and Julie Custer, 25, who also lives at 35 E. Bruce Ave., were released from jail Feb. 9 — two days after Richey’s death. A suspect cannot be held for more than 48 hours before being formally charged with a crime.

No one has been charged in connection with Richey’s death.

“Often, 48 hours is simply not sufficient time for the police to conduct a full and complete investigation and to ensure that all the elements of a crime are supported by the evidence,” Greg Flannagan, spokesman for the Montgomery County Prosecutor’s Office, said in a statement. “We continue to work with and assist the police in this ongoing investigation.”

Ted Richey, Klonda’s brother, said Friday that his family met with a detective investigating the incident. “We are pleased they are doing everything they can to bring whoever is responsible to justice,” he said.

Klonda Richey made numerous attempts to call attention to the trouble she said she was having with her neighbor.

In total, 13 complaints were filed with the Animal Resource Center and another 46 calls were made to the Montgomery County Regional Dispatch Center related to Nason’s home between Dec. 27, 2011, and Richey’s death on Feb. 7. Most of the Animal Resource Center calls were anonymous but 23 of the calls to the Montgomery County Regional Dispatch Center were from Richey or associated with Richey’s phone number. The majority of the calls were about the dogs at the Nason house, but other calls included complaints about juveniles, fireworks and other activity.

Richey also sought a civil stalking protection order against Nason but ultimately was denied in April 2013.

‘Nothing was done’

Richey decided to file again. “’I’m not laying down on this again,’” Jahnke said she told him. “‘I’m going to document everything.’”

Richey’s life revolved around protecting herself, yet “nothing was done” to protect her, Jahnke said.

On one occasion, Jahnke said, he arrived at Richey’s house just as the police and an Animal Resource Center official were leaving Nason’s house. “They just drove away and there was nothing,” he said. “They wrote a report. That’s all they did.”

Mark Kumpf, director of the Montgomery County Animal Resource Center, said his agency did all it could to address the complaints lodged about the dogs at 35 E. Bruce. Of the 13 complaints that went directly to the resource center, 12 were anonymous and none involved a dog attacking someone. Instead, they involved neglect, dogs barking, running loose or chasing people.

In 2012, Nason registered two mixed-mastiff dogs with the Montgomery County Auditor’s office. It’s not clear if other dogs were at the house.

“This is a tragic accident,” Kumpf said. “There’s nothing that would be foreseeable or doable to prevent a situation like this from happening. We can go out and visit each and every time. Again, in this particular case, these dogs have no history of ever biting a person or been complained on for killing another dog. All of the criteria that exists for animal control officers and dog wardens, none of those were met in this case.”

A caller who did leave her name said on May 21, 2013, that “all four of the dogs were loose again and chased her.” But Kumpf said the caller didn’t actually witness anything, and was reporting third-hand for someone else. The newspaper tried contacting the caller but was unsuccessful.

Kumpf said investigators made numerous visits to the house at 35 E. Bruce in response to the dog complaints. The majority of the time, the homeowners were not there or did not answer the door, he said, and a warning was posted on the house.

Although dog owners typically contact the resource center “99 percent of the time,” after a warning is issued, Kumpf said, no one at the Bruce house did so.

He said there is no evidence the owners broke the law in connection with any of the complaints made about the dogs.

“Under Ohio laws, for a dog at-large violation to be issued, the officer must actually witness the dog off the property and not under the owner’s immediate control,” Kumpf said. “We cannot issue a citation based on a third party witnessing an event.”

If no violation is issued, the case is closed, Kumpf said.

“To proactively patrol, that’s very difficult,” he said. “We have very limited staff in order to provide that service.” Kumpf did say animal control officers follow up on notices when they can and check out known problem areas. East Bruce Avenue was not a designated problem area for vicious dogs, he said.

Animal resource officers are still trying to collect Richey’s many cats, and her family is working with Kumpf’s staff to find homes for them. Richey, who rescued cats and had two homes to house them, owned as many as 50 cats.

Although no complaints were filed against Richey, she was in apparent violation of the Dayton zoning code for having so many cats. Under the code, a resident who owns four or more cats is considered to be an animal boarding facility, and such a facility cannot be in a residential zone, Dayton law director John Danish said. He said there is no record of Richey being cited.

In addition to the house at 31 E. Bruce, Richey owned a house at 142 Northwood Ave. in Dayton, Montgomery County property records show. As of Friday, animal resource officers had counted 23 cats in or around the Northwood Avenue house. Friends are currently taking care of those cats and animal resource staff is currently evaluating their health. The rest of her cats are at the Animal Resource Center and may be available for adoption in 10 to 14 days.

‘Energizer Bunny’

Richey, 57, grew up in Dayton, the youngest of three children. She shared a bedroom with her older sister, Linda, and like most children loved her stuffed animals. Known as “Ducky” to her big brother, Ted, she enjoyed swimming but was scared of riding a bike.

Ted Richey said in an email this week that Klonda was, “described as the ‘Energizer Bunny’ because she was happiest when she was active and busy.”

A 1974 graduate of Fairview High School, she attended Sinclair Community College, the College of Charleston in South Carolina and the former Chadwick University (now The Chadwick Institute) in Alabama.

“She experimented with other locations,” Ted Richey said, but ultimately she returned to Dayton to be near family.

In 1992, Richey bought her home on East Bruce Avenue from her parents who had owned the home since 1988, according to the Montgomery County Auditor’s Office.

Jahnke met Richey in 1987 at a gym downtown. They worked out together and dated for about three months at the time. They went their separate ways, Richey married briefly and Jahnke didn’t see her again until Nov. 29, 2010.

Ted Richey and Jahnke said Klonda’s life was full of many interests: sewing, painting, cooking, exercising, dancing.

“She was very talented,” Jahnke said.

In his email, Ted Richey said his sister danced everyday “for the joy and exercise. Taught ballroom dancing for a while and in her words, ‘dancing creates a feeling of sheer joy within.’”

She came from a family that had a lot of longevity, he said. Their grandmother lived to be 100, their father 92 and their mother 90. For his sister to die at 57 and in this way, he said, is inconceivable.

