RICHMOND, Va. -- One year after 4,000 beagles were seized from the now-shuttered Envigo breeding facility in Cumberland County, Virginia, one of the people who helped organize the massive operation to find the pups their forever homes is reflecting on the journey.
Adam Parascandola with the Humane Society of the United States helped lead the charge with finding rescue organizations across the country to take in the dogs, which were bred for medical research.
“I’m grateful we’re able to give that to them,” he said about being able to rehome the dogs to give them normal lives.
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Parascandola described the conditions in the Envigo facility as restrictive.
"The life that existed in this facility was so limited," he said. "They didn't have an opportunity to have that freedom."
The Department of Justice filed a lawsuit against Envigo in May 2022, alleging dozens of animal welfare violations.
Government inspectors found a number of violations, including that beagles were being killed instead of receiving veterinary treatments, nursing mother beagles were denied food and the food given to the dogs was contaminated. Officials also discovered that 25 puppies died from cold exposure.
Additionally, PETA’s investigation claimed all of the dogs were born in cages and were never socialized.
The Norfolk-based animal rights nonprofit claimed that if the dogs had not been saved, the animals would have been shipped across the world for experimentation and then killed.
While the company denied the allegations, two months later they announced they would close the facility and place the dogs with the humane society.
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Parascandola said he remembers the moment the humane society was tasked with rescuing the dogs and finding other rescue shelters to place them across the country.
“It was kind of a mix of emotions. It’s a bit of a daunting task," he recalled. "How are we going to started? How are we going to get those 4,000 dogs out of there? But we were really excited to get these dogs to a better place.”
Parascandola and his crew would come to the facility in Cumberland and do a couple of transfers a week.
The organization was able to bring the dogs to more than 100 humane society shelters in 29 states across the U.S., according to Parascandola. Those shelters found homes for the dogs.
One year later, the beagles are learning to acclimate to their new lives across the county while bringing many, like Parascandola, great joy.
In fact, he described the dog he adopted and named Enzo as a ball of energy who especially enjoys hikes.
"He's a happy-go-lucky guy," Parascandola said.
While Parascandola said the organization never before responded to something of this magnitude, it made them realize the capacity within the community to help.
"It was just an amazing feeling to realize when we all come together, we can accomplish something incredible like this,” Parascandola said.
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