assaulted and someone being killed and doesn't get much attention and that
just is it is where it is but yeah seems out of work sometimes yes no I hear
what you're saying
La Crosse County Attorney Tim Grinky joins us now and thanks very much for being here
no problem so why did you seek this resolution with Ridgeland farms
well the conclusion I came to was that I could charge one of the types of things that I was
referred to by the judge in Dane County and I was going to charge that but charging that would
only have started a process that probably would have taken six months to year to get the trial
there were some issues that could have been appealed so charging it would have just been the start
of a process when the farm offered to close down in exchange of charging I thought that was a
good outcome because even if I had charged and convicted them I still had no authority to
pose them down and the fines that they had been charged with as well they could have just paid
and kept on running so I thought them ending the business is what most people wanted
and it's more than I could do by charging and it would happen much quicker than me charging
so I thought that was a good resolution to have them agree to end their business in exchange for
not charging a crime so the resolution effectively closes down the operation because I thought that
under the deal they'd still be able to maintain their own research on remaining animals
correct there's two parts of the business the part where they do their own research I was never
part of I had no authority over them the judge didn't involve that in the appointment of my
special prosecution so that was an issue I had no controller from the start so whether they
continue on or don't is up to them and I had no control over it the only control I had was on
the breeding part which is the part they agreed to shut down and that's as far as my authority
could take me do you have any idea how many dogs are still at Richland Farms and and Wood
Wisconsin statutes render Richland immune from any future prosecution based on what they're
doing they're being researched well the first question I don't know how many dogs are there
currently I'm not keeping up to date with them on a daily basis I'm relying on the state agencies
to confirm at some point before July 1st that they're uh surrounding their license and they're
out of their business so if they did anything after that they'd be doing it without a license and
could be prosecuted um the federal law and the state law exempt research facilities and research
on animals from the animal cruelty law so if they are doing research on dogs under the federal
grant of authority under the USDA uh the state statutes exempt that from prosecution so that's why
I never had any authority over them and wouldn't in the future if they continued testing on animals
it did this week's sale and release of 1500 of the Beagles there come as a surprise to you
no uh when we negotiated this last fall the idea always was that they would be closing down and as
that process went on they would be uh getting rid of their Beagles by selling them off or if
they couldn't sell them putting them up for adoption and they had kind of estimated a time range and
this was kind of the end of that time range that they thought they would be doing that we picked
July 1st just so they wouldn't be able to delay and I need to kind of renegotiate things but we
always I was always told that about April or May they would be hopefully winding down and getting
rid of all their dogs so it it wasn't a surprise to me that this is how they did it that was always
their intent getting back to the specifics of your investigation you did find that you could
support charging on one procedure conducted on these Beagles uh can you describe what that was
it's called a cherry eye procedure it's basically uh an eye gland that is
swollen or prolapse that has to be removed if you were doing it with a patch it would be an
expensive procedure and you'd want to have a licensed veterinarian doing it they were doing it
the way they'd been doing it in decades past which is kind of outdated which was removing the gland
without general anesthesia and without having a licensed veterinarian do it so when the veterinary
board decided that they would revoke the main veterinarian's license because it didn't meet their
standard of care that's what I thought if they're violating that standard of care that allows me
to charge the case honestly if they had found that it did not fall below the veterinary standards
I'm not sure I would have had a legal authority to go forward um but basically they were performing
a surgery without proper veterinary methods required by the state of Wisconsin what one thing that
you talked about in your charging decision was the prospect of euthanasia of the Beagles why did you
consider that the I'm sorry the prospect of euthanasia yeah or euthanasia
being familiar with a lot of farmers growing up and farmers in lacrosse area that I
talk to you know and they have animals that are injured or need some help they have the right to
euthanize them as long as it's done humanely um and if you had a dairy farm or a pig farm
where an animal had some injuries if it costs more than the cost that animal is to you most farmers
would would put it down and so in this case if the original farms are required to go to such an
extent to uh you know surgery on the dogs they could just euthanize them um and so that was a
factor of my charging decision that it's it's not a place that was breeding dogs for sale for pets
it's a farm like a turkey farm or a pig farm where you bring them for food or for in this case
testing so it's not looked at the same under the veterinary standards or under the law
and so that just reality of the economics of farms that are doing business
as a DA who prosecutes homicides and uh you're currently in the midst of a of a homicide uh case
still did it pull on your heartstrings to pour over evidence in this case especially as we know
that you are a beagle owner and a fan of beagles actually have a painting of one in your office
yes i uh like most people like dogs and like beagles are some in my opinion some of the cuter dogs
um it's heartbreaking to see them in cages and heartbreaking to see them um you know not being
socialized properly not being able to run free and do what dogs do um but the law allows for this
behavior on a farm um you know i've been to farms before with friends of mine that grew up on farms
and the way the cows were treated i didn't like but you know when you've got a hundred two hundred
cattle or cows they're not gonna be treated the same as a pet um and saying goes for other types
of animals so if you don't think of this as your pet or think of it as raising dogs to be pets but
think of it as a farm it's a little bit different and uh the standard are different the way they're
gonna be treated is different and the reasons are should be obvious that they're not going to get
pets uh they're not going to be considered pets so as long as you're following the usda regulations
and the dad cap regulations the fact that i don't like it or we don't like it doesn't mean that
we could charge a crime so i was relying mostly on the state regulator's inspectors that are
experts in this area and going by their advice on what they normally see on farms uh dog readers
and uh that's why one of the reasons i came with the decision i came to about this behavior
we leave it there d.a. tim greenkey thanks very much thank you
good luck with your criminal case good luck to you and say hi to gary
hi well i will thank you bye