A Holden Farms, Inc. facility in Utica, Minnesota was the subject of an undercover investigation by nonprofit Animal Outlook. The video, filmed by an Animal Outlook investigator who worked inside the facility, shows repeated and routine abuse and neglect, including numerous instances of methods and practices inflicting suffering on countless animals.

After reviewing the footage, the Animal Legal Defense Fund filed a False Claims Act lawsuit against Holden Farms. The false claim is predicated on Holden Farms’ receipt, and the ultimate forgiveness, of $2.57 million in Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loan funding under the CARES Act. To secure the funding, Holden Farms certified it is not engaging in any illegal activity under federal, state, or local laws. The lawsuit claims the four-month undercover investigation at the Utica facility establishes Holden Farms “engages in systematic and ongoing violations of the Federal Swine Health Protection Act, the Minnesota anti-cruelty law, and the Minnesota anti-garbage feeding law.” 

The release of this investigation, documenting an intensive confinement U.S. pork facility, comes in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court upholding California's Proposition 12 this spring and as the animal agriculture industry works aggressively to enact a new federal bill called the EATS Act, which would nullify Proposition 12 and many other animal protection laws nationwide. The investigation shows in depth the kinds of cruelty and related harms the industry is fighting so hard to be able to continue perpetrating.

Holden Farms knowingly made false statements to the U.S. government when it applied for a Paycheck Protection Program loan. To secure $2.57 million, Holden Farms certified it is not engaging in any illegal activity under federal, state, or local laws.

The Animal Legal Defense Fund has evidence Holden Farms engages in systematic and ongoing violations of:

• the federal Swine Health Protection Act,

• the Minnesota anti-cruelty law, and

• the Minnesota anti-garbage feeding law.

If the federal government had been aware of the non-compliance, the agency would have been prohibited from guarenteeing Holden Farms' loan in November 2020, and ultimatly forgiving the loan in June 2021.

Read more about the lawsuit.

Lawsuit Filed Against Pig Breeder Holden Farms Related to Feeding Dead Piglets’ Intestines and Feces to Mother Pigs and Other Offenses

Animal Legal Defense Fund filed a False Claims Act lawsuit against Holden Farms. Allegations include violating federal and state laws banning “garbage feeding” and state animal cruelty law

Contact: Mike Heymsfield, media@aldf.org, 707-364-8387   
 
ST. PAUL, Minn. — An undercover investigation conducted by Animal Outlook of a Holden Farms pig breeding facility in Utica, Minnesota exposed alleged illicit conduct. The video shows employees feeding dead piglet intestines and bodily fluids blended into a ‘slurry’ with pig feces to mother pigs — a practice the animal agriculture industry calls “feedback.” The investigation led to the Animal Legal Defense Fund filing in September 2021 a False Claims Act lawsuit against Holden Farms. The lawsuit alleges that Holden Farms falsely certified to the federal government that it was not violating federal, state or local laws when it applied for issuance, and later forgiveness, of a $2.57 million pandemic loan. Until this week, the case was under seal while the U.S. Department of Justice reviewed the case.  

The undercover investigation took place from November 2019 — March 2020. Additional footage obtained by Animal Outlook during the investigation exposed: 

• Multiple instances of piglets falling through slats in the floor into an underground pit of feces, urine, and decaying piglet corpses and being left in the pit to die. 

• Numerous pigs are documented with severe prolapses, where intestines are spilling out of their body. In one documented incident, a pig’s extremely distended prolapsed tissue swings side to side as she struggles to walk down a hallway. 

• Piglets trying to nurse from their dead mother, who suffered a prolapse that spilled out of her crate. 

• A significant number of pig and piglet corpses in multiple stages of decomposition — some appearing to have mummified — in the hallways of the facility. 

• Workers tormenting piglets, including two workers playing ‘catch’ with a piglet — throwing the piglet with such force when the animal hits a PVC ceiling pipe it bursts. Water sprays from the pipe and the piglet falls to the floor unable to move. 

• Workers ripping male piglets’ testicles off with their hands and bragging about biting off piglets’ tails with their teeth, instead of the minimum industry standard of using a scalpel. 

• Routine kicking and beatings of mother pigs — some too sick or injured to walk. 

• Facility management acknowledging they were not ordering enough food, resulting in the pigs not being fed on most weekends, to avoid company-imposed penalties for overordering. 

The False Claims Act lawsuit is predicated on Holden Farms’ receipt, and the ultimate forgiveness, of $2.57 million in Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loan funding under the CARES Act. To secure the funding, Holden Farms certified it is not engaging in any illegal activity under federal, state, or local laws. The lawsuit claims the four-month undercover investigation at the Utica facility establishes Holden Farms “engages in systematic and ongoing violations of the Federal Swine Health Protection Act, the Minnesota anti-cruelty law, and the Minnesota anti-garbage feeding law.”  

“Holden Farms feeding dead piglets to their mothers is disgusting, unethical and unlawful, and we believe this practice continues at its facilities today,” says Animal Legal Defense Fund Managing Attorney Daniel Waltz. “Factory farms are already an immense risk for spreading zoonotic disease based on the large number of animals kept in confined, concentrated spaces — but compounding that risk with this ‘feedback’ practice during a global pandemic is unconscionable.”    

In one of several videos capturing the “feedback” process, an employee removes dead piglets from a plastic storage container — coughing and dry heaving, the employee complains of the smell “like sour placenta.” Using a scalpel, the employee cuts a piglet’s stomach lengthwise and squeezes the piglet’s internal liquid contents into a blender. While squeezing the piglet’s stomach the employee inflates the intestine like a balloon and turns to show her co-workers, before proceeding to pull the intestines out of his body (measuring dozens of feet in length), like a sinewy thread. When the blender is full, the “slurry” is poured into a large orange plastic cart labeled “FEED” that also contains pig feces, then wheeled out to the pens and fed to the mother pigs. 

