Investigation of Slaughterhouse Sought After Cattle Shot Multiple Times

PETA Cites Federal Report Showing That a JBS Green Bay Worker Lodged Bolt in Head of Bleeding Cow Who Then Tried to Crawl Away

For Immediate Release:
August 10, 2017

Contact:
David Perle 202-483-7382

Armed with damning U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) records (available here and here), PETA sent a letter this morning calling on the Brown County district attorney to investigate local slaughterhouse JBS Green Bay and, as appropriate, file criminal charges against the workers there who, on three different occasions this year, failed to stun cows on the first attempt—subjecting them to multiple captive-bolt blasts.

According to the USDA documents, operations were suspended on July 20 after an inspector witnessed a worker fire a captive bolt into a cow’s head and the bolt lodged in her skull. Bleeding from the nose, the cow moved her head from side to side and struggled to crawl away as the worker shot her a second and third time. She then stood and staggered about 15 feet before several workers pinned her to a wall and fired at her a fourth time, finally stunning her. On two prior occasions, workers failed to stun a steer and a cow effectively and apparently sent them onto discharge belts without first verifying that they were effectively stunned. PETA notes that these instances appear to violate Wisconsin’s animal-mistreatment statute, which states, “No person may treat any animal … in a cruel manner.”

“PETA is calling for a criminal investigation into JBS Green Bay, whose workers have failed to stun cows on the first attempt, subjecting these sensitive animals to numerous blasts to the head and prolonged deaths,” says PETA Senior Vice President of Cruelty Investigations Daphna Nachminovitch. “There’s no difference between the pain and terror that these cows felt and how dogs or cats would feel if they had shots fired into their skulls.”

PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to eat”—notes that animals have the same central nervous system and sense of self-preservation as humans and that the only way to prevent cows, pigs, chickens, and other animals from suffering in slaughterhouses is to go vegan.

For more information, please visit PETA.org.