Indiana Shelter Adopts Humane Killing Policy

April 2003

Whistleblowers in Madison-Jefferson County, Indiana, contacted PETA to report that cats were found crawling over dead animals in the county animal shelter’s freezer after they were presumed dead. Cats slated for death at the facility were being piled into a metal box pumped full of nitrous oxide (“laughing gas”), a substance not recognized as a killing method by the American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA). PETA offered to help the shelter convert to euthanasia by injection, and on our behalf, actor Woody Harrelson wrote to the Madison mayor and city council and the Jefferson County Commission, imploring them to stop their inhumane practice. As a result, the shelter stopped using nitrous oxide.