Injunction Restrains Animal Rights Group
Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Abby Soven has issued a preliminary injunction prohibiting harassment of UCLA faculty members at their homes and other disruptive activities by Last Chance for Animals, a group opposed to the use of animals in scientific research.
The injunction specifies that Last Chance for Animals and six of its leaders may not threaten, intimidate, harass or annoy faculty at their homes, break into or block facilities at the Westwood campus or interfere with or obstruct the teaching, research or other functions of the campus. The research in question involves cats.
UCLA spokesman Richard Elbaum said the group has broken into campus laboratories where research involving the cats is done and has harassed faculty members who are conducting research using animals.
Christopher Rose, president of Last Chance for Animals, who was named in the injunction, said the ruling was “a direct infringement of our constitutional rights” that “just goes to show the power of these institutions.”
“They can dictate their own law,” he said. “But in no way will this deter us. We will prevail.”
Rose acknowledged that his group had demonstrated at the homes of two UCLA health-sciences faculty members but denied that the protesters acted inappropriately.
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