She worked at Montgomery County Children Services, now the Montgomery County Job & Family Services, for almost 26 years, eventually becoming a purchasing agent. A dedicated exerciser and personal trainer, she frequently walked the short distance to work.

“It was part of her daily routine,” Ted Richey said. One of the reasons she didn’t want to leave her house was because her house was so close to her job — allowing her to walk to work.

Despite her many other interests, her cats are what she was best known for. She moved several of the “baby cats” to the Northwood Avenue house after she purchased it in March 2006, Jahnke said. Her dream was to buy land and create a retirement home for cats called Alleycat Garden. The home would be “a place for cats to roam and be free with a courtyard that was fenced in and a garden,” Jahnke said.

“She would work just to make money to take care of her cats,” Ted Richey said. “Basically, her life’s work was caring for these cats.”

Growing up, Richey didn’t have many pets, Ted Richey said. “Our parents did not want pets, but we had a Cocker Spaniel for a brief time and a stray tomcat that we were allowed to feed,” he said.

“Klonda always had a love of cats in particular and they seemed to find her.”

Her friends and co-workers expressed outrage that enough was not done to assist her with the problems she told them she had with her neighbors and their dogs.

“She’s always been terrified of those dogs,” said Tim Bridwell, a friend and co-worker at the Montgomery County Job & Family Services, who lives two blocks from Richey.

Ann Stevens, who worked with Richey for 16 years at the Montgomery County Job & Family Services Administration Services Division, said it was ironic that such a devout animal lover would be “killed by animals in such a brutal aggressive way.”

“Every conversation I had with Klonda included cats,” Stevens said. “She was very passionate about animals and their well-being and because of that she always had a special place in my heart.”

Jahnke said Richey didn’t seem to mind filling at least 10 food bowls and cleaning multiple litter boxes every day.

Her home always was tidy, he said. When police officers entered after her death, all of her cats seemed to be well-cared for, the Animal Resource Center said.

“She was the workingest woman I ever saw,” Jahnke said. “Those cats were her life. Period.”

‘No one’s life is in danger’

The first complaint to the Animal Resource Center about Richey’s next-door neighbor at 35 E. Bruce Ave. was Dec. 27, 2011, according to records. The anonymous complaint was that a “dog is very thin, ribs are visible. No F/W (food/water) outside.”

Andrew Nason had purchased the home earlier that year, though it is not clear when he moved in. Nason was placed under five years probation in February 2012 after being convicted of petty theft and assault, according to court records. Custer lived in the home as well during the past two years, and children were present. It is unclear how many children lived there, however.

Richey’s troubles with Nason began in May 2012, according to the civil stalking protection order petition she filed in Montgomery County Common Pleas Court in September 2012 and a 911 call she made in July 2013.

Richey said she filed the petition based on a recommendation made by Dayton police following an incident on Sept. 6, 2012, when she said Nason circled around her in a dune buggy.

Georgetta Young, who lives across the street, said the neighborhood is “pretty quiet” after 10 p.m. but she would sometimes hear loud vehicles — “ATV-type things.”

Of the complaints Richey had with Nason, Young said, “I didn’t know that it was to the point she had that many issues and complaints because you never really witness anything like that.”

In her filing for a protection order, Richey said she “live(d) in fear of what’s next” from May 12, 2012, to September 2012. Richey said she had lost 12 pounds because of Nason’s conduct toward her, which included:

• Letting his dogs chase her.
• Mowing down her peonies.
• Yelling at her from his deck or porch.
• Threatening her cats and damaging three of them.
• Circling her in his dune buggy as she walked to and from work.
• Interrupting workers as they tried to build her fence.

According to court documents, Nason denied hurting Richey’s cats, said he “loves animals,” and that the issue between them was strictly over the property line. Nason denied making threats and said “no one’s life is in danger.”

Nason “lamented he would like (Richey) to keep her cats inside because he ‘would really love not to have my cars scratched.’ He said he was unaware that the issue between them had gotten this serious,” the court record stated.

Nason also said Richey had the “same problem” with the neighbor on the other side of her home, which is 27 E. Bruce Avenue. That home is now vacant, but at the time was occupied by Kevin Harris, who wrote a letter on Nason’s behalf detailing his own feud with Richey.

Harris said Richey “is a looney tune and needs help real bad,” in his letter dated Nov. 28, 2012. Custer also submitted a letter, accusing Richey of harassment; calling police, animal patrol and housing inspection for no reason; making a false report to children’s services; and taping letters to their back porch with “obscene things written on them after repeatedly being asked to stay off of our property.”

One of those letters was included in court documents. In the undated and unsigned letter, Richey offered to buy Nason’s house for $3,900 cash.

“Don’t really want the house, but do want the trauma to my cats and fear to end,” Richey wrote. “…If you want to hurt me, shoot or stab me. Leave cats in peace.”

Magistrate Kristi Wuebben in February 2013 denied the civil stalking protection order, despite saying that Richey “gathered extensive information about what (Nason) is doing during the day and night.” There was no evidence that Nason had caused or threatened to cause Richey with physical harm, Wuebben wrote.

“(Richey) believes that (Nason) is harming her cats, after, he purportedly threatened to harm her cats, yet she leaves the cats outside,” the court record says. “It does not reconcile with common sense that if, in fact, (Nason) had threatened the cats and/or if (Richey) really believed (Nason) was hurting the animals, that she would leave them outside.”

Wuebben’s magistrate office referred all questions to Judge Michael Tucker, who declined to comment on the specific case, beyond what was recorded in court documents.

Tucker said to grant a civil stalking protection order, there must be a pattern of conduct — two or more incidents closely related in time — that has caused physical harm or mental distress.

“There is a statute that sets forth what needs to be established in order for a civil stalking protection order to be issued,” Tucker said. “I can only conclude that Magistrate Wuebben determined that based upon what was presented to her, the statutory requirements were not established by Ms. Richey.”

Tom Hagel, professor of law at the University of Dayton School of Law, said uncorroborated accusations alone are not sufficient to justify the granting of a temporary protection order in such cases.

