During two nighttime protests at the home of NY Blood Center (NYBC) board member Michael Hodin, many area residents descended from their buildings to express their outrage at being disturbed after dark.

“My baby is sleeping,” said one angry man who confronted the protesters. “Give me your address, and I’ll come to your house.”

Neighbors express their outrage at being disturbed at night by chimp advocates.

Activists began protesting at night only after more than a dozen daytime protests failed to persuade Hodin and his colleagues to reinstate funding for the 66 chimpanzees who they abandoned on islands in Liberia with no food or water.

“Most of these people ignored us for months when we politely asked them to contact Michael Hodin about the chimp crisis, so they shouldn’t be surprised that we came back at night – when we thought we could get their attention.” said Elena Natale, an activist who has protested at the same location several times during the day. “How odd that people explode over an hour’s worth of noise but show no anger at all about the abandonment of 66 chimps despite being made aware of the crisis week after week.”

The blood center did not acknowledge the grass roots campaign demanding that it reinstate funding for the chimps until the activists began protesting at night. “NYBC has made it clear that disruption is the only language they understand,” added Natale.

In a Q&A on its website, NYBC suggests that the chimp advocates are “bullies” who “encourage terrorism.”

In response to the anger, activists told area residents to complain to Michael Hodin and NYBC and noted that they will continue protesting at night until the organization fulfills its promise to provide lifelong care for the chimps.

For a thirty year period starting in the mid-1970s, NYBC conducted experiments on over 400 hundred chimpanzees in Liberia, where they could capture, breed and experiment on them with little regulatory oversight. After the research was conducted, NYBC moved the survivors onto six islands with no natural food or water and made a public commitment to provide them with lifelong care.

Chimps in Liberia left to die by the New York Blood Center

In May, 2015, the NY Times reported that NYBC had “withdrawn all funding,” leaving the chimps to die of starvation and thirst. In order to keep the chimps alive, Liberians who had been employed by NYBC to deliver food and water, began to care for them on a volunteer basis. With virtually no resources and burdened by the Ebola outbreak in Liberia, these volunteers kept the chimpanzees alive until a coalition of over 30 animal conservation groups, led by the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS), raised funds from the public to pay for the chimps’ care on an emergency basis.

At a press conference on May 19th organized by HSUS, NY State Senator Tony Avella and NY State Assembly Member Linda Rosenthal condemned NYBC’s actions and demanded that the group resume funding for the chimps.

NY State Senator Tony Avella Demands that NY Blood Center reinstates funding for the 66 chimps who they abandoned.

Sign the Care2 petition and NYCLASS petitions to MetLife, NYBC’s largest corporate donor.

Join the Facebook page: New York Blood Center: Do the Right Thing to stay apprised of news and to participate in online actions to pressure NYBC board members to fulfill their promise to provide lifelong care to their laboratory chimps.

Use the tweet sheet to contact MetLife, NYBC and their stakeholders.

Follow TheirTurn on Twitter, and follow “Save NYBC Chimps” on Instagram and Twitter.

Unlocking the Cage, a highly-anticipated new film that documents the historic battle by the Nonhuman Rights Project (NhRP) to win legal rights for nonhuman animals, premiered in New York City on May 25th.

The film’s directors, D A Pennebaker and Chris Hedegus, who, according to the New York Times, have made the “most memorable documentaries of the past half-century,” followed their subject, Steven Wise, for four years to record his effort to achieve personhood for several chimpanzees in New York being held captive in laboratories and roadside zoos.

“We are grateful to Pennebaker and Hegedus not only for making such an excellent film about the groundbreaking legal work of Steven Wise and the NhRP but also because their involvement will expand the reach of the film to mainstream audiences worldwide,” said Kevin Schneider, Executive Director of the Nonhuman Rights Project.

