Historical Dictionary of Terrorism Third Edition

ANIMAL LIBERATION FRONT • 25which seven such devices showed up at primate research facilities;in November 1999 about 40 activists invaded a mink farm in SouthJordan, Utah, and destroyed about 300 breeding cards and released20 mink, while the ALF attacked and vandalized the Avian HealthLaboratory at the Veterinary College of Washington State University,causing thousands of dollars of damage to the facility.In December 1999 the ALF became active with the Stop HuntingdonAnimal Cruelty (SHAC) campaign, started in Great Britainagainst Huntingdon Life Sciences, a biomedical research firm withbranches worldwide. The SHAC website published names, addresses,and telephone numbers of Huntingdon staff as well as people affiliatedwith firms doing business with Huntingdon. The Huntingdonmanaging director, Brian Cass, was assaulted by three masked menoutside his home while other staff have been threatened by animalrights protestors. In 2001 British courts sentenced three SHAC activiststo 12-month prison terms for harassment. The SHAC is viewedby some as merely another ALF front while Kelly Stone, director ofthe group Stop Eco-Violence, believes that the SHAC is a steppingstoneorganization by which animal rights protestors are initiated intoviolent protests and then join the ALF proper.The SHAC campaign spread to the United States in early 2001with a break-in of the Huntingdon animal testing facility in Trenton,New Jersey, in which 14 beagle dogs were released. In 2003, from25 to 31 May SHAC activists embarked on a campaign of harassmentof Huntingdon in which the homes of Huntingdon affiliates wereplastered with posters of mutilated animals, cars and walls spraypaintedwith slogans, and threats telephoned and e-mailed to familymembers. In March 2004, six SHAC activists were arrested for violationsof the 1992 Animal Enterprise Protection Act, a law designed toprosecute violent animal rights protests, which had been strengthenedwith more vigorous enforcement provisions in 2002. In February2006 these six were tried for vandalizing the home and automobile ofa Huntingdon employee, for sending smoke bombs to the offices oftwo insurance firms doing business with Huntingdon, and for staginga cyberterrorism attack on the Huntingdon computer network.In addition to physical assaults and vandalism, the SHAC has directeda virtual campaign of harassment aimed at all firms doing businesswith Huntingdon, targeting investors, banks, and other financialinstitutions holding Huntingdon stock or bonds. By the beginning of