“The burden is on the person seeking the order to convince the magistrate or judge that the dogs are a threat to her safety,” he said.

In cases where a criminal charge has not been filed regarding the dogs’ owner, it is often more difficult to convince the judge to issue the order, he said.

Hagel said the law attempts to balance the interests of the dog owner’s right to possess the dogs against the public’s right to safety. In addition, seeking such an order can, at times, be misused, he said, as a way to retaliate against someone by making accusations that are not true.

“In most cases, the complaints are legitimate,” he said. “The problem is that the person requesting the protection order may not understand the legal requirements to justify issuing the order, such as what evidence the law requires to be presented.”

Richey filed an objection to Wuebben’s denial, but it was overruled by Judge Michael Krumholtz. Richey did not file a copy of the initial hearing transcript in her objections, which factored into Krumholtz’s decision.

“You must get to the judge who is ruling upon the objections a transcript of the hearing before the magistrate, or the judge can’t determine whether or not the factual objections are accurate or not,” Tucker said.

He said Richey could have appealed Krumholtz’s ruling in the Second District Court of Appeals.

Review coming

State lawmakers will likely review Ohio’s dangerous dog laws in the wake of Richey’s death, House Republican Caucus spokesman Mike Dittoe said last week.

A new state law, which took effect in May 2012, created three definitions for problem dogs — nuisance, dangerous and vicious — and removed pit bulls from the definition of a vicious dog. It also created a process for owners to appeal the designation of their pet as a nuisance dog.

“We have been severely hampered by the state law that changed,” Dayton Mayor Nan Whaley said on Wednesday after her state of the city address, in which she did not mention vicious dogs.

Whaley said she receives a complaint from a citizen about a vicious dog roughly once a week.

Under the law’s definitions, nuisance dogs are those that, without provocation and off their owners’ property, chase or menace someone or attempt to bite a person. Dangerous dogs have, without provocation, injured someone, killed other dogs or had three or more violations of regulations covering the confinement or control of dogs. Vicious dogs are defined as those that have, without provocation, killed or caused serious injury to a person.

The county’s control officers only have authority to enforce violations of the Ohio Revised Code, Kumpf said. The mixed-mastiff dogs involved in Richey’s death did not have a designation of nuisance, dangerous or vicious, according to Kumpf.

Joe Tuss, Montgomery County Administrator, said the county’s Animal Resource Center did all it could under the law when it responded to the complaints and investigated them.

“This is an incredibly unfortunate circumstance and a terrible tragedy, but to move to the conclusion that the county didn’t do enough, that the Animal Resource Center didn’t do enough and could have done more, I don’t have anything to lead me to that conclusion,” Tuss said.

County commissioner Dan Foley said state legislation needs to give more authority to local animal control officers to act upon patterns of behavior or violence, even if it is not witnessed by the officer.

“It would allow staff to be able to make judgment calls in a way to improve safety,” Foley said. “We could use data to help our staff understand which dogs have the highest level of concern by the community, and we could make an improvement.”

Foley said he would categorize the 13 complaints in about a two-year span at 35 E. Bruce Ave. to be a “pattern of violence.”

“Nobody should have to go through what she went through,” Foley said. “The thing that matters the most is she lost her life. I hope that doesn’t get lost.”

Hagel said that he’s not sure if changing the law is the answer.

“People tend to confuse ‘law’ with ‘justice,’ he said. “They are not synonymous. What the community may believe to be ‘just’ may not be the same as what is ‘legal .’”

Jahnke said his friend glass blocked her windows and built what resembled a prison compound because she wanted to be left alone.

Ted Richey said he and his wife tried to convince his sister to move but she wanted to stay because she considered the house not only hers but her cats’ as well.

He hopes some good can come of her death, including an examination of the law.

“If anything, the laws may need to be adjusted,” he said. “If something like that were to come out of this whole incident, that would be something positive — so that maybe nothing like this will happen again.”

In her own words

In a 911 recording from July 2, 2013, Klonda Richey tells the dispatcher that Nason intimidated her as she walked to work.

“He knows my schedule,” Richey says. “The dog had a leash on, but he wasn’t holding it. He said his treat today was going to be eating a whole bunch of cats. … This is nuts. It’s a constant intimidation thing.”

Richey tells the dispatcher that Nason knows where her surveillance cameras are and he stays out of those zones. She says she’s spent more than $2,000 in surveillance video and $1,500 on her fence to keep Nason and his dogs off her property.

“I have to turn my home into Fort Knox,” Richey says.

“I tried the civil protection order, and I got brushed aside with those judges as a neighbor dispute,” she says. “This has gone way beyond a neighbor dispute. … I’ve done everything in my power to contain this guy.”

Donald Cleary, director of communications and publications for the National Canine Research Council, said “at first blush, (Richey’s death) looks as though it’s just a situation where someone was doing an extremely poor job looking after the dogs.”

He said that some fatalities are preventable because it’s all a matter of pet ownership.

“There are certain common sense things,” Cleary said.

Those include prohibiting your dog from running loose; putting it on a good diet; not ignoring it when it displays an increasing level of stress; familiarizing itself with the normal flow of human interaction; and not leaving it with small children.

“Everybody is responsible for the dog that he has,” Cleary said. “It’s not that hard.”

More online: Listen to the audio of a 911 call Richey made to police to complain about her neighbors months before her death and watch an exclusive surveillance video of encounters between Richey and Nason at MyDaytonDailyNews.com/local.

To bring you the most complete coverage of the tragic death of Klonda Ritchey, the Dayton Daily News examined hundreds of pages of documents, viewed surveillance video taken from the cameras outside Richey’s home and conducted multiple interviews with friends, family members, neighbors, animal control officers, lawmakers and other local officials.

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KEEP IN MIND: CAPTIONS, PHOTOS, PULL QUOTES, EDITORIAL NOTES, AND SIDEBARS BY THE EDITORS, NOT THE AUTHORS

[dropcap]W[/dropcap]ayne Pacelle, HSUS president, has filed this unusually strong criticism of some of our megalomaniac corporate overlords’ pastimes, a situation in which the true moral character of these fellows is revealed in all its ugly vainglory. Apparently not content with exploiting and ruining much of humanity and the environment, this compulsorily acquisitive scum is also a plague on animals in all continents, including severely endangered ones. They are the naked face of the status quo, and it surely ain’t pretty. What’s really sick is that their antics are studied, praised and often imitated by clueless B-school graduates across the world.

