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http://www.foxnews.com/wires/2007Nov24/0,4670,MonkeyMeat,00.html
Monkey Meat at Center of NYC Court Case
Saturday, November 24, 2007
NEW YORK - From her baptism in Liberia to Christmas years later in her
adopted New York City, Mamie Manneh never lost the longing to celebrate
religious rituals by eating monkey meat.
Now, the tribal customs of Manneh and other West African immigrants have
become the focus of an unusual criminal case charging her with meat
smuggling, and touching on issues of religious freedom, infectious diseases
and wildlife preservation.
The case "appears to be the first of its kind relating to that uniquely
African product," defense attorney Jan Rostal wrote in a pending motion to
dismiss. "Unfortunately, it represents the sort of clash of cultural and
religious values inherent in the melting pot that is America."
At the center of the case in federal court is a modest woman with nine
children and a history of domestic discord.
Manneh, 39, is serving a two-year sentence in state prison for trying to run
over a woman she suspected of sleeping with her husband, Zanger Jefferson.
If convicted of the federal charges she faces up to five more years in
prison and deportation.
"The government's taking a woman away from her children," complained
Jefferson, who's struggling to raise the children alone. "It's very
depressing, especially with the holidays right around the corner."
The federal prosecution also has dampened spirits at the church in Staten
Island where Manneh and other African immigrants once packed the pews to
practice a religion blending Christianity and tribal customs.
One of the few worshippers left, Leona Artis, says the congregation's
appetite for monkey meat is deeply misunderstood.
Take Thanksgiving.
"Where some people have turkey, we'll have monkey meat," Artis said. "Nobody
ever ate it, got sick and died from it. I've been eating it all my life.
It's delicious."
The monkey meat case dates to early 2006, when federal inspectors at JFK
Airport examined a shipment of 12 cardboard boxes from Guinea.
They were addressed to Manneh and, according to a flight manifest, contained
African dresses and smoked fish with a value of $780.
Instead, stashed underneath the smoked fish, the inspectors found what West
Africans refer to as bushmeat: "skulls, limbs and torsos of non-human
primate species" plus the hoof and leg of a small antelope, according to
court papers.
Three days later, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service agents were at Manneh's
door, where she told them she ran a smoked fish importing business.
According to the agents, she initially denied ordering any bushmeat from
Africa or ever eating it while in the United States.
But after she consented to a search, the agents came across a tiny, hairy
arm hidden in her garage.
"Monkey," she explained, claiming the arm was sent to her out of the blue
"as a gift from God in heaven."
Federal prosecutors hit Manneh with smuggling charges that accused her of
violating import procedures and suggested she was a menace to man and beast
alike.
A criminal complaint cited evidence that the illegal importation of bushmeat
encourages the slaughter of protected wild animals.
More ominously, the complaint warned of "the potential health risks to
humans linking bushmeat to diseases like Lassa fever, Ebola, HIV, SARS and
monkeypox."
Defense attorney Rostal has countered by accusing the government of picking
on a poorly educated immigrant.
Her client's only offense, she said, was her inability to grasp Western
attitudes and highly technical regulations regarding bushmeat.
Defense papers also argue that the U.S. demand for the meat involved in the
Manneh case _ from Africa's green monkey population _ is "too small to have
any significance for conservation."
Manneh testified last year that before arriving in the United States more
than 25 years ago, monkey meat was critical to her religious upbringing.
At age 7, "I was baptized and they used that for the baptizing ceremony,"
she told a judge.
Baptisms, Easter, Christmas, weddings _ all are occasions for eating monkey,
Manneh's supporters said in a sworn statement filed with the court.
The statement was vague about how the meat is obtained, but explains that it
always arrives dried and smoked. Once blessed by a pastor, "we usually
prepare it by cooking it for several hours into a stew," they said.
For them, the exotic import is more than just food.
"We eat bushmeat," they said, "for our souls."
Monkey Meat at Center of NYC Court Case
Saturday, November 24, 2007
NEW YORK - From her baptism in Liberia to Christmas years later in her
adopted New York City, Mamie Manneh never lost the longing to celebrate
religious rituals by eating monkey meat.
Now, the tribal customs of Manneh and other West African immigrants have
become the focus of an unusual criminal case charging her with meat
smuggling, and touching on issues of religious freedom, infectious diseases
and wildlife preservation.
The case "appears to be the first of its kind relating to that uniquely
African product," defense attorney Jan Rostal wrote in a pending motion to
dismiss. "Unfortunately, it represents the sort of clash of cultural and
religious values inherent in the melting pot that is America."
At the center of the case in federal court is a modest woman with nine
children and a history of domestic discord.
Manneh, 39, is serving a two-year sentence in state prison for trying to run
over a woman she suspected of sleeping with her husband, Zanger Jefferson.
If convicted of the federal charges she faces up to five more years in
prison and deportation.
"The government's taking a woman away from her children," complained
Jefferson, who's struggling to raise the children alone. "It's very
depressing, especially with the holidays right around the corner."
The federal prosecution also has dampened spirits at the church in Staten
Island where Manneh and other African immigrants once packed the pews to
practice a religion blending Christianity and tribal customs.
One of the few worshippers left, Leona Artis, says the congregation's
appetite for monkey meat is deeply misunderstood.
Take Thanksgiving.
"Where some people have turkey, we'll have monkey meat," Artis said. "Nobody
ever ate it, got sick and died from it. I've been eating it all my life.
It's delicious."
The monkey meat case dates to early 2006, when federal inspectors at JFK
Airport examined a shipment of 12 cardboard boxes from Guinea.
They were addressed to Manneh and, according to a flight manifest, contained
African dresses and smoked fish with a value of $780.
Instead, stashed underneath the smoked fish, the inspectors found what West
Africans refer to as bushmeat: "skulls, limbs and torsos of non-human
primate species" plus the hoof and leg of a small antelope, according to
court papers.
Three days later, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service agents were at Manneh's
door, where she told them she ran a smoked fish importing business.
According to the agents, she initially denied ordering any bushmeat from
Africa or ever eating it while in the United States.
But after she consented to a search, the agents came across a tiny, hairy
arm hidden in her garage.
"Monkey," she explained, claiming the arm was sent to her out of the blue
"as a gift from God in heaven."
Federal prosecutors hit Manneh with smuggling charges that accused her of
violating import procedures and suggested she was a menace to man and beast
alike.
A criminal complaint cited evidence that the illegal importation of bushmeat
encourages the slaughter of protected wild animals.
More ominously, the complaint warned of "the potential health risks to
humans linking bushmeat to diseases like Lassa fever, Ebola, HIV, SARS and
monkeypox."
Defense attorney Rostal has countered by accusing the government of picking
on a poorly educated immigrant.
Her client's only offense, she said, was her inability to grasp Western
attitudes and highly technical regulations regarding bushmeat.
Defense papers also argue that the U.S. demand for the meat involved in the
Manneh case _ from Africa's green monkey population _ is "too small to have
any significance for conservation."
Manneh testified last year that before arriving in the United States more
than 25 years ago, monkey meat was critical to her religious upbringing.
At age 7, "I was baptized and they used that for the baptizing ceremony,"
she told a judge.
Baptisms, Easter, Christmas, weddings _ all are occasions for eating monkey,
Manneh's supporters said in a sworn statement filed with the court.
The statement was vague about how the meat is obtained, but explains that it
always arrives dried and smoked. Once blessed by a pastor, "we usually
prepare it by cooking it for several hours into a stew," they said.
For them, the exotic import is more than just food.
"We eat bushmeat," they said, "for our souls."
