Animal rights groups want Iowa vet sanctioned
DES MOINES (AP) — A handful of animal rights groups are calling for the Iowa Department of Agriculture to investigate a veterinarian who they claim testified in an Ohio court that a pig farm humanely killed hogs by strangling them.
The groups — including the Humane Farming Association, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals and The Humane Society of the United States — are calling for sanctions against Dr. Paul Armbrecht, a veterinarian in Lake City.
They sent a letter and a DVD of Armbrecht’s testimony to the Agriculture Department’s Iowa Board of Veterinary Medicine on Friday. The letter states that when Armbrecht served as a paid expert and delivered testimony in the Ohio case, he likely violated the Iowa Veterinary Practice Act by supporting actions that constitute livestock neglect. The groups said the act prohibits “knowingly making misleading, deceptive, untrue, or fraudulent representation in the practice of the profession.”
In the letter, they ask for disciplinary action “up to and including revocation of his license to practice veterinary medicine.”
Armbrecht said that as of early Monday evening he had not received a letter or been contacted by the animal rights groups.
“What I said in court is what words should be taken, and a complete testimony should be used,” he said. “If they are attempting to have some discreditation of me, doesn’t it seem a little bit strange that I haven’t been included in this firsthand?”
Bruce Friedrich, PETA’s vice president of campaigns, told The Associated Press that Armbrecht’s testimony contradicts industry guidelines, which provide only the bare minimum protection for animals.
“It’s shocking to learn that for 40 years a farm has been hanging pigs as a method of killing them, and even more shocking that a veterinarian would justify such horrible cruelty,” Friedrich said. “Veterinarians are supposed to help animals. In this case, Armbrecht violated that trust in the most disgusting possible way, justifying unimaginable suffering.”
The animal rights groups charge that Armbrecht was a paid expert at the animal cruelty trial this summer of the owners and an employee of Wiles Hog Farm in Creston, Ohio. Friedrich said that with the help of Armbrecht’s testimony, they were found not guilty of the charges related to hanging pigs.
During an undercover investigation by the San Rafael, Calif.-based Humane Farming Association, workers at the farm were videotaped killing sows by placing a chain around their necks and attaching it to a front-end loader, which then lifted the animals into the air and strangled them to death over a period of up to five minutes, Friedrich said.
Tom Johnson, executive director of the Iowa Veterinary Medical Association, declined to comment on the issue. However, he pointed to the American Veterinary Medical Association and the American Association of Swine Veterinarians Web sites, which include guidelines on euthanasia. Neither listed hanging as an acceptable form of killing pigs.
Iowa’s acting state veterinarian, David D. Schmitt, was out of town and unavailable for comment. Officials with the Agriculture Department said they had not yet received any letters or communications regarding the issue, but would look into it.
The other animal rights groups who signed the letter were the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, the Animal Welfare Institute and the Association of Veterinarians for Animal Rights.
