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Thomas Keller Targeted for Animal Cruelty

NEW YORK, May 6 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ --The Animal Protection & Rescue League and several animal protection groups will be protesting outside Thomas Keller restaurants in three cities across the country on Saturday due to the company's sale of "foie gras" - liver from cruelly force fed ducks.

The groups will be displaying graphic banners showing scenes from inside Thomas Keller's supplier, Hudson Valley Foie Gras, and other producers of this barbaric product. The coalition of groups, which includes the Animal Protection & Rescue League, Orange County People for Animals, In Defense of Animals, and Compassion Over Killing, have launched a campaign website at www.foie-gras-industry.com.

    Protest locations and times on Saturday May 8:

    Per Se, 10 Columbus Circle, New York, NY 10019 - Time: noon
    Bouchon, 235 N. Canon Dr. Beverly Hills, CA 90210 - Time: 7:30pm
    French Laundry, 6640 Washington St., Yountville, CA 94599 - Time 7pm

"As a veterinarian, I find foie gras to be a disease rather than a delicacy," states Elliot Katz, DVM, President of IDA. "The liver's function is to process toxins, and a liver in this grossly enlarged state from force feeding cannot function properly."

To make the livers fat enough for foie gras, workers restrain the ducks, force long metal pipes down their throats, and pump up to two pounds of food into them per day. After three weeks, their livers swell up to 12 times their normal size.

"The conditions I have witnessed in Hudson Valley Foie Gras are appalling," states Bryan Pease, Esq., Board Chair of APRL. "In visiting there and other farms to document conditions, I saw ducks panting incessantly and showing great difficulty walking and breathing in the later stages of force feeding, and I saw trash barrels full of dead ducks killed by the process."

Animal cruelty investigations by APRL and a lawsuit filed by APRL and IDA led to enactment of Cal. Health & Safety Code section 25980, banning the sale or production of foie gras in California effective 2012. The cities of San Francisco, Berkeley, West Hollywood, Solana Beach and San Diego have recently passed resolutions in support of the ban.

Early last year, the National Advertising Division of the Better Business Bureau found that D'Artagnan, a major U.S. foie gras distributor, was engaging in false advertising by claiming the livers are not diseased and implying the animals are treated humanely.

More information is available at www.foie-gras-industry.com.

SOURCE Animal Protection & Rescue League