Feds See Pigs Beaten and Repeatedly Shot; PETA Seeks Slaughterhouse Cameras

For Immediate Release:
February 1, 2023

Contact:
Nicole Meyer 202-483-7382

PETA has just obtained U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) records that reveal a worker beating a pig at Bob Evans Farms in Xenia—the latest in a string of illegal horrors at the slaughterhouse. In response, the group fired off a letter today to the company’s president and CEO, Mark Delahanty, calling on him to livestream video footage from the slaughterhouse to help prevent additional egregious suffering.

On September 15, 2022, a USDA inspector saw a worker hit a sow “with excessive force on the side of the face” and then “use force while using both of his hands to quickly push [a metal] gate into the right side of the sow,” who cried out. The incident occurred just weeks after a trucker was spotted kneeling on the backs of crying sows and caps off years of workers ineffectively shooting animals and leaving them conscious—even while slashing one’s throat. In total, the slaughterhouse has been warned at least six times in recent years about violating federal law.

“This facility is hell on Earth for animals, where pigs have been abused and shot over and over as they scream,” says PETA Vice President Daniel Paden. “PETA is calling on Bob Evans Farms to livestream its operations publicly and reminds everyone that the only humane meal is a vegan one.”

PETA has also asked Delahanty to report the workers involved in the incidents to local law-enforcement officials and reassign those individuals to positions that don’t involve having contact with live animals.

PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to eat”—opposes speciesism, a human-supremacist worldview. For more information on PETA’s investigative newsgathering and reporting, please visit PETA.org, listen to The PETA Podcast, or follow the group on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram.

PETA’s letter to Delahanty follows.

February 1, 2023

Mark Delahanty

President and CEO

Bob Evans Farms Inc.

Dear Mr. Delahanty:

Given the latest U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) reports detailing that a worker beat a sow, a truck driver kneeled on sows’ backs, and other problems at Bob Evans Farms’ slaughterhouse in Xenia, we ask that you immediately alter operations there in order to reduce animal suffering. A long history of alarming incidents at the facility underscores the need for significant changes:

• On September 15, 2022, a USDA inspector saw a worker hit a sow “with excessive force on the side of the face” and then “use force while using both of his hands to quickly push [a metal] gate into the right side of the sow,” who cried out.
• Less than a month earlier, a truck driver kneeled on sows’ backs, and the animals were “vocalizing loudly” in response.
• In November 2021, a worker shot a sow near her right ear with a captive-bolt gun, leaving her conscious and crying out.
• In August 2020, a worker ineffectively shot a downed pig and cut her throat, after which the severely injured animal cried out.
• In 2018, a downed pig continued to cry out after workers shot her in the head twice, and yet another kept upright on her forelimbs and cried out after two shots to the head and attempts by workers to slash her throat.

Will you please publicly livestream video from all areas of this facility where live animals are handled? Workers might take their duty to handle animals lawfully more seriously if they knew caring people were watching. At the very least, will you reassign the staff referenced in the federal reports to jobs that don’t involve having contact with any live animals and report the involved personnel to local law enforcement for investigation for possible violations of Ohio’s anti-cruelty statute? Thank you for your consideration.

Sincerely,

Daniel Paden

Vice President of Evidence Analysis

Cruelty Investigations Department