Holden Farms is the 16th largest pork producer in the U.S., reporting to have 72,000 mother pigs in 2022. 

“Based on the size of Holden Farms and the sheer volume of animals they produce, it's not a concern that animals born in this facility could be anywhere... they are everywhere,” says Waltz.  

Learn more at aldf.org/holdenfarms. 

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About the Animal Legal Defense Fund  
The Animal Legal Defense Fund was founded in 1979 to protect the lives and advance the interests of animals through the legal system. To accomplish this mission, the Animal Legal Defense Fund files high-impact lawsuits to protect animals from harm; provides free legal assistance and training to prosecutors to assure that animal abusers are held accountable for their crimes; supports tough animal protection legislation and fights harmful legislation; and provides resources and opportunities to law students and professionals to advance the emerging field of animal law. For more information, please visit aldf.org.     

Animal Protection Organization Alleges Torture, Abuse In Major Pork Industry Breeding Facility

Undercover footage reveals pigs kicked, hit, subjected to botched castration and gassing, fed intestines of dead piglets, and neglected

Contact: (202) 798-3989, press@animaloutlook.org

LOS ANGELES, Calif. and UTICA, Minn. -- Today, Animal Outlook, a national animal protection charity, released footage obtained via hidden camera at Holden Farms, one of the largest family-owned producers of pork in the country, in Utica, Minnesota. Holden breeds pigs to supply pork to some of the largest pork companies in the U.S. Holden Farms has been linked to Tyson Foods and to JBS, the largest meat processing company in the world.

The video, filmed by an Animal Outlook investigator who worked inside the facility, shows repeated and routine abuse and neglect, including numerous instances of methods and practices inflicting suffering on countless animals. Animal Outlook believes that Holden Farms has violated multiple state laws and has asked law enforcement officials to prosecute for cruelty and neglect. Video documentation includes:

●  Often-botched attempts to gas to death sick or injured piglets using carbon dioxide poisoning. Piglets are seen writhing and gasping for breath inside the gassing chamber box.

●  Piglets subjected to castration via testicles being ripped out by hand without any pain relief, causing some to suffer ruptured internal organs and later die. Piglets vocalize in distress from the castration while some of the workers tease one another by throwing the testicles at each other. This is done so often there is a wall covered with testicles stuck to it.

●      A practice known as “feedback” in which workers blend the intestines of dead piglets together with pig feces into a slurry and feed it to pregnant pigs.  A worker is seen retching and nearly vomiting as she blends the intestines.

●      Dozens of incidents of hitting, kicking, slapping, punching, beating with a paddle, or roughly handling pigs.

●      Widespread neglect, including open sores and prolapses where internal organs hang from live pigs’ bodies.

●      Pigs injured or killed by cage systems, including one animal who was trapped between bars and died there due to neglect. Her body was then sawed in half and made the subject of jokes.

●      Many animals died - in one month alone, Animal Outlook’s investigator removed hundreds of dead piglets.

●      Pigs subjected to cruel, yet standard, industry practices including cutting off piglets’ tails without pain relief with clippers or pliers and confining pregnant and nursing pigs in metal crates so small they cannot turn around.

Holden is part of the industry-developed We Care program, which claims to uphold the “highest standards” of animal well-being. However, Animal Outlook says its footage shows that the agriculture industry continues to commit horrific violence persists despite claims that it is possible to produce meat humanely. 

“Pigs trapped in this cruel industry are born into a world of suffering,” said Cheryl Leahy, Executive Director of Animal Outlook. “The cruelties we documented at Holden Farms are so rampant and so extreme, this is how this facility does business. Holden should be held accountable for these abuses, under the law, which needs to be made to work against this large-scale corporate cruelty. Either way, the court of public opinion stands with us in demanding an end to this cruelty and the industry that profits from it, and each of us has the power to refuse to support it.”

“The ‘slurry’ with deceased baby pig intestines and feces known as ‘feedback’ fed to mother pigs violates both federal and local anti-garbage feeding laws and poses a significant risk to public health, further risking the spread of zoonotic diseases,” says Animal Legal Defense Fund Managing Attorney Daniel Waltz. “Holden Farm’s use of this grotesque practice is not only reckless, but just one example of the facility’s unlawful disregard for animal and human health.”

Investigative footage is available here.

The release of this investigation, documenting an intensive confinement U.S. pork facility, comes in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court upholding California's Proposition 12 this spring and as the animal agriculture industry works aggressively to enact a new federal bill called the EATS Act, which would nullify Proposition 12 and many other animal protection laws nationwide. The investigation shows in depth the kinds of cruelty and related harms the industry is fighting so hard to be able to continue perpetrating.

The Animal Outlook investigation is the basis of a federal False Claims Act lawsuit filed by the Animal Legal Defense Fund, which has been under seal pursuant to the rules of the federal courts while the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) investigated the claims. Today, the federal court lifted the seal on the federal complaint. Animal Outlook is now able to reveal this disturbing expose to the public.

Further information about the investigation and the lawsuit are available here.

ABOUT ANIMAL OUTLOOK

Animal Outlook is a national nonprofit 501(c)(3) animal advocacy organization based in Washington, DC, and Los Angeles, CA. It is strategically challenging animal agribusiness through undercover investigations, legal advocacy, corporate and food system reform, and disseminating information about the many harms of animal agriculture, empowering everyone to choose vegan. https://animaloutlook.org/ 

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