Feds Wallop SeaQuest After Customers Repeatedly Bitten by Animals, Animals Hurt or Killed
For Immediate Release:
January 23, 2023
Contact:
David Perle 202-483-7382
PETA has just obtained a newly released citation and notification of penalty from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) revealing that the agency hit SeaQuest with a $4,500 fine for multiple alleged violations of the federal Animal Welfare Act. The fine addresses numerous cases in which animals bit members of the public from 2019 to 2021—most of which are outlined in PETA’s recent complaint to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC).
The USDA lists the following incidents at SeaQuest Utah in Layton:
- An otter bit a customer who was feeding the animal.
- A South American coati bit a customer and an employee during two separate interactions with the public.
- A kinkajou bit a customer’s finger.
- An otter bit a customer who was attempting to hand the animal a toy.
Other SeaQuest locations included in the citation and notification of penalty were those in Woodbridge, New Jersey, where a flying squirrel was crushed to death in a door, and Las Vegas, where an otter was injured when a door fell on the animal’s foot.
“People should know that SeaQuest’s history of injuries to animals and the public is horrific and that this shoddy facility deserves to go out of business,” says PETA Foundation Director of Captive Animal Law Enforcement Michelle Sinnott. “The clock is ticking for this seedy and neglectful chain, which faces pressure from PETA for the FTC to investigate.”
PETA’s motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to use for entertainment,” and the group opposes speciesism, a human-supremacist worldview. For more information about PETA’s investigative newsgathering and reporting, please visit PETA.org or follow the group on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram.