Cecil the lion was widely photographed and somewhat habituated to a non-threatening human presence in Hwange National Park. Photo Credit: Brent Stapelkamp/500pix Prime via HSUS

 

David Cote, CEO of Honeywell, a company in the top tier of the Fortune 500, shot a white rhino and had parts of the prehistoric-looking animal made into two vases, an ashtray, and an ice bucket. How’s that for treating the natural world as your playground and reducing one of the most magnificent animals on the planet into an array of frivolous decorative items for your home?

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SIDEBAR
In 2010, President Obama named Cote as one of the Chief Executives he most admired.^[20] In 2009, Cote was invited to the White House to meet the President for a briefing on the US economic recovery plan^[21] and in November 2009, he was one of 12 businesspeople asked by the White House to host the US-India CEO Forum, which Cote and Ratan Tata co-chaired.^[22] In February 2010, Cote was selected by President Obama to be on the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform, more commonly known as the debt panel.^[4][23]

Since his tenure at Honeywell began in 2002, the company’s donations via its Political Action Committee have risen from $212,112 in 2002 to $7,879,570 in 2014.^[19]

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^{NOTE: Cote pockets approximately $30 MM a year, not to mention countless corporate perks that escape accounting.} 

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On his trips to Africa, perhaps on the dime of Honeywell and possibly delivered there courtesy of the company plane, Cote also shot leopards and even some captive animals, including an endangered Bontebok and a black wildebeest. He didn’t restrict his killing to the southern hemisphere – he pursued and killed lots of animals in the top half of the world, from Alaska to Russia.

He’s hardly the only fat cat to use his wealth and privilege to spread suffering and death. Jimmy John Liautaud, CEO of the eponymous fast-food company, has killed enough animals to fill a museum – including a rhino, an African elephant, a leopard, and even a hyena. He also shot a lynx and a wolf. He had a compatriot in former GoDaddy CEO Bob Parsons, too. In 2006 alone, SCI records show Parsons killed a kudu, an eland, a bushbuck, and a grysbok in Zimbabwe and even bison in the United States. In 2011, he posted a video of himself killing an elephant – a hunt that could have cost him up to $500,000.

[dropcap]B[/dropcap]ut these guys are all pikers compared to Thomas J. Hammond, founder of Flagstar Bank, which in 2012 paid a $133 million settlement for predatory and fraudulent mortgage lending practices. Hammond has killed at least 13 African lions, 11 elephants, five leopards, and even a highly endangered cheetah, among thousands of other animals. In all, he claims he’s killed 314 different species. There’s a fellow who values biodiversity as his own personal grab bag.

Today, on the eve of the one-year anniversary of the slaying of Cecil the lion – an act that inadvertently threw back the curtain on the perverse subculture of high-price competitive trophy hunting with the United States as the top importer – The HSUS and Humane Society International release a report that reveals trophy hunting’s terrible foothold within the United States. It’s a realm filled with thousands of people pursuing the biggest animals in the world, in order to get into the record books, by killing enough animals to qualify for the “grand slams” and “inner circles” that secure their place in the Safari Club International’s pantheon of trophy hunting. The SCI’s awards include the “Africa Big Five,” “Bears of the World,” “Cats of the World,” and “Introduced Trophy Game Animals of North America,” which essentially requires the trophy hunter to shoot dozens of captive animals on American “canned hunting” facilities.

We had our cameras rolling at the SCI convention in Las Vegas earlier this year to get the unfiltered views of the trophy hunters and the guides and outfitters who are known to all but guarantee a successful hunt, in what is known in the industry as a “no kill, no pay” arrangement. Walter Palmer paid an estimated $50,000 to kill Cecil after the lion wandered out of the protected range of Hwange National Park in Zimbabwe and into range of Palmer’s bow and arrow. Trophy hunters may pay even more for an elephant or a rhino, or a little less for a leopard or a Cape buffalo.

Typical of his braggart and depraved ilk, Thomas J. Hammond has killed at least 13 African lions, 11 elephants, five leopards, and even a highly endangered cheetah, among thousands of other animals. In all, he claims he’s killed 314 different species.

Drawing an estimated 25,000 trophy hunting enthusiasts, the SCI convention displays taxidermied lions, wolves, leopards, bears, elephants, mountain goats, and other creatures as killer porn bait for these bloodthirsty gents. Around 500 trophy hunting outfitters are on hand to book sales well into 2018.

The annual convention is a major source of income for SCI. According to its financial statement for 2014, 62 percent of SCI’s $23.8 million in revenue was generated by that year’s convention – a large chunk of this was from auctioning off hunts to a host of willing bidders.

Our cameras captured the guides and outfitters saying some pretty extraordinary things. A representative of Hallamore Hunts noted, “The problem with lion, isn’t to get him to eat the bait, he’s gonna eat the bait. Problem is, does he have a nice mane?” A person with Swanepoel Safaris noted that captive lion hunting is a major industry in South Africa, with probably 1,000 lions being shot there each year by hunters. “In South Africa they’re so, so affordable. Thirty thousand dollars, you can shoot a hell of a big lion, you know.” (The shame of these countries who sell their wildlife for money to rich degenerates, not only from the US, Japan and Europe, but from Saudi Arabia, as well, usually nations riddled with corruption and foreign influence, is one of the tragic, underpublicized stories of our times.—Editors)

Just like the factory farms or commercial seal killing that are the targets of other HSUS and HSI campaigns, these activities are so removed from daily experience that most of us hardly realize that they are occurring. That’s why the image of the grinning Walter Palmer and his guide over the slain Cecil came as such a jolt – it looked perfectly cruel and bizarrely colonial.

