Led by a professor whose car was set on fire last month in an anonymous attack, more than 400 UCLA scientists and their supporters rallied on campus Wednesday to defend research using animals and to protest the violent tactics of some opponents.
At almost the same time, about 40 critics of animal research demonstrated just across Westwood Boulevard from the pro-research gathering, and the two groups briefly traded slogans before marching to different UCLA plazas. Police reported no violence and no arrests.
With signs proclaiming, "Research Yes, Terror No," the larger rally was organized by UCLA neuroscientist J. David Jentsch. Police say Jentsch's car was destroyed by animal rights extremists near his home March 7 because he uses and sometimes kills vervet monkeys in research on schizophrenia and drug addiction. That incident, in which no one was injured, was the latest in a string of arson attacks and threats against UCLA scientists since 2006.
Jentsch said his rally's comparatively large turnout showed that many people wanted to speak out against the attacks and for the medical advances that he said animal research produces.
"Look around you and you will see the brightest minds on the West Coast on this street, right now. They are all here to support this cause," said Jentsch, who recently founded UCLA Pro-Test, which backs what it calls humane, regulated animal research.
Among the marchers was Dana Gant, who carried a placard that read, "Animal Research Saved My Mom," a reference she said was to new medicines that helped her mother survive breast cancer.
A UCLA researcher who uses mice and rats in seeking cures for Alzheimer's disease, Gant said she also attended the rally to decry anti-research violence, which she said shows "a lack of respect for human life."
This week, authorities announced the felony indictments of two people for allegedly harassing and threatening UCLA researchers, but no one has been charged in the most serious incidents, involving arson and vandalism. On Wednesday, authorities announced that the reward offered for information leading to an arrest and conviction in the Jentsch car burning had been increased to $75,000.
Besides Jentsch, speakers at the rally included Tom Holder, a leader of Pro-Test, a British group formed at Oxford University in 2006 in support of research, and UCLA professor Lynn Fairbanks, an animal behavior expert who has been a target of threats.
