My breast is not a handle!

Here's a story of being assaulted at peaceful protest by a crazed, pervy Culpepper & Merriweather Circus carnie-guy while members of Evansville Lion's club stand by watching, laughing. Evansville police protect buddies and refuse to make arrest, thus retaining the reputation they've so earned throughout the state. Since I'm lazy and way too verbose, I'm just pasting my official statement here, below. What an adventure!

While photographing the dilapidated animal ‘housing’, Allegrea noticed a small dog, wandering around the parking lot. She called my attention to it, and we both moved closer to watch the dog and see if there was a person nearby who was watching the dog. I asked two small groups of elderly people if it was their dog or if they saw where it came from, and they said, “no”. Allegrea picked up the dog, because leaving the dog to wander the parking lot was too dangerous. She checked the collar tag, which showed the name ‘Peanut’ and had a phone number. There was no rabies tag and no other information on the collar/tag. As we always do in such situations, we called the police department (because there isn’t a local humane society) to come get the dog.

While we were standing in the same spot in the parking lot, one of the circus folk yelled over that it was their dog. As we had been standing there inquiring about the dog for around 10 minutes, and none of them had spoken up, we were a bit dubious of their claim. Small ‘designer’ dogs like Peanut are often falsely claimed, because of their potential resale value and/or breeding possibilities. We told them that we had already called the police, and they were on their way, and if they could show proof of ownership and vaccination, the police would return the dog to them. Various circus folk yelled things at us about stealing their dog, killing their animals, etc. We pointed out that we were standing in the exact same location we had been standing, and the police were coming to resolve this issue shortly. I then asked Rose if she could call again, because it had been nearly 20 minutes since her last call, and I was worried about the way the situation seemed to be escalating—particularly since I had two young children there with me.

This situation continued, and Rose again called the police to see what was taking so long. They said they were en route. Again, still standing in full view, I tended the dog in front of them, telling them what I was doing, so they couldn’t falsely accuse me of anything strange. I told them that I was going to wipe all the goo from the dogs little eyes with a tissue, and proceeded to do so. I then told them I was going to brush off all of the massive quantities of doggy dandruff from his back, and did so. I then said that the dog was cold, and I was going to wrap my sweater around him, and I did so. At this point, we noticed a very strange, disturbing looking man exit the trailer and seemingly beelining toward Allegrea, who was holding the dog. He looked very threatening and had a very drugged-out look in his eyes. This is where things became very weird and happened very quickly. I’m still shocked by the whole thing!

Somehow, without speaking, Les and I knew we had to protect Allegrea and the dog. They are both very tiny. Without a word, we stepped in front of Allegrea to block him from reaching her. We had been standing between two cars in the parking lot, so when Les and I stood shoulder to shoulder, there wasn’t room to pass through to get to Allegrea and Peanut. Allegrea yelled out to him, to not touch her—that she did not want to be touched. As activists, we’ve been trained that, if confronted with violence, we shout clearly that we do not want to be touched and back off. After making our wishes clear, we then become passive and do not touch back. Without stopping or slowing, he kept walking, using his hands to grab and shove me to the side. Les is much smaller than me, and was fairly easily shoved aside. I’m a big, burly girl and it took a bit more effort to move me. I attempted to hold my ground without fighting back at all.

I chose not to fight back, only to resist passively. I’ve been an Animal Rights’ activist for 20 years, and know exactly how it goes, particularly in small towns. Had I attempted to DEFEND myself at all, I knew that as an AR person in a small town, I would be hauled in and arrested for the self-defense. Since we had witnesses (which is unusual in an AR-related physical assault) and a video camera, I felt that as long as none of us offered anything other than complete passive resistance, there would be no room for questions or police misinterpretation.

I don’t have the name of the assailant, so I will hereby refer to him as Mr. CrazyMethGuy. I felt the struggle and shove against my arm, and ironically, he was initially unable to shove me out of the way because he had stepped his full weight on my right foot, right on top of my big toe and the excruciatingly painful bunion that remains swollen and sore. Once he moved his big, dirty foot, I felt his hand on my right breast. It was at that moment that I freaked out. I’m a middle-aged woman, and nobody but my husband touches my breasts, for god’s sakes, so I certainly wasn’t expecting to feel the entire filthy paw of Mr. CrazyMethGuy on my breast. Needless to say, it hurt in a way I can’t really express. He was successfully able to shove me out of the way and get to Allegrea.