With today’s report, we remind the world that there are plenty of Walter Palmers still creating mayhem at the edges of the social grid. It will be made tougher now with U.S. restrictions, successfully petitioned for by The HSUS, Humane Society International and our partners, on the import of African lion trophies. And the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has not permitted the import of elephant trophies from Tanzania and Zimbabwe since 2014.

But it’s still not enough to put a stop to this trophy hunting madness. Only shining a light on the participants, and passing stricter laws in the range countries, importing countries, and right here in the United States, can stop them from killing so many of the planet’s most majestic creatures for ego, for awards, and for a deep-seated instinct to dominate, kill, and acquire. It just fuels the outrage, on top of that, to see that these people have the audacity to try to excuse their selfish, life-nullifying acts as generous act of conservation. Anybody who sees what they do, and the trail of destruction they leave, knows better.

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About the author

 Wayne Pacelle is the president of The Humane Society of the United States. His new book is The Humane Economy: How Innovators and Enlightened Consumers Are Transforming the Lives of Animals (William Morrow, 2016).

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SPECIAL COMMENT BY PATRICE GREANVILLE

Cholula, a dog whose owner was charged with animal cruelty. (Montgomery County Animal Services and Adoption Center)

By Justin Wm. Moyer June 29, 2016, The Washington Post

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A Maryland man was arrested on animal cruelty charges last week after he left his maggot-infested dog outside to die, Montgomery County animal services said Wednesday.On June 21, an animal services officer responded to the home of Ronald Vaughan, 34, in the 13000 block of Deerwater Drive in Germantown, the Montgomery County Animal Services and Adoption Center said in a statement. In the back yard, the officer could see a small dog lying on its side in a crate, which was covered by a towel and encircled by flies, and could hear the animal’s cries of distress, the statement said.When questioned, Vaughan claimed that he had been out of town and that a friend was caring for the dog, named Cholula, according to the statement. Vaughn said the friend had notified him that Cholula had many flies on her, and Vaughn declared that he had made plans to take her to a veterinarian, but officials later confirmed that no appointments were scheduled, the statement said. In the meantime, Cholula was placed outside the home because of the odor she was emitting, according to the statement.Vaughan surrendered Cholula to the officer, and she was examined by a veterinarian, who noted that her body cavities were infested with maggots, as were wounds of unknown origin, the statement said. It was decided that the opportunity to treat the dog had passed, and she was euthanized at the shelter, according to the statement.Vaughan was arrested June 22 and charged with two counts of misdemeanor animal cruelty, the statement said. Animal control obtained custody of a cat and a 6-month-old puppy in his home.

Ronald Vaughan (Montgomery County Animal Services and Adoption Center)

 

“This is an unfortunate case that ended with the euthanasia of an animal that, if properly treated, could have lived a much longer, healthier life,” Tom Koenig, director of the Montgomery County Animal Services and Adoption Center, said in a statement. “The public should be aware of both state and local laws that protect animals, especially with regard to obtaining medical care for those who are injured or are suffering.”

Reflections on a small tragedy that demands attention
Patrice Greanville

Events like this cry for an explanation, but no easy explanations are possible nor forthcoming. We are forced, therefore, to dig deeper, to look further, to reveal the diverse forces that made this poor animal’s fate (and those like her) a foregone conclusion.

Many decades of working in this trench has shown us that changing the ways of society is hard work, that some victories are frequently rolled back, and that the status quo packs numerous areas filled with customs that facilitate and even encourage animal cruelty, from dominionistic religions—the Abrahamic triumvirate—Judaism, Christianity, and Islam— is notorious for that, as it literally sacralizes human tyranny over other sentient creatures and nature itself—to huge industries and commerce rooted in massive exploitation of animals, from factory farming to unrestricted fishing and deforestation, to national pastimes of varying idiocy—from Spanish bullfights to the recently cancelled Nepalese Gadhimai festival, a ritual slaughter of epic dimensions that will surely remain a landmark in the history of human depravity and imbecility for centuries to come.

Under such circumstances the severe disconnect between the gravity of the offense and the punishment meted out to animal abusers is bound to offend and enrage many animalists who see time after time that such characters suffer little retribution for their despicable acts. Why is this so, even in the 21st century? Has “civilization” meant any real progress in this complicated area of species interactions? Let’s recapitulate the situation for a moment.

A FRACTURED LEDGER OF ACCOMPLISHMENTS AND DEFEATS PUNCTUATED BY LONG PERIODS OF STASIS

[dropcap]W[/dropcap]hile it is perhaps clear that in some areas most of the world has seen a glimmer of progress in the treatment and status of animals, especially in the affluent nations, the benefits remain deeply sectionalized by species and a number of cultural factors.

It’s undeniable, for example, that companion animals —chiefly cats and dogs—or those animals we have come to regard as “pets”—may be enjoying a relative improvement in their lives in the developed world. This is something to celebrate indeed, for it has taken (and still does) enormous efforts to turn that tide of suffering. Barely 400 years ago many felines were persecuted with viciousness throughout Europe, the victims of faddish superstitions, while the vast majority of dogs were consigned to a life of errant destitution, persecution and starvation. That has changed, somewhat, albeit we still talk of incomplete victories.

At the same time, a multitude of animals which many cultures continue to classify as “food animals” or “draft animals” remain the object of extremely cruel treatment and industrialized death. Under such circumstances, the net effect, compounded by the ecologically criminal expanded consumption of meat as a symbol of economic success, is overwhelmingly negative. Indeed, relative melioration in some areas is being quickly obliterated by the appalling growth of meat production, the ugliest of human addictions, a habit that translates into the enslavement and murder of billions of creatures every year, from birds to cattle to hogs, plus other species consigned to the human table, not to mention the terrible harm we do to our planetary life-sustaining systems. These crimes—for the word is no hyperbole when we look at the situation with a modicum of honesty—are made even more odious by the impersonal business calculus ruling these operations, a mentality that reduces animals to mere non-sentient entities to be produced at the lowest possible monetary cost and in mind-boggling quantities.

