A Day in the Life: 3 Animal Cruelty Investigators Share How They Save Animals Every Day
From All-Creatures.org Animal Rights/Vegan Activist Strategies Articles Archive

FROM Lex Talamo, LadyFreethinker.org
January 2021

Investigator: “It’s not a job that’s ever going to give you the feeling that you’re finished at the end of the day...You’re never finished.”

Farm equipment improperly used to drag collapsed cows (Image Credit: Animal Outlook)

Intense pressure. Isolation. The need to witness brutality and death on a daily basis — and stay silent.

Those were the working conditions facing Erin Wing, a then 24-year-old Hispanic woman wanting to make a difference for animals, when she applied to become an animal cruelty investigator for Animal Outlook.

“What I heard a lot of was actually, ‘Do you really want to do this? Maybe you should rethink this decision,’” Wing recalled. “The staff actually tried to convince me not to do this work because it is so intense. But I felt I was needed there.”

Nina Jackel, founder and president of Lady Freethinker (LFT), is no stranger to these horrifying conditions. She also has to bear witness daily to brutal images and reports of animal cruelty to help bring light to the horrors of abuse.

“The hardest thing, hands down, is dealing with viewing animal cruelty all the time,” Jackel said. “There’s never so much of a barrier that you ever stop having empathy for the animals. But the mission is more important to me than anything, and that’s what keeps me going.”

The animal cruelty investigations team at Pasado’s Safe Haven, a nonprofit animal sanctuary and rescue in Washington, pulls hundreds of dogs, cats, and farm animals from cases involving medical neglect, violence, hoarding, animal fighting, bestiality, and a seemingly endless cycle of other abuses.

“It’s not a job that’s ever going to give you the feeling that you’re finished at the end of the day,” Pasado’s investigator and director of animal cruelty operations noted. “You’re never finished.”

(Lady Freethinker is not naming the investigator, who still is active in field work, as doing so could jeopardize operations and her safety.)

All three animal cruelty investigators said their work can be infuriating, emotionally draining, and never-ending. But they also all said it’s important and fulfilling, and they’ve found solace knowing the work they do each day makes a difference....

 

Please read the ENTIRE ARTICLE HERE (PDF).

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