movieline / CC

Just a month after PETA wrote to the cast and producers of The Zookeeper to warn them that the company supplying animals for the movie's production has a long list of USDA citations, we have heartbreaking news to report. Tweet, a giraffe on the set who had also been forced to perform in Ace Ventura and a slew of Toys "R" Us commercials, has died.

Tweet collapsed in his pen while being fed on Friday. While giraffes in the wild can live into their mid 20s, Tweet was only 18 years old.

The results of Tweet's necropsy haven't been released yet, but according to a whistleblower who contacted PETA, Tweet's premature death may have resulted from his eating pieces of the blue tarp that covered his enclosure. The whistleblower alleges that Tweet's owner and trainers were notified that the giraffe had been eating the tarp but that they did nothing about it.

The whistleblower also said that Tweet spent the last few months of his life confined to a 20-foot-by-20-foot stall, which was barely large enough for the 18-foot-tall giraffe to lie down in. In their natural habitat, giraffes live in vast home ranges of up to 400 square miles.

PETA is now calling on the USDA to investigate Tweet's death. We're also asking for other people associated with the production of the movie to come forward with additional information about the treatment of animals on the set.

Posted by Shawna Flavell

militaryplaques / CC

This is hot off the press, folks. We just heard from an Army medic today that several goats who had been used in a trauma training exercise at Fort Lewis were allegedly discarded in sealed plastic bags even though they were still breathing.

The goats had been subjected to all sorts of horrific exercises, including having holes cut in their chests to relieve an induced massive buildup of pressure in their lungs, having their throats punctured, and having their ribs cracked open to expose their beating hearts, all before being injected with a chemical to induce cardiac arrest. Apparently, their vital signs weren't checked before they were chucked into trash bags like rotten produce.

PETA has been arguing for months that such trauma training exercises are in violation of Department of Defense (DOD) rules that bar the use of animals for training exercises if humane alternatives exist (which they do, in abundance). But even if the DOD isn't ready to cede that point, surely it can agree that suffocating animals in plastic bags is inexcusable.

Our whistleblower tells us that dozens more goats are slated to be used in trauma training exercises in the coming days and weeks, so we're wasting no time in demanding that the exercises be stopped immediately. Read our letter to Fort Lewis and then see our action alert on this topic here.

Posted by Alisa Mullins

After our recent demonstration in New Haven to let residents know that Yale is spending millions of taxpayer dollars torturing monkeys, the university wasn't exactly ready to throw open its doors and give guided tours to people who wanted to find out more. Well, Yale's secretive vivisectors may have been a bit surprised on their drive to work when they saw our massive new billboard near their facilities calling on anyone who witnesses cruelty in the university's labs to blow the whistle:

Whistleblowers have been instrumental in revealing neglect, carelessness, and cruelty in laboratories across the nation. This has led to countless victories for animals—so we're always eager to hear from people with the inside scoop.

Even if you don't work in a laboratory, you can blow the whistle on animal abusers. Whistleblowers have revealed details of Ringling's abuse of animals, shed light on beatings of animals on movie sets, and given us behind-the-scenes information on the horse-racing industry. Wherever you see animals abused—whether at a race track, pet shop, circus, carnival, or in your own neighborhood—speak up and let us know about it!

Posted by Liz Graffeo