PA: No place to visit! SHARK Campaign Against Pigeon Shoots Moves Into High
Gear
This is an abomination! Sheer perversity and heartless cruelty! A shame for all
who live in Pennsylvania. If you live in PA, please read below and contact these
shameful and corrupt DA's (see contact info below); demand that they enforce
anti-cruelty laws! Contact your legislators; legislation to stop cruel trapped
animal shoots is pending in Pennsylvania.
Please take action today
and contact your representatives, urging them to vote for H.B. 1411/S.B. 843.
Demand that they pass these laws and bring Pennsylvania into the 21st century!
If you don't live in PA, contact tourist offices and the Chambers of Commerce.
Let them know you will not be spending your hard earned dollars vacationing in a
place that endorses and condones such abuse and cruelty to innocent birds.
Cruelty
Never Stops
This poor bird was wounded at a pigeon shoot,
struggled to a nearby
roof, where, without care or help,
she tumbled into the gutter and suffered an agonizing death.
And District
Attorneys John T. Adams and David Heckler don't
think pigeon shoots
are cruel?
TELL THEM TO STOP
PANDERING AND UPHOLD THE LAW!
Contact
them and ask that they prosecute pigeon shooters
under
Pennsylvania' s cruelty statutes.
John T. Adams
Berks County District Attorney
Services Center, 5th Floor
633 Court Street
Reading, PA 19601 da@countyofberks.com
Telephone: 610-478-6000
Fax: 610-478-6002
David Heckler
Bucks County District Attorney
Bucks County Courthouse
55 East Court Street
Doylestown, PA 18901
e-mail:
dwheckler@co.bucks.pa.us
Phone: 215-348-6344
Fax: 215-348-6299
Read what SHARK sent to both DAs further down in
this update.
And it's not just the shooters who should be
prosecuted for cruelty. In
the following SHARK video, watch how an innocent,
wounded bird is
treated by supporters of pigeon shoots.
AVMA Is Not Responding to Inquiries About
Their Stand on Live Pigeon Shoots
As stated last week, in the February 1 article in
the Philadelphia Daily News that followed the
January 30 slaughter, Philadelphia Gun Club attorney
Sean M. Corr was quoted with the following:
"...the club follows all state-mandated euthanasia
procedures," as determined by the American
Veterinary Association (AVMA).
SHARK called the AVMA regarding this issue and asked
for a formal statement on their stance of this
issue. A week later and we have yet to receive a
response.
Shot pigeon escaped the pigeon shoot area and drown
in the nearby Delaware River.
Last week we asked you to call them. So far no one
has received a response from the AVMA. Obviously,
this is not a good indicator about their stand on
this issue. The AVMA was formed to help the animals
and has betrayed the animals on more than one
occasion and this is looking to be another one of
those times.
Please send an e-mail or make a call of your own.
Please demand that
the AVMA make a public and unequivocal statement
that clearly
defines where it stands. We will update you on the
issue as soon as
possible. Either Philadelphia Gun Club attorney Sean
Martin Corr will
be made to (again) eat his words, or SHARK will be
initiating a new
campaign to expose the American Veterinary Medical
Association.
What You Can Do:
Please demand that the
AVMA make a very clear and unequivocal statement that
clearly defines where it stands with regards to live
pigeon shoots.
American Veterinary Medical Association
1931 North Meacham Road, Suite 100
Schaumburg, IL 60173-4360
email: avmainfo@avma. org
Phone: 800-248-2862
Fax: 847-925-1329
Please let SHARK know if you receive a response.
SHARK's Letter to Berks County District Attorney John T.
Adams
February 3, 2010
John T. Adams
District Attorney
Berks County, Pennsylvania
Dear District Attorney Adams,
On December 14, 2009, you contacted Humane Society Police
Officer Johnna Seeton, and demanded that she withdraw the animal
cruelty citations she had filed, just four days earlier, against
a pigeon
shoot held at the Pikeville Township Sportsmen Association.
After
she declined, explaining that her citations showed multiple
violations
under the cruelty code, you then took matters into your hand and
sent a letter dated December 28, 2009, to Judge Victor Fredrick,
telling him that the "...citations are to be withdrawn."
Your abrupt and unprecedented interference with a lawful
prosecution caused a much warranted uproar. In response to that,
you issued the following statement:
"I wanted to respond to your email to me regarding pigeon
shoots.
On April 16, 2002, Judge Scott Lash of the Court of Common Pleas
of Berks County issued an opinion and ruling in the case of
Johnna
Seeton v. Pike Township Sportsmen's Association, No. 01-11736
which in pertinent part stated that pigeon shoots do not
constitute
a violation of 5511(c) Cruelty to Animals. Judge Lash also cites
for
support of that position the case of Mohler v. Labor Day
Committee,
663 A2d 162. Furthermore, Judge Lash in that same case stated
that the deprivation of veterinary care language found in
5511(c)
does not apply to pigeon shoots. As I have told many of your
fellow
supporters, I understand your plight but I am bound to follow
the
law. The law as stated in Judge Lash's opinion is clear. My
strong
suggestion is that your only way to combat the law as set forth
in
the cases cited above is to lobby your state legislators to have
them
amend the Cruelty to Animals Statute, 18 Pa. C.S.A. 5511 to set
forth that these type of events (pigeon shoots) are illegal. My
research indicates that a Bill is pending in the Legislature
regarding
this issue however, I am not aware of the status of this piece
of
legislation.
