Baby’s trainer faces justice on May 6th in Marmande
One Voice leads a nonviolent fight to defend animal rights and respect all life forms. The organization operates independently and is thus free to speak and act freely.
Do you know Baby? Perhaps your thinking no or probably you do. For more than 30 years, this elephant has been surveying film sets, appearing on advertising spots, participating in television shows, sitting on stools in circus shows… His trainer passes before the Agen Correctional Court in Marmande at 2.00 pm on Tuesday, May 6th for the irregular exploitation of a non-domestic animal.
Editorial on 6th May 2019
The judgment is deliberated on
June 3rd,
2019 at 2:00 p.m.
An elephant uprooted
Originally
from Africa, Baby was captured in 1985 when she was two years old.
Like all baby elephants kidnapped in the wild, she had to live
through many traumas before ending up in France to perform in shows.
Since then, she has been offered for rental by Gilbert Bauer, she has
been used to host both official inaugurations, Christmas trees, trade
fairs, municipal parades, children’s snacks, birthdays and other
private parties. Listening to the trainer, Baby is like his daughter
and swims in happiness by his side … The public is fooled by this
illusion, but is this the life for an elephant?
Uprooted
from her native land, isolated from all contact with her family –
while elephants are highly social animals – and suffering from a
disability in the rear left foot, she is so alone … At her age,
Baby should live on the burning hot planes of the savannah along with
his aging mother and sisters, baby elephants and nephews. Walking
would be their daily life, helping to teach little ones, the
transmissions from the matriarchs. Their common memory would take
them from place to place, those of love, those of meditation, those
of feasts …
But
Baby is far from this life, she can only dream of it now, forced as
she is to turn around on a stool, to return the ball to thunderous
music, to pose for photos or to be forced to parade on tarmac, close
to humans she should never have met.
The penal procedure
The
association has been tracking and monitoring Baby for a long time,
and has consistently gathered evidence to denounce and rescue her.
On May 27th
2017, Gilbert Bauer went too far, and our warnings were heard by the
authorities. That day the trainer paraded Baby without respecting the
regulatory safety measures concerning the presentation of wild
animals to the public. Inspectors from the National Office of Hunting
and Wild Fauna (ONCFS) were able to observe that no electric barrier
or fence separated the crowd from the elephant. Also, these elephants
had to support performers that were perched upon their backs and that
any of the public, including children, could approach her very
closely.
The
consequences of this offense could have been dramatic and Gilbert
Bauer is now being prosecuted for the illegal exploitation of
non-domestic animals. He is scheduled to appear before the Agen
District Court on May 6th
at 2 p.m. It is a step forward. One Voice however wishes to go
further and requests that this criminal procedure be reclassified as
ill-treatment and that Baby be entrusted to us.
For
her and all of the animals exploited for the entertainment of certain
humans, we call for the ban on this practice. Their place is in a
sanctuary !