{"id":7646,"date":"2024-01-26T11:40:03","date_gmt":"2024-01-26T16:40:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/?p=7646"},"modified":"2024-01-26T11:40:03","modified_gmt":"2024-01-26T16:40:03","slug":"local-virginia-zoo-accused-of-animal-abuse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/?p=7646","title":{"rendered":"Local Virginia Zoo Accused of Animal Abuse"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>Written by <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Hannah Guanti <\/span><\/em><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Last month, Virginia state investigators seized 96 animals from the Natural Bridge Zoo, on allegations of animal abuse. Since December 20, the Attorney General\u2019s office and the defense team have had several meetings in court.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A Rockbridge County judge ruled last Friday that 39 of the 95 animals were to be returned to the zoo after insufficient evidence was found on the abuse charges. A rare white tiger had already been euthanized due to its failing health. The remaining animals will remain in alternate housing<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This case comes after months of investigating the zoo for their treatment of the animals. The animals were allegedly held in dirty and deteriorating conditions, did not receive proper daily care, and denied medical treatments when needed.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The zoo was home to a plethora of non-native species including giraffes, lemurs, tropical birds, pythons, and more. Many of these are included in the animals who remain in the states custody, and have been rehomed to several facilities or zoos.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">On Monday, Karl and Deborah Mogensen, the zoo\u2019s owners, filed a notice to appeal the ruling.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Roanoke Times reports that the defense will be requesting a five- day trial before a jury Circuit Court of Rockbridge Co. The initial hearing is planned for February 1.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The zoo is home to a 40-year-old African elephant named Asha. Asha has received global attention for what many deem inhumane treatment. From In Defense of Animals, to National Geographic, several publications have emphasized the negatives associated with isolation and the climate for these species.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">As of now, Asha has not been located by investigators. <\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Written by Hannah Guanti Last month, Virginia state investigators seized 96 animals from the Natural Bridge Zoo, on allegations of animal abuse. Since December 20, the Attorney General\u2019s office and the defense team have had several meetings in court. A Rockbridge County judge ruled last Friday that 39 of the 95 animals were to be&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":7647,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_kad_post_transparent":"","_kad_post_title":"","_kad_post_layout":"","_kad_post_sidebar_id":"","_kad_post_content_style":"","_kad_post_vertical_padding":"","_kad_post_feature":"","_kad_post_feature_position":"","_kad_post_header":false,"_kad_post_footer":false,"_kad_post_classname":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7646","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7646","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7646"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7646\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/7647"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7646"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7646"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7646"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}