Action Animal Rescue Team 12/11/2000
Victorian Battery Hen Rescue - Press Release
From: Patty Mark
media release December 11, 2000

ESCAPE IS THE ONLY OPTION!

19 Chickens Run Free From Victorian Egg Factory

PRESS CONFERENCE
Monday, December 11, 2000 at 11 am
2A Spray Street, Elwood 3184

The Action Animal Rescue Team, Australia's only animal rights group dedicated to farmed animals, last night orchestrated a mass "CHICKEN RUN" at Nature's Dozen Egg Farm, north of Melbourne.

19 battery hens found a way out of their cages but then found themselves trapped in a giant manure pit below. The activists then aided their great escape from this enormous factory which imprisons 120,000 hens.

The hens, who will flaunt their freedom at today's press conference, will live out their natural lives at lush animal sanctuaries, and will never become "chicken pie."

The Action Animal Rescue Team have repeatedly rescued dozens of hens from this manure dungeon. Last night's "run" was the fourth time this year the activists have broken in and raided the property. The police and RSPCA have been notified each time and continue to turn a blind eye, both to the starving animals and to several forced entries.

The Action Animal Rescue Team vows to help chickens run from the appalling and inhumane conditions inside Australia's egg factories until all are free!.

Rescue Team member Romeo Gadze said today:

"No hen deserves to die in her own waste. The current movie, CHICKEN RUN shows that hens can be heroes too. To know them is to love them. The birds rescued last night, like Ginger, Rocky and friends, have experienced an exodus to freedom that 10 million battery hens imprisoned around Australia can only dream about."

further information:

    Romeo Gadze 0401 257 098
    Patty Mark (03) 9531 4367

VIDEO FOOTAGE OF THE 'RUN' AVAILABLE


Australian hen rescue update
From: Patty Mark

I wish you could all see these 19 angels basking in the warm Australian summer sun..i've never seen such a group bath before!!!! we'll get photos online asap. These girls have never even SEEN the sun before and they took to it with pure BLISS. Mind you, forgot to say they were SWARMING (and i mean swarming) with mites. Just lifting one bird out of the rescue box had hundreds of mites running up your arms....

All the hens are debilitated, defeathered, exhausted, but ALIVE and FREE. most of them have faecal balls hardened on their claws in varying degrees of size depending on how long they were trapped in that manure pit.

One TV station (7) came to press conference (the others all apologised saying they have covered our raids so often now, they don't want to be "branded" so until something really changes or "the rspca" does something they'll have to leave it....

but we got lots of radio and maybe something in the paper tomorrow. We really hit out at police on national ABC radio. We admitted that this time we broke in (busted the lock on the door, as we knew the hens were locked inside with no food or water. And only did this after FOUR rescues this year with the police and RSPCA doing nothing!!!!

Well, i think we finally got to the police...(the police just ignore us lately when we go in and do the rescues and i think the industry has warned all members to ignore us also so there is no media) I've had several calls from police today however, and i think they're getting worried. The owner of the factory threatened one radio station who named them... he tried to deny it even happened (even though he complained to the police).

I've told the police that if they don't help or prosecute this place we will CONTINUE TO BREAK AND ENTER... and if anything happens to us we'll sue them for not looking after us, as their negligance will be the cause!!! (this is when I started to get more calls from the CIB)

keep in mind we have HARD HITTING video evidence over almost a year of on-going cruely and abandonment of hens to slowly starve to death in their manure pits... the video would make you cry...

will keep you all updated....

with you in spirit and strength till all the hens are free!!
patty and the rescue team


For more information
about the
Action Animal
Rescue Team,
contact Patty Mark at
amag@ihug.com.au
Action Animal Rescue Team 12/11/2000