There was one, for certain, and possibly two of the Lion’s club members leaning against a car diagonally from us in the parking lot. I remember thinking, why haven’t they moved?! I screamed then, “help!”, “assault”, “we are being assaulted”, “rape”, with each screaming becoming more desperate and angry that these “men” just sat there and didn’t help. It was obvious that there was one crazy man assaulting women who were screaming for help, meanwhile, my children were standing there terrified. I noticed that Allegrea was bent over backwards on the trunk of the car near us, with him on top of her, crushing her and the dog. He had her face smashed sideways onto the car trunk. I started to approach him, seeing at this point that I had a totally clear shot and could have dropped him. Again, I chose not to muck up the issue, certain that the police would arrive at any second.

Despite their lack of help, it never crossed my mind that the Lion’s club members would completely lie about the incident. I chalked up their lack of interference as perhaps due to their advanced age, or lack of ability to physically intervene. I truly never thought a member of a service club and an assumedly productive member of society/law-abiding citizen would condone assaulting women, and in front of small children. It is an embarrassment to the Lion’s International, to Evansville, and to their families, that they would fail to protect women and children, and then lie to cover the violent behavior of a transient, simply because said transient was helping them make money. I’m appalled and disgusted with them, as will be the public and Lion’s International!

Allegrea let go of the dog then, because Mr. CrazyMethGuy was squishing the dog. He had absolutely no regard or interest in whether the dog was being hurt as a result of his crazy, violent behavior. Apparently the dog is important enough to him to assault women who are kindly holding it while waiting for the police, but not important enough to oh, say, return him alive and in one piece. We did care for the dog, so Allegrea let go to protect Peanut.

Rose had to make yet another two calls to the police before an officer finally arrived. He seemed quite happy to see his Lion’s Club friends, but was extremely gruff with us. Despite doing absolutely nothing wrong and taking the high road at every single opportunity, I was spoken to in a very disrespectful, condescending, nearly hostile way. His demeanor, from the start, was completely different with us than it was with the Lion’s club members. Shortly after this, a backup officer arrived from Rock County. She very respectfully and patiently listened to all of the facts, and was professional and well-prepared throughout the remainder of our extended time with the police officers.

I left as soon as we finished with the police, because I had to remove the children from that very unsafe environment. The violent attacker was still at large, as were the other circus folk and Lion’s club members, who continued to pick, laugh, mock, and make rude statements out of the officer’s earshot. I did not trust that the children would be at all safe in Evansville. The remaining members of the group stayed on to finish up the demo. They were harassed by circus and Lion’s club folks the entire remainder of their time there.

I am still sore and bruised as a result of the attack. The police photographed the bruises left on my breast, where Mr. CrazyMethGuy grabbed and yanked. Additionally, my right arm is bruised—also his ‘fingerprints’, and my right foot is sore. My upper body is sore and stiff from pulled muscles. I am humiliated and embarrassed that I was the victim of such an attack, and moreso that I have had to have my breasts photographed and discussed.

---------------------- end of statement

Even worse, though, is Allegrea's condition. Her face is sore and has contusions. X-rays taken today determined that she has two sprains of her back and a jaw injury. It's really hard to remain non-violent when a big crazy man assaults your itty bitty best friend!

I have to add that this circus is the worst, sleazy, rundown, ghetto circus I've had the misfortune to encounter. The animal housing was small and rusty--very trashy. It was immediately apparent why this circus (really more of a carnival with a few sad large animals) has had so many incidents with animals escaping. They've also been investigated for child labor/work camp issues, but moved to another state. I will most certainly be contacting the state of OK to encourage them to investigate the many young girls that are working (and they travel and perform almost every day of the year!) there and living in close quarters with nasty, pervy, drugged out men who may or may not be in this country legally.