A perhaps slightly happier cow.
This story is deeply awful. Not unexpected, just awful. From the Los Angeles Times:
The U.S. Department of Agriculture temporarily closed Hanford-based Central Valley Meat Co. after reviewing video footage from the animal rights group Compassion Over Killing, which said it had captured images of torture and intentional cruelty to cows. …
Federal investigators went to California on Friday to review two videos, one running three hours and the other only three minutes. Compassion Over Killing said the footage — which it said was taken by one of its contractors who held a job inside the plant in June and July — captured images of cows being jabbed, hit, electrically shocked and sprayed with hot water.
Gawker has a copy of the video, which I couldn’t bear to watch. I also recommend steering clear of the comments there.
Central Valley Meat Co.’s track record with its human workers is barely better:
Central Valley Meat Co. has already been under scrutiny from Cal/OSHA, which has issued three citations to the company in two years — one of them involving 72-year-old Leopoldo Gutierrez, an employee who was crushed to death in a meat grinder. In that incident, state officials concluded that the company had failed to make sure the power was off before the worker climbed inside.
The company president, Brian Coelho, quickly identified the culprits: the people who shot the footage.
“We are extremely disturbed to be informed by the United States Department of Agriculture that inspection was suspended and our plant could not operate based on a videotape that was provided to the department by a third-party group that alleged inhumane treatment of animals on our property,” Coelho said.
Awful. Awful person, awful situation.
