Whistleblower: Live Monkey Imported for Experiments Tossed in Dumpster and Found Far Away Five Days Later; PETA Wants Answers
For Immediate Release:
February 6, 2026
Contact:
Tasgola Bruner 202-483-7382
PETA is calling on a slew of national and state authorities to investigate after receiving a whistleblower report that an Immokalee-based monkey importer and laboratory supplier BC US LLC tossed a wooden crate containing a live monkey into a biohazard waste dumpster, which was then trucked across the state—and no one at BC US noticed the primate, who should immediately have been placed in quarantine, fed, and watered, was missing until he was found alive in Miami five days later.
PETA wants to know how a newly imported macaque — who is required to be placed immediately into CDC-mandated quarantine —reportedly ended up loose inside a biomedical waste processing facility miles away in Miami, and today filed complaints with the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission, Florida public health officials, and the Association for Assessment and Accreditation of Laboratory Animal Care (AAALAC). PETA calls on the agencies to immediately investigate what appear to be profound failures in basic inventory controls, containment practices, the safeguards often falsely touted by the primate importation industry, and depriving a monkey of care and nourishment after a grueling overseas flight.
The monkey was one of hundreds of long-tailed macaques who were packed into wooden crates and endured a 28-hour flight aboard a charter plane flown by Poland-based SkyTaxi from Mauritius to Miami International Airport that began on Tuesday, January 27. The primates were then unloaded and trucked two hours north to BC US in Immokalee, where staff unloaded them from the shipping crates into quarantine cages late at night on January 28. Staff threw the crates into a biohazard dumpster, at least one apparently containing a live monkey.
The monkey stayed there, when temperatures dropped into the 30s at night for two days before waste disposal company Stericycle collected the dumpster on Friday, January 30. It is unknown where it went from there, but it ended up in Miami, the whistleblower alleges.
The dumpster was unloaded on Monday Feb 2, and the monkey who had now been without food or water for over five days reportedly got loose inside the facility, before being captured and sent back to BC US.
“BC US’s apparent inability to count and look after the primates it imports–incapable of even securely moving a monkey from one cage to another– meant five days of misery for the monkey and represents a serious biosecurity risk to the human population,” says PETA Senior Science Advisor for Primate Issues Dr. Lisa Jones-Engel. “PETA calls for immediate local and federal investigations and an end to this primate-import pipeline.”
A long-tailed macaque in a shipping crate during a layover on a SmartLynx flight.Photo for illustrative purposes only. Photo shared with PETA by Stitching Animal Rights.
BC US imports long-tailed macaques from Bioculture, its sister facility in Mauritius, which has had multiple outbreaks of tuberculosis, including one in 2023 that killed 200 monkeys. The whistleblower reported to PETA that monkeys are sometimes sick in quarantine at BC US, but that staff are told to keep it secret.
In nature, macaques live in large, tight-knit groups, travel several miles each day exploring diverse habitats, and cuddle together in their favorite “sleeping trees” at night. Monkeys imported to U.S. laboratories are bred on squalid factory farms or abducted from their forest homes, pushing some species toward extinction. The International Union for Conservation of Nature recently reaffirmed the long-tailed macaque’s Endangered status.
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.
