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Subject: From the San Francisco Chronicle
Importance: Low

(09-09) 04:00 PDT Washington -- Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California
proposed legislation Friday to crack down on animal rights activists who
make threats or commit violence against people engaged in research using
animals.

The bill, which the Democrat introduced with Republican Sen. James
Inhofe of Oklahoma, would toughen federal criminal penalties for causing
physical harm to people or making threats to researchers or their
families. It would also boost penalties for causing economic harm to
companies or universities engaged in research using animals that are
frequently destroyed in the course of lab work.

Proposed penalties in the bill, which is a modification of legislation
Inhofe had previously offered, include life in prison for incidents in
which someone is killed.

It's unlikely the measure will reach the Senate floor this year, with
just about a month left before Congress expects to recess for the fall
campaign.

The killing of animals for research, along with nonlethal practices that
activists say amount to animal torture, has spurred some to violence,
including an August 2003 bombing outside the Emeryville laboratories of
Chiron Corp., another bombing a month later at Shaklee Corp. in
Pleasanton, ongoing threats against UCSF researchers and the firebombing
this year of the home of a UCLA researcher.

"The deplorable actions of these eco-terrorists threaten to impede
important medical progress in California and across the country,''
Feinstein said in a statement Friday.

Her staff said the senator got involved in the issue after Californians
targeted by animal rights groups contacted her office.

Inhofe has held hearings into the issue, one of which in October 2005
featured an exchange with Dr. Jerry Vlasak, a Southern California trauma
surgeon who is a leader of the North American Animal Liberation Front.

The senator asked Vlasak if he stood by his earlier statement about
animal researchers that "I don't think you'd have to kill, assassinate
too many. I think for 5 lives, 10 lives, 15 human lives, we could save a
million, 2 million or 10 million nonhuman lives.''

"You're advocating the murder of individuals, isn't that correct?''
Inhofe asked.
"I made that statement, and I stand by that statement,'' Vlasak said,
saying animal researchers are engaged in "speciesism."

"These animals are being terrorized, murdered and killed by the millions
every day,'' he added.
E-mail Edward Epstein at [email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]> .


V_Key's Note: :!:
Help support articals and legislation like this:
E-mail Edward Epstein at [email protected]
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