Against this Dantesque backdrop, we should expect that as long as factory farming systems continue to exist, it will prove impossible to create or enforce effective broad protective legislation at any level –city, state or federal–that will do away with the crimes we commit in other far less defensible areas, such as hunting, furs, blood festivals, etc. For, after all, according to the accepted rules of speciesism animals are “things”, and can thereby be “owned”, traded, used, exploited, and killed with relative impunity.

The causes of our failure

“The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars / But in ourselves, that we are underlings.”— Wm. Shakespeare

[dropcap]A[/dropcap]nimal exploitation and abuse is such an old and massive phenomenon in the world that it’s hard to sort out the many cultural streams that give rise to this mighty river of suffering. The dimensions of this problem are such that many activists often burn out or are frequently paralyzed, depleted and overwhelmed by the seeming intractability of so many issues.

In general we can argue that the failure to really make a dent on speciesism stems from two major interconnected areas: internal and external causation, and the prospects of improving either follow different logic and approaches. Simplifying the matter a bit, internal causation relates to the poor performance of major animal groups, and the general small-bore vision of many animal activists.  When changing human society, perhaps one of the toughest and most thankless jobs anyone can undertake, it’s essential to have a sense of the broader field affecting attitudes and policies towards animals, and the forces shaping it. Put charitably, the longer view is in scant supply in our movement. Passion and short-term thinking are the rule, especially for people in the “trenches”—the people who go out every day and night to rescue or rehab animals, the people who embrace a variety of issues (there’s never any shortage of that), often at great expense and even risk in their personal lives. In my view these people—the majority of whom are women— are the real heroes of the animal movement, exemplars of what compassion in action is and should be. My respect (and love) for them is immense and unswerving. That said, I must also say that their stubborn refusal to amplify their understanding of the social and political matrix in which such issues arise, or master more effective tools (such as media creation or manipulation) to combat issues at the general, social level, perpetuates the tragedies they fight so bravely and with such dedication every single day. Aversion to “politics” or an amateur understanding of the nature of politics harms our movement at the rank-and-file level, and I see no easy solution to this.

Compounding the problem is the fact that our ranks are riddled with de facto disunity and, in general, poor leadership. Sadly, despite the lip service paid to collaboration by most big organization leaders, a virtual lack of collaboration and jealousy about turf (read: supporters’ list and credit for whatever victories are secured) are the norm, and this reality cripples the animal defence movement to this day. Media campaigns, for example, should be supported by all major organizations, the funding issuing from a media pool, and ideally implemented by our own national media staffed with talented professionals (but not careerists) from top to bottom. Is this doable? Of course it is. A look at history shows it’s been done by organizations and groups with far less societywide support and fewer talented people. What is still missing is the leadership and willingness to move toward convergence of operations (wherever possible) instead of the preferred mode of going it alone.

THE BROADER FIELD: TRIBUTARY ISSUES

[dropcap]S[/dropcap]o some of the failure to really make a breakthrough in animal liberation, to defeat some of the factors that make their lot so hard, is at least partially self-inflicted. But what of the “external causes”?

If changing the subculture that permeates our movement is difficult (but something we can envision nonetheless), tackling the external causations is harder still, but, again, not impossible.

As they seek change for the sake of the animals, activists collide with what seems to many of them like an immutable thing, the mores that people embrace at any given time. Indeed, social customs can extend for decades and even many centuries, even while they are imperceptibly changing all along.  At present, a look at society in general, when so many problems converge to define what looks like a virtual implosion, is bound to inject despair into the soul of any social change activist, especially those engaged in the toughest struggle of all, animal liberation.

The enforcement and proper provisioning of animal protection laws, such as they are, which could have saved Cholula, remains spotty due to the innumerable conflicts and corruption of the society at large, the rationales and the morally bankrupt priorities assigned to public monies and social resources of all kinds, which tend to underfund not just animal protection—regrettably still a low priority for far too many human beings—but many other essential things for a dignified life.  This reality is more difficult to accept when we see that all such problems originate in a nation as rich as the United States from a general lack of decent political leadership at almost all levels. Politics, therefore, is a dimension of work that serious ecoanimal activists cannot afford to neglect. Why does politics matter, some may ask? Because politics is, in reality, not the buffoonery that we see on television every day, nor the idiocies the media would like us to believe, but the far more serious business of acquiring, holding and using social power to change the shape and priorities of society. What can be more important than that?

Indeed, in addition to all the systemic suffering we inflict on animals we also inflict indirect wounds. Death by ecosystem denial and destruction, as is the case with repeated oil spills, the further embedding of oil in our culture, forest devastation in pursuit of grazing pastures or monoculture crops, or the grandaddy of all, climate change—all of these evils stem from political decisions made by others, people with little or no regard for animals, humans or nature.

SUMMATION

Obviously, speciesism and it myriad evils is not about to be cured overnight. Furthermore, it is also clear that the existing political leadership—of their own accord— is not likely to provide any real solutions. If anything, given the current pervasive corruption and pathetic quality of most professional politicians, the situation is quite likely to get worse, especially in the realm of “indirect wounds.”

That means the ball is in our court, has been for a very long time, and we need to come up with creative and savvy solutions, as well as a whole array of new tactics and strategies, if anything is to change in a substantive way. It also means we must get serious about mastering mass communications, or, to be more precise, propaganda for our side. We are facing an ideological challenge of huge proportions but our efforts are for the most part amateurish and uneven.

Climate change alone, and a global regime of constant (manufactured) wars, not to mention what some reasonably define as the collapse of civilization, threaten the destiny of animals more than ever before: droughts, floods, storms, civil wars, a shrinking of our civil liberties, even nuclear wars, are now credible events in our near future. Each of these cataclysmic factors, the product of bankrupt politics, will make the work of animal defenders, especially animal liberationists, immensely more difficult. For if people are not listening now, when, as far as they know, things are not yet as bad as they soon might be, imagine what the situation will be when pandemonium reigns, humanity is in a panic mode and naked survival of the fittest begins to take hold. In colossal crises like that, it is always the weakest who suffer the most, and all of you know who they are.

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By Ash Moorthy

The recent death of Harambe, a silverback gorilla at Cincinnati Zoo that was shot dead after a boy fell into the gorilla enclosure has triggered a fierce debate.