From left to right: NhRP President Steven Wise and Unlocking The Cage filmmakers D.A. Pennebaker and Chris Hegedus (photo: Lukas Maverick Greyson)

On the day before the worldwide premiere at the Film Forum in Greenwich Village, the New York Times gave the film a favorable review:

“It is hard to watch Unlocking the Cage without being somewhat swayed by the arguments — or at least impressed by the sincerity — of Steven Wise, a leading animal-rights lawyer. . . Mr. Wise has argued that animals should have the legal status of persons. What this means is not that they should be classified as human, but rather that their rights should be acknowledged and protected under the law.”

The review contains a strong pro-animal rights message: “It is also possible that practices and attitudes now widely taken as natural will look arbitrary and cruel to future generations, and that the future will arrive sooner than many of us expect. It wouldn’t be the first time.”

Unlocking The Cage premiered in NYC on May 25th.

To stay apprised of developments with Unlocking the Cage, please follow the film’s Facebook page.

To learn more about the groundbreaking work of the Nonhuman Rights Project, please visit the organization’s website.

On May 26, several employees of the New York Blood Center (NYBC) assaulted advocates protesting the organization’s decision to abandon 66 chimpanzees with no food or water on islands in Liberia. One man wearing a maintenance uniform, who punched and shoved protesters for several minutes, pulled out a switch blade. Video shows NYBC’s security team restraining him twice during the confrontation.

The protest lasted approximately 30 minutes and culminated with the arrival of police. Advocates continued to protest for another hour at the entrance to educate NYBC employees as they left the building for the day. Most either ignored the advocates or commented that humans are more important than chimps, as if to suggest that NYBC shouldn’t spend money to feed them.

New York Blood Center employees confront chimp advocates.

For a thirty year period starting in the mid-1970s, NYBC conducted experiments on over 400 hundred chimpanzees in Liberia, where they could capture, breed and experiment on them with little regulatory oversight. After the research was conducted, NYBC moved the survivors onto six islands with no natural food or water and made a public commitment to provide them with lifelong care.

Liberians hired by HSUS feed the chimps abandoned by the New York Blood Center

In May, 2015, the NY Times reported that NYBC had “withdrawn all funding,” leaving the chimps to die of starvation and thirst. In order to keep the chimps alive, Liberians who had been employed by NYBC to deliver food and water, began to care for them on a volunteer basis. With virtually no resources and burdened by the Ebola outbreak in Liberia, these volunteers kept the chimpanzees alive until a coalition of over 30 animal conservation groups, led by the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS), raised funds from the public to pay for the chimps’ care on an emergency basis.

Caregiver hired by HSUS with money donated by the public (photo: Jeff Topham)

The campaign to compel NYBC to reinstate funding for the chimps has escalated with activists targeting the organization’s major corporate donors. One former donor, Citigroup, contributed $50,000 toward the care of the chimps and stated that “the situation is not tolerable.” MetLife, on the other hand, has refused to make a public statement or meet with the community in spite of the fact that it is NYBC’s largest corporate donor and partner.

NY State Senator Tony Avella Demands that NY Blood Center reinstates funding for the 66 chimps who they abandoned.

At a press conference organized by HSUS, NY State Senator Tony Avella and NY State Assembly Member Linda Rosenthal condemned NYBC’s actions and demanded that the group resume funding for the chimps

Sign the Care2 petition to MetLife, NYBC’s largest corporate donor.

Join the Facebook page: New York Blood Center: Do the Right Thing to stay apprised of news and to participate in online actions to pressure NYBC board members to fulfill their promise to provide lifelong care to their laboratory chimps.

Use the tweet sheet to contact MetLife, NYBC and their stakeholders.

Follow TheirTurn on Twitter, and follow “Save NYBC Chimps” on Instagram and Twitter.

Elected officials in New York held a press conference at City Hall to demand that the New York Blood Center fulfill its promise to provide lifelong care for the 66 ex-lab chimpanzees who the group abandoned on islands in Liberia with no food or water. The press conference was organized by the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS), which has stepped in on an emergency basis to feed the chimps using money raised through a GoFundMe campaign.

After demanding that NYBC resumes the funding, New York State Assembly Member Linda Rosenthal said, “This isn’t a scene out of Lost,” referring to the TV series in which airplane crash survivors are stranded on a desert island. “This is real life for these chimpanzees.”

