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State ag secretary calls for investigation into Postville plant
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP)--Iowa Agriculture Secretary Patty Judge called Dec. 6 for a federal investigation into slaughtering practices at a kosher meatpacking plant in Postville.
The Agriprocessors Inc. plant has been the target of a complaint by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, which claims the plant violates state law that requires the use of humane methods of slaughter.
PETA had asked Judge to take legal action against the plant. Judge called on the United States Department of Agriculture to conduct an investigation.
Judge said that because the Postville plant ships meat to other states, it falls under the jurisdiction of the USDA, and not the state ag department.
"The Iowa Department of Agriculture has no legal authority to inspect or regulate the Postville plant," Judge said in a written statement Dec. 6.
"When properly applied, the kosher method of slaughter renders the animal unconscious, quickly and humanely," she said. "No one in the Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship supports the inhumane treatment of animals"
PETA filed a complaint Dec. 1 with the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which helps oversee the plant, calling for the prosecution of Agriprocessors and the Orthodox Union, an international kosher certification agency.
PETA's move comes after a seven-week undercover investigation at the Postville plant which employs about 700 workers. It is the world's largest glatt kosher slaughterhouse. Glatt, under kosher law, means that the animals are free of certain physical defects.
During slaughter at the plant, rabbis use a 2-foot blade to cut across the neck of the animal, severing the arteries on both sides and the trachea and esophagus. A second cut is made to each artery to ensure rapid blood loss as a second rabbi stands by to monitor, company officials have said.
Kosher slaughter requires that the animal's throat is slit. The sudden and enormous blood loss triggers immediate anemia in the brain, which renders the animal insensible.
PETA charges that a made secretly at the slaughterhouse shows improperly executed kosher slaughter resulting "in the mutilationof fully conscious cows." Some cows were bellowing up to three minutes after their throats were slit, the organization said.
Agriprocessors officials have said the process for slaughtering animals at the plant strictly adheres to federal guidelines and is overseen by rabbinic leaders committed to humane treatment.
Mike Thomas, a company spokesman, Dec. 8 called PETA's actions "an attack on the kosher processing industry."
Officials with the Orthodox Union have said they're reviewing the 30-minute videotape, but that it is important to remember that the video covered only selected moments over a seven-week period in which 18,000 cattle were slaughtered.
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