Harambe, in a photo by S. Streithorst (CBS). A precious creature destroyed by human self-centeredness and ineptitude.

Our reaction to this tragic incident has been very polarized. Some expressed fury at the zoo’s decision to kill the gorilla and rallied behind the “justice for Harmabe” tag, while others called for charges against the three year old’s mother. And in perhaps what is a reflection of the hypocrisy and intolerance hidden in us, many others trivialized the death of the 17 year old Gorilla.

“It’s a Gorilla; Get Over it” read the title of one column, while another called the decision to shoot the gorilla an obvious one.

Just a day after the incident, the child’s mother took to social media to defend herself from criticism, but did not think Harambe deserved a word of condolence. To the prosecutor who refused to press charges against the child’s mother, it didn’t matter that Harmabe is a fellow primate with 98% genetic similarity with humans, he was still an animal.

So what if Harambe is “just” a gorilla? They are self-aware sentient beings that share many of our traits like having complex emotional feelings and a desire for social groups. Recent studies show that gorillas too make tools like our ancestors.

What justifies the superiority of humans over gorillas? Is it our better intelligence? But if we are going to value individuals based on their intelligence, we will be condoning the killings of intellectually disabled persons, something no civilized person would find acceptable.

While many people who transcend human chauvinism have mourned Harambe’s death, there’s always idiots to remind us our breed is filled with ignorant and selfish specimens devoid of even the most elementary empathy.

It is also equally arguable that the life of an animal belonging to a critically endangered species, like a silverback gorilla is worth more than the life of a member of an overpopulated species.

While we can endlessly argue the superiority of one species over the other, one thing is clear: our view as the superior species is based on prejudice. The prejudice that had led to us to believe in the superiority of one race over another in the not so distant past, the prejudice that fueled Alexander Stephen’s infamous defense of slavery in the Cornerstone speech.

Ironically, those who mock the outpouring over the death of Harambe are the very same people fighting racial intolerance. “Black Lives Matter” activists who believe the protests over the shooting of the gorilla is misplaced because in their eyes the shooting of unarmed black men do not result in comparable protests are not only factually wrong but are unwittingly justifying the mentality that discriminates those different from us — whether “those” belong to a different species or a different race.

The endless debates that have hogged the social media since the fateful Saturday cannot bring Harambe back to life. But the least we can do is to recognize and respect the sentient beings we share this planet with, irrespective of whether they have a name Harambe the gorilla or Cecil the lion, or they get sliced anonymously into our sandwiches.

About the author

Ash Moorthy, is a Silicon Valley based software engineer, and freelance writer. Follow him on Quora at http://www.quora.com/Ash-Moorthy

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ENVIRONMENT

In the end, Harambe’s own sense of security was violated.

By Marc Bekoff / AlterNet

Harambe: A victim of a long concatenation of human errors and crimes.

Many people worldwide already know about the shooting of a 17-year-old male western lowland gorilla named Harambe at the Cincinnati Zoo to save the life of a four-year old child who fell into the gorilla’s cage. The boy apparently told his mother he wanted to meet Harambe and crawled under a rail and over the wall of the moat. As usual, my inbox was ringing constantly with different reports of Harambe’s killing, some might call it an execution or a murder. Indeed, the title of Peter Holley’s essay in the Washington Post is called “Shooting an endangered animal is worse than murder’: Grief over gorilla’s death turns to outrage.” 

Who’s to blame and what can be done to avoid such unnecessary killings?

Opinions vary widely about whether or not the boy’s parents are to blame and should be charged for negligence, and whether Harambe should have been killed, as there is essentially no evidence that the gorilla was going to harm the child. As I watched footage of the event I was reminded of an incident at Chicago’s Brookfield Zoo in which a female western lowland gorilla named Binta Jua rescued a three-year old boy who fell into her enclosure.

We can also ask if the zoo is to blame. Why was the boy able to get under the rail, had zoo workers practiced the sorts of rescues brought on by these events, why wasn’t Harambe tranquilized? 

Grief and outrage over Harambe’s death.

Moving forward, caretakers, who are responsible for the day-to-day well-being of the zoo’s residents and who form personal relationships with them, must be involved in preparing for emergency situations such as this. It’s these people “on the ground” who know the animals the best and who regularly communicate with them. They also could well be the people who could communicate the animal out of danger so it could be a win-win for all involved. Harambe, like all other gorillas and numerous other zoo-ed animals, are highly intelligent and emotional beings who depend on us to respect and value their cognitive capacities that could well be put to use in potentially dangerous situations. Clearly, knowing about the behavior of each animal, as an individual with a unique personality, is essential for the well-being of every captive being.

We can’t undo Harambe’s death but we can, and must, ask these sorts of questions. We also must be sure that all zoo personnel are prepared for unexpected emergencies and are adequately trained to respond where lives are on the line, because killing Harambe is a tragedy that could have been avoided. 

Analyzing Harambe’s behavior after he met the child

[dropcap]T[/dropcap]here seems to be no reason to think that Harambe was going to harm the young boy who fell into his enclosure. I know how serious this situation is so let me be clear that thisis a horrible situation and I know that people make split decisions they often come to regret. But I still am not convinced that Harambe could not have been tranquilized and that regular rescue drills centering on this sort of event could have resulted in Harambe still being alive and the little boy being returned to safety.

SIDEBAR
Hanna agrees “1000%” with Zoo officials’ decision
[dropcap]I[/dropcap] don’t know much more about the behavior of gorillas than I read in texts and research papers, so I asked my friend Jennifer Miller some questions, as she has worked with these amazing beings. Jennifer wrote in an email, “Harambe’s movements and positions during the encounter presented nothing more than curiosity and protection for an unfamiliar child inside his environment. What I learned from studying captive Western Lowland gorillas at the Cleveland Zoo was that they are deep contemplators. They are observers more than reactive aggressors. They move their eyes, lips, and heads slowly to communicate through subtle movements. They are rarely vocal and rarely dramatically expressive. Even when threatened by other gorillas, an individual will choose to avoid confrontation more often than engage in harmful behaviors. In avoidance gorillas often run past other individuals beating their chest, stand still on all four limbs biting their lips or they will hit a wall/tree/anything close and then run off. The only protection that Harambe had that day was the zoo enclosure he was locked into. That protection was violated by the human public, at which point Harambe became unprotected and was more at risk than the child. He did not stand a chance at human forgiveness as soon as the child entered his enclosure. And the proof lays in the bullet that shot him dead.”

