FRESNO, Calif. (AP) — Federal regulators shut down a Central California slaughterhouse
Monday after receiving undercover video showing dairy cows — some
unable to walk — being repeatedly shocked and shot before being
slaughtered.
Officials with the U.S. Department of Agriculture,
which inspects meat facilities, suspended operations at Central Valley
Meat Co. in Hanford, Calif., which slaughters cows when they lose their value as milk producers.
The USDA
received hours of videotape Friday from Compassion Over Killing, an
animal welfare group, which said its undercover investigator was
employed by the slaughterhouse and made the video over a two-week period in June.
"USDA
considers inhumane treatment of animals at slaughter facilities to be
unacceptable and is conducting a thorough investigation into these
allegations," said Justin DeJong, spokesman for the Food Safety
Inspection Service.
Four minutes of excerpts the animal welfare
group provided to The Associated Press showed cows being prepared for
slaughter. One worker appears to be suffocating a cow by standing on its
muzzle after a gun that injects a bolt into the animal's head had
failed to render it unconscious. In another clip, a cow is still
conscious and flailing as a conveyor lifts it by one leg for transport
to an area where the animals' throats are slit for blood draining.
"The
horror caught on camera is sickening," said Erica Meier, executive
director of Compassion Over Killing, based in Washington, D.C. "It's
alarming that this is not only a USDA-inspected facility but a supplier
to the USDA."
Online USDA records show the company has contracted to sell ground beef to USDA food programs.
Within hours of seeing the video, the USDA's Office of Inspector General sent investigators who found evidence of "egregious inhumane handling and treatment of livestock."
"FSIS
suspended operations at the facility and is prepared to take further
action as warranted by the investigation," DeJong said.
The USDA
had at least two inspectors stationed at the site, and federal
officials, when asked whether there was evidence the inspectors had
neglected their duties, said the investigation is ongoing.
The USDA probe will include whether sick "downer" cows entered the food supply. That information would be used to determine whether a recall of the company's meat products is warranted.
"That's the main issue right now," DeJong said.
Just
because a cow is down doesn't mean it's sick, officials said. The video
clips showed some cows with udders swollen so large they could not keep
their legs underneath them. One was on the ground twitching, and
another tried to walk but kept falling.
Central Valley Meat Co.,
owned by Brian and Lawrence Coelho, declined to comment on the video,
saying company officials had not seen it.
"We were extremely disturbed to be informed by the USDA
that ... our plant could not operate based upon a videotape that was
provided to the Department by a third party group that alleged inhumane
treatment of animals on our property," said a company statement.
Brian Coelho added, "Our company seeks not just to meet federal humane handling regulations, but exceed them."
Meier said pay stubs confirm the undercover operative's stint working at the slaughterhouse.
The
videos show workers pulling downed cows by their tails and kicking them
in an apparent attempt to get them to stand and walk to slaughter.
Others shoot downed cows in the head over and over as the cows thrash on
the ground. In one instance, the video shows workers trying to get
cattle to back out of a chute while repeatedly spraying them with water
and shocking them.
The case is reminiscent of a 2008 undercover
operation by the Humane Society of the United States at the Hallmark
slaughter plant in Chino, Calif., that led to the largest-ever recall
of beef and the conviction of two people found to have treated the cows
cruelly. In that case, video showed downed cows being prodded with a
folk lift.
The prosecutor in that case, San Bernardino County
Deputy District Attorney Debbie Ploghaus, said that even if animals are
headed to slaughter, California law says they must not be subject to
"needless suffering."
"I would argue that whoever this person is,
is causing needless suffering or inflecting unnecessary suffering," she
said after listening to a description of the video.
Standard
humane slaughter involves the cow being rendered unconscious by a single
shot to the head from a pneumatic gun that fires a bolt through the
skull to pierce the brain, according to federal regulations.
Veterinarians specializing in humane handling were a part of the USDA's rapid initial inspection that led to the shutdown at Central Valley Meat Co. The USDA
told plant officials Sunday that it was withholding inspection marks
and "immediately suspending the assignment of inspectors at the
facility."
"It's a good sign that the USDA
is taking this seriously, but I want to see what comes next," said
Meier, adding the video will be posted on the organization's website
Tuesday. "The footage clearly speaks for itself, but this is not an
isolated incident. Investigation after investigation of these places is
revealing cruelty."
Earlier this year, USDA
tests on a dairy cow carcass at a Hanford rendering plant transfer
facility showed it was infected with mad cow disease, or bovine
spongiform encephalopathy.
Hanford is in the heart of the Central Valley dairy region where there are 1.6 million dairy cows.
Copyright 2012 The Associated Press.