New York State Senator Tony Avella also condemned NYBC’s decision to abandon the chimpanzees: “They used them for 30 years, and now they just dump them on this island. So we stand here today to tell the New York Blood Center to do the right thing and follow through on your commitment.”

During the press conference, Joyce Friedman, the NYC Coordinator for HSUS, announced that ten New York City Council Members wrote an open letter to the NYBC demanding that the organization resumes funding:

Letter from NYC Council Members to NYBC

For a thirty year period starting in the mid-1970s, NYBC conducted experiments on over 400 hundred chimpanzees in Liberia, where they could capture, breed and experiment on them with little regulatory oversight. After the research was conducted, NYBC moved the survivors onto six islands with no natural food or water and made a public commitment to provide them with lifelong care.

Liberians hired by HSUS feed the chimps abandoned by the New York Blood Center (photo: Jeff Topham)

In May, 2015, the NY Times reported that NYBC had “withdrawn all funding,” leaving the chimps to die of starvation and thirst. In order to keep the chimps alive, Liberians who had been employed by NYBC to deliver food and water, began to care for them on a volunteer basis. With virtually no resources and burdened by the Ebola outbreak in Liberia, these volunteers kept the chimpanzees alive until an HSUS-led coalition of over 30 animal conservation groups raised funds from the public to pay for the chimps’ care on an emergency basis.

Daily food delivery (photo: Jeff Topham)

Sign the Care2 petition to MetLife, NYBC’s largest corporate donor.

Join the Facebook page: New York Blood Center: Do the Right Thing to stay apprised of news and to participate in online actions to pressure NYBC board members to fulfill their promise to provide lifelong care to their laboratory chimps.

Use the tweet sheet to contact MetLife, NYBC and their stakeholders.

Follow TheirTurn on Twitter, and follow “Save NYBC Chimps” on Instagram and Twitter.

In spite of petitions, protests and letters from concerned citizens around the world, MetLife CEO Steven Kandarian continues to ignore the chimp crisis created by the NY Blood Center (NYBC), so activists took the campaign to his neighbors in Summit, NJ, an exclusive suburb of NYC.

MetLife is the largest corporate donor of the NYBC, which left 66 chimpanzees on islands in Liberia with no food or water after conducting experiments on them for 30 years; earning an estimated $500 million in royalties; and promising to provide them with lifelong care. Since May 2015, advocates worldwide have asked MetLife to hold NYBC accountable, but the company, which prides itself on “corporate social responsibility,” has refused to respond.

Advocates educate MetLife CEO Steven Kandarian’s neighbors about his complicity in the abandoned chimp crisis

While most of Mr. Kandarian’s neighbors were eager to hear why advocates were protesting in his neighborhood, one man (wearing pale blue shirt) virtually assaulted them as they marched through the town of Summit, which is one mile away from Mr. Kandarian’s mansion.

An inexplicably angry man in Summit, NJ, aggressively confronts advocates protesting MetLife CEO Steven Kandarian

On April 26th, animal rights activists in NYC staged a 30 minute disruption inside of the MetLife building at the height of rush hour. The company’s decision to ignore the protesters instead of engaging them triggered them to take the campaign to the CEO’s hometown.

Advocates protesting chimp abandonment march through the town of Summit, NJ

In an article entitled Animal Rights Group Protests Outside of MetLife CEO’s Residence in Summit, Mr. Kandarian’s hometown newspaper published a lengthy story about the protest.

Advocates inform Steven Kandarian’s neighbors about his complicity in the New York Blood Center abandoned chimpanzee crisis

Sign the Care2 petition to MetLife.

Join the Facebook page: New York Blood Center: Do the Right Thing to stay apprised of news and to participate in online actions to pressure NYBC board members to fulfill their promise to provide lifelong care to their laboratory chimps.

Use the tweet sheet to contact MetLife, NYBC and their stakeholders.

Follow “Save NYBC Chimps” on Instagram and Twitter.