Ms. Miller goes on, “Harambe’s hold on the child and his sheltering of the child inside his stance, are all indications of protection. Harambe did not view this most unexpected encounter through a lens of fear. Not only was Harambe examining the child in front of him but he was also attentive to the other changes in his environment – the movement of the crowd, the communication between mother and child, the positioning of strangers in areas of his exhibit where they are not normally.” 

I’m thrilled that the four-year old boy survived, but like many others, I too wonder why Harambe was killed, rather than tranquilized. I’ve listened to all of the reasons why he was killed but don’t see that it was necessary.

Why the extra media hype about killing an animal but “business as usual” for human shootouts?

[dropcap]M[/dropcap]s. Miller also noted, “Some media reports claim that Harambe aggressively dragged the child through the water. Nothing can be further from the truth. This type of behavior — ‘dragging through the water’ — is common. Adult gorillas commonly do this to one another and to their offspring, in which case the infant gorilla typically climbs up the adult to avoid the ground. A human child would not know to do this, but that does not justify defining a normal non-aggressive behavior as aggressive.”

I also am interested in how media covered this event. For example, on some national news programs on TV the evening of Sunday May 29, the story of Harambe was immediately followed by a report on a shootout in Houston, Texas in which two people were killed and six injured. What was incredibly apparent was the tone of the voice of the reporters. When Harambe’s story was told the reporter was wired and breathless as she reported the incident, noting that Harambe simply had to be killed to save the boy. When the next reporter told the story of the horrific Houston shootout her voice was calm and came across as something like, “Oh well, here we go again — another mass killing — business as usual.” I was shocked and later that evening I watched a few other news shows with the same trend being rather obvious. I talked with a few people and without exception they also saw that type of image being presented, one that surely didn’t do much for Harambe’s image. 

Zoo-ed animals and their total losses of freedoms

Another point many people make is that animals like Harambe should not be kept in zoos in the first place. I totally agree, but this discussion at this point deflects attention from the event at the Cincinnati Zoo that could have and should have been avoided. In the best of all possible worlds Harambe would not have lived as a caged animal and the little boy would not have violated the safety of Harambe’s home. The case of all zoo-ed animals must be openly discussed because their lives are so horrifically compromised and numerous freedoms lost as they are forced to live in small cages for human entertainment (please see, for example, “What Zoos Need to Do for Zoo’d Animals,” “Is Going to a Zoo Like Shopping for a Car? Musical Semen,” and “What Do Zoos Teach about Biodiversity and Does it Matter?“). 

All in all, Harambe’s freedoms were taken from him the moment he was born into captivity and his protection taken from him when his space was violated by human activities. While it’s most likely that Harambe and other animals kept in cages in zoos would prefer to be free, it’s also likely that he viewed his cage as his home and felt safe in familiar environs.

Let’s remember in head and heart that Harambe was killed for being forced to live in a cage for some human’s, not his own, benefit, and because it was thought hemight harm the child for coming into his home. He was killed for doing what many of us might do in a similar situation, but it still remains highly questionable that Harambe had to be killed. 

Let’s be sure Harambe did not die in vain

Harambe is gone forever, but what happened to him can and must be used to make certain that events like this never happen again. As I mentioned above, there is global concern about Harambe’s death and people who never before have been involved in “animal issues” have weighed in on what happened to him. We can only hope that Harambe, like Cecil the lion who was trophy murdered by a rich dentist from the United States and Marius, a young giraffe who was killed at the Copenhagen Zoo because he was deemed to be disposable because his genes were no longer useful, will remain in people’s hearts and this will lead to a rapid termination of killing animals when it is utterly unnecessary and wrong. All sorts of media can help this movement along and foster peaceful coexistence between humans and nonhumans. 

Harambe and Binta Jua revisited

In the end, Harambe’s own sense of security was violated, as was Binta Jua’s. However, Binta Jua survived and was hailed worldwide as a heroine, whereas Harambe was killed and his death is being criticized and carefully scrutinized globally. Let’s hope that something like this never happens again. 

 Note: Carol Gigliotti’s comment captures much of what others and I are writing about: The underlying issue is the way we treat animals in general, as objects for our use, and I felt that blaming the mother of the child, for this admittedly tragic instance, obscured and muddled that underlying issue. Breeding an animal to live out their life in a zoo, and then wondering why untoward things happen when people, in this unfortunate case, a small boy, intrude on the only home they know is the actual problem in this and many other situations involving animals.

This article was originally published on Psychology Today.

About the author

  is Professor Emeritus of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Colorado, Boulder. He is the co-founder, with Jane Goodall, of Ethologists for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, a fellow of the Animal Behavior Society and a former Guggenheim fellow. Marc's latest books are Jasper's Story: Saving Moon Bears (with Jill Robinson), Ignoring Nature No More: The Case for Compassionate Conservation, Why Dogs Hump and Bees Get Depressed: The Fascinating Science of Animal Intelligence, Emotions, Friendship, and Conservation, Rewilding Our Hearts: Building Pathways of Compassion and Coexistence, and The Jane Effect: Celebrating Jane Goodall (edited with Dale Peterson). For more information, visit marcbekoff.com. Follow Marc on Twitter @MarcBekoff. 

APPENDIX:
Mainstream press reporting human shift in perceptions about wildlife
See below

After Harambe the gorilla shooting, how best to protect endangered species? (+video)

SHIFT IN THOUGHT 

The death of the gorilla Harambe comes amid a climate of heightened public interest in how humans treat animals – both in captivity and in the wild.

By Henry Gass, Staff writer
MAY 31, 2016

Witness behind cell phone video of Harambe supports zoo’s decision
WCPO – Cincinnati, OH

• 

Watchdog Group Blames Cincinnati Zoo

AP