Sincerely,
John T. Adams
District Attorney
Berks County, Pennsylvania"
What you wrote is stunning; for
not only is it clearly erroneous, but
it is easily proven so.
You take the position that whether pigeon shoots violate
Pennsylvania' s cruelty law, PA. STAT. ANN. tit. 18, � 5511(c),
has already been answered in the negative by Pennsylvania
courts,
and that the only way to combat this problem is through the
legislature. You base this on an April 16, 2002 memorandum
opinion
issued by Judge Lash of the Berks County Court of Common Pleas
in
the case of Seeton v. Pike Township Sportsmen's Association.
The Truth:
� Judge Lash's April 16, 2002 opinion was in response to a
motion
for a preliminary junction - it was not a decision on the merits
of the
case. The purpose of a preliminary injunction is merely to
prevent a
party from going forward with a course of conduct until a
decision
on the merits has been reached.
Motions for preliminary injunctions often arise at the beginning
of a
case, well before either party has had the opportunity to
conduct
discovery, and are based upon evidence that is much less
complete
than that which would be presented during a trial on the merits.
Judge Lash's opinion was issued before Plaintiff had any
opportunity
to conduct discovery, present evidence, and examine witnesses.
The Truth:
No Pennsylvania court has ever reached a decision on the merits
as
to whether pigeon shoots violate the cruelty law.
The Truth:
� The Pennsylvania Supreme Court has expressed skepticism about
the lawfulness of pigeon shoots, noting that hundreds of birds
suffer
a slow and painful death, and that wounded birds that are
retrieved
are killed by a variety of methods that are contrary to accepted
veterinary methods of humane euthanasia and cause the birds
additional pain and suffering. (Hulsizer v. Labor Day Committee,
holding that humane officers have standing to pursue civil
injunctive
actions).
The Truth:
Pennsylvania' s Animal cruelty Law, Title 18, section 5511,
prohibits
a person from wantonly or cruelly illtreating or otherwise
abusing
any animal. The law also prohibits neglect, abandonment, and
depravation of food, drink, shelter, or veterinary care.
Pigeon shoots violate each of these prohibitions.
Shooters and shoot organizers "wantonly or cruelly illtreat" the
birds
by intentionally wounding hundreds of pigeons at each shoot;
wounded birds that are not retrieved and left to suffer from
their
injuries are neglected and abandoned; and wounded birds are
never
provided with food, drink, or veterinary care.
The statute could not be clearer
- the intentional wounding of
pigeons, without regard to the
consequences, and the subsequent
neglect and abandonment of
wounded birds constitutes cruelty.
Moreover, Pennsylvania courts
have held that pigeons are not "game
birds," and therefore the
hunting exception to the cruelty law does
not apply.
As disturbing as your obstruction of Officer Seeton's case was,
including the groundless nature of your intervention,
information has
been presented to us which shows that your political campaign
has
received a significant amount of money, $1,000, from a political
organization whose stated mission on their website is that they
are
"...dedicated to promoting and protecting bird shooting..."
With all of this before you - your own reasons refuted and a
major
conflict of interest exposed - we strongly ask that you recuse
yourself from all association with this case, that you rescind
your
order and allow this prosecution to move forward, and that you
do
not participate in or impede any future legal action taken
against the
Pikeville Township Sportsmen Association and pigeon shooting.
Furthermore, on February 20 and 21, the Pikeville Association is
planning on a two-day pigeon shoot which will result in the
slaughter
of thousands of birds, and the wounding, mauling and brutal
suffering of thousands of others. The only way for you to clear
your
name, to allow justice to be done and see the law upheld, is to
act
immediately upon your recusal and redress of this situation.
Sincerely,
Steve Hindi
President, SHARK
A similar letter was written to Bucks County District Attorney
David Heckler. Both letters will be up on PennsylvaniaShame.
com later today.
Please Support SHARK's Efforts to Elminate PA Pigeon Shoots
The Humane Society of the United States has been trying for
years to get legislation passed to specifically ban pigeon
shoots, since the PA Humane Law is not being properly enforced
regarding the pigeons. We wish them the very best of luck and
will continue to use our methods to help end this cruelty.
This includes SHARK continuing to travel to Pennsylvania almost
weekly to attend the pigeon shoots and document the cruelty.
Our documentation is being sent to the PA legislators, PA media,
PA law enforcement and uploaded onto our website and YouTube.
Billboards will be posted in the next couple of weeks.
These trips are very time consuming and costly, even as frugal
as SHARK is. Please support our
efforts to eliminate the cruel Pennsylvania live pigeon shoots
by donating
here.
