Copyright Live 5 News WCSC
JASPER COUNTY, Miss. (WDAM/Gray News) - New developments have surfaced a week after a crash on a Mississippi highway that involved a truck carrying 21 monkeys, resulting in the escapes of three of them. Twenty-one Rhesus monkeys owned by PreLabs, LLC, a biomedical research organization, were being transported in a truck that overturned last Tuesday on Interstate 59 in Jasper County. According to Jasper County Sheriff Randy Johnson, five of the monkeys were shot and killed at the accident site, while 13 remained caged on the truck. Three of the monkeys escaped following the crash. According to an incident narrative, a Jasper County deputy was informed the monkeys were test monkeys from Tulane University and “possibly carried Hep C, Herpes, and Covid.” Tulane and PreLabs have since disputed this claim. Two of the escaped monkeys were shot and killed by civilians in the days following the crash. The third was recovered Wednesday by PreLabs after it was found on a Vossburg woman’s land. In body camera footage obtained by WDAM and WLOX, law enforcement officers responding to the crash are shown expressing their shock at seeing monkeys. “Y’all gotta shoot ‘em,” said a passenger in the transport truck, who was under stress. “You gotta shoot it. You have to shoot it. They can’t get away!” Monkeys can be seen in the footage fighting and wandering around the area of the crash. One monkey was even seen running across the interstate in front of a tractor-trailer into the woods. In his narrative, the Jasper County deputy said that after coordinating with the Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks, first responders were instructed by the passenger and his boss to euthanize the monkeys. “I...was advised by them that the monkeys that were running loose had to be put down immediately for the safety of the public and the safety of the traveling public on Interstate 59,” the deputy said. According to the narrative, the deputy tried to gather more information on the monkeys and where they were being transported to. “I was advised that I could not be given that information due to a privacy contract,” the deputy said. Another deputy’s incident narrative states that the monkeys were being transported from Tulane to a testing facility in Maryland. Body camera footage shows the responding law enforcement officers firing at the monkeys, shooting at them until they were “not injured, but deceased,” according to documents from the Jasper County Sheriff’s Department. According to a document displaying the points of contact from the gunfire, shots were fired “at the main body of the animal to put it down to ensure it was not injured, but deceased.” The driver of the truck carrying the monkeys has been identified as Andre Malcom, who was working for the transport company Wildlife Facilitators. According to a Google search, the company is based in Thurmont, Maryland, which supports deputies’ claims about the truck’s destination. WDAM reached out to Callan Hahn, the owner of the company, by phone for comment about the incident. He politely declined to answer questions, saying, “If I’m involved in anything on the news here, I’m out of business.” PreLabs said in a press release Monday that the monkeys “were being lawfully transported in compliance with all federal and state regulations to a licensed research facility.” The 13 monkeys who remained caged despite the crash arrived at their original destination last week, according to Tulane.
