Victory! PETA to Receive All Records Relating to Monkey Tests in UMass Lawsuit Settlement

For Immediate Release:
April 22, 2025

Contact:
Tasgola Bruner 202-483-7382

PETA will receive all videos, photos, and other documentation about cruel experiments on marmosets conducted in the University of Massachusetts–Amherst (UMass) laboratory of Agnés Lacreuse that were previously withheld, as a result of today’s settlement of PETA’s public records lawsuit against the university. The university has paid PETA $50,000 for legal fees.

PETA will also receive the names of those currently serving on the university’s institutional animal care and use committee, according to the settlement. The committee reviews, approves or rejects experiments on animals and is responsible for ensuring adherence to animal protection laws and regulations.

PETA filed the lawsuit in Suffolk County Superior Court in Massachusetts in September 2022 after the university refused to fulfill requests for photos, video, and other documentation, in apparent violation of Massachusetts Public Records Law. PETA scientists and attorneys will review all records as they are released.

“UMass harmed small monkeys in pointless experiments and then tried to hide what it was doing by flouting open records laws,” says PETA Senior Vice President Kathy Guillermo. “There’s no scientific reason to keep this wasteful, abusive laboratory open another minute—its federal funding should be cut now.”

In Lacreuse’s laboratory, experimenters screwed electrodes onto marmosets’ skulls, deprived them of water, and shoved them into plastic cylinders. Many of the tests purport to study menopause, which marmosets don’t experience. Lacreuse has squandered more than $6 million in taxpayer funds on these wasteful, curiosity-driven tests.

PETA has also urged federal officials to investigate whether Lacreuse misused taxpayer money after she spent approximately $340,000 on a failed sleep deprivation experiment at the Wisconsin National Primate Research Center.

In nature, marmosets live high up in the canopies of rainforests in tight-knit social groups composed of up to three generations of family members.

PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to experiment on”—points out that Every Animal Is Someone and offers free Empathy Kitsfor people who need a lesson in kindness. For more information, please visit PETA.org or follow PETA on X, Facebook, or Instagram.