U.S. Customers Exposed As Monkey Torture Video Network Exposed
Criminals were making sadistic videos of monkeys being tortured and killed for paying customers around the world, with at least 20 Americans now under investigation.
The torture videos typically used baby long-tailed macaques.
Warning: this story contains upsetting and disturbing details of monkeys being tortured.
A global network dedicated to the torture of monkeys has been exposed after a year-long undercover investigation by the BBC’s World Service.
Hundreds of customers around the world were found to be paying Indonesians to torture and kill long-tailed macaques on film.
The so-called monkey torture ring intially established a following on YouTube, and then moved to private groups on the messaging platform Telegram.
According to the BBC’s undercover investigators, hundreds of followers take part in the private Telegram torture groups, where they discuss and devise ideas on how to torture monkeys.
If a torture idea is commissioned, torturers in Indonesia or other Asian countries then carry out the scene on film, and sell the video to paying customers.
The graphic videos are incredibly distressing and disturbing. “It was extreme depravity”, Joel Gunter, an investigative reporter with the BBC team behind the investigation, told CBS. “We saw a video of a baby monkey being put into a blender, videos with power tools used on monkeys. It was torture like you can't imagine”.
The shocking details of the investigation come as police action is already underway to arrest those involved in the torture ring.
At least 20 people in the US are now under investigation, including one man in Oregon who was indicted last week. Authorities in Indonesia have also arrested two men. One has been sentenced to three years in prison for animal torture and the sale of a protected species, and the other male sentenced to eight months for animal torture.
Special Agent Paul Wolpert, who is leading the investigation by the US Department of Homeland Security, told the BBC that anybody involved in buying or distributing the monkey torture videos should "expect a knock on the door at some point - you are not going to get away with it."
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