UPDATE: New filing asks court to compel prosecution of Colorado slaughterhouse

CURRENT STATUS: (Closed) Court dismissed motion to compel after lengthy oral argument.

June 25, 2024

Animal Partisan and Animal Equality have filed a motion with the District Court in Morgan County, Colorado asking it to order the local prosecutor to file criminal charges against a lamb slaughterhouse. The motion stems from District Attorney Travis Sides’ refusal to prosecute Colorado Lamb Processors for animal cruelty following the botched stunning of a lamb in March 2023.

In January 2024, the two organizations filed a criminal complaint with Sides that detailed the incident in which Colorado Lamb Processors repeatedly botched attempts to stun the lamb prior to slaughter. After failing to properly stun the lamb using electrical currents, workers used a device to fire a steel bolt into the animal’s head repeatedly. Throughout the ordeal, the lamb showed signs of distress and bleeding from the nose before finally being rendered unconscious. Animal Partisan and Animal Equality alleged that the acts constituted animal cruelty under Colorado law and urged Sides to prosecute. But he declined to do so and provided no rationale for his decision.

In response, the groups are now asking the local court to intervene and order prosecution. The motion argues that the District Attorney’s decision not to prosecute was “arbitrary, capricious, and without reasonable excuse.”

January 24, 2024

Animal Partisan, alongside global animal protection organization Animal Equality, has filed a formal complaint with the 13th Judicial District Attorney seeking animal cruelty charges against a Colorado slaughterhouse over the botched killing of a lamb. The complaint seeks misdemeanor animal cruelty charges against the company itself as well as a supervisor involved in the incident. The organizations are represented pro bono by the Denver Sturm College of Law’s Animal Activist Legal Defense Project, the only offering at any U.S. law school that provides legal advice and representation to animal activists.

The complaint was filed against Colorado Lamb Processors which operates a 62,000 square foot facility northeast of Denver and kills up to 1,500 sheep each day. The slaughterhouse allegedly sources lambs for slaughter from several western states, including Idaho, Wyoming, Montana, and Utah, and sells products in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and New York.

In March 2023, a United States Department of Agriculture (“USDA”) veterinarian performing inspection of slaughter activities at Colorado Lamb Processors observed a fully conscious lamb sitting upright and looking around on a conveyor belt. Due to a faulty electrical stun, the lamb was conscious and alert when they arrived at the station where their throat was to be cut. A supervisor for Colorado Lamb Processors arrived at the conveyor belt, grabbed the struggling lamb by the ear and jaw, and attempted to deliver a stun with a device that fires a metal rod into an animal’s skull. The supervisor’s attempt failed and the lamb remained conscious, now with blood pouring out of their nose as a result of the skull trauma. The supervisor again attempted to stun the lamb by firing the metal bolt into their skull but failed once more. The suffering lamb—having now been shocked and bolted twice in the skull—showed clear signs of distress. Finally, a manager for Colorado Lamb Processors arrived and delivered a stun that rendered the lamb unconscious.

In December 2023, a remarkably similar event occurred. In that incident, another lamb regained consciousness after a faulty electrical stun when a Colorado Lamb Processors employee attempted to flip the animal over and expose their throat to be cut. When the lamb rose to their feet and attempted to escape, an employee covered the lamb with their body and a supervisor bolted the animal in the skull, rendering them unconscious.

Animal Partisan and Animal Equality are calling on the District Attorney to enforce Colorado’s animal cruelty laws against Colorado Lamb Processors. Every state has animal cruelty laws that protect animals from acts of abuse and mistreatment such as those that the complaint alleges happened at Colorado Lamb Processors. It makes no difference that the act was committed against an animal being slaughtered for food or that the events happened within the walls of a federally inspected slaughterhouse. As Animal Partisan has separately petitioned the USDA to clarify, state law enforcement officials have the authority and the obligation to enforce animal protection laws for acts committed against the millions of animals that suffer each year in the animal agriculture industry.

Animal Partisan has past success obtaining enforcement of animal cruelty laws at slaughterhouses. In fact, an Animal Partisan complaint to a Pennsylvania District Attorney led to a cruelty conviction against a worker who kicked a lamb in the face during slaughter.

Sheep are gentle and sensitive animals. As prey animals more comfortable in the company of fellow sheep, the lambs brutally killed at Colorado Lamb Processors undoubtedly experienced terror in their final, vulnerable moments. Through its mistreatment of animals at slaughter, Colorado Lamb Processors repeatedly violated federal law, as cited by the USDA. Animal Partisan and Animal Equality are now asking the state of Colorado to enforce its own laws and hold the company accountable for acts of cruelty.

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