YEMASSEE, S.C. — Two more monkeys that escaped last week from a South Carolina research facility were recaptured Tuesday, according to the facility's CEO, bringing the total number of primates caught and returned to 32 since the incident. Eleven monkeys are still on the loose.
Greg Westergaard, the chief executive officer of the facility Alpha Genesis, in Yemassee, South Carolina, told CBS News that both of the newly-trapped monkeys were healthy and enjoying a meal of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Fruit Loops were also "planned for dessert," Westergaard said.
He added none of the monkeys, rhesus macaque primates used for biomedical study, showed signs of "ill effects from their adventure" and all continued "to do well."
But Westergaard's company has come under scrutiny from a federal lawmaker who criticized the lab for negligence and alleged the laboratory has performed harmful experiments on monkeys for years. Rep. Nancy Mace, whose South Carolina jurisdiction includes Yemassee, penned a letter to animal welfare officials at the National Institutes of Health and the U.S. Department of Agriculture, raising concerns about operations at the research facility in light of the monkeys' escape.
"We are writing with urgent concerns regarding federal oversight of Alpha Genesis, a company which manages a nonhuman primate breeding and experimentation laboratory located in my Congressional district," Mace wrote in the letter. She said the laboratory received $19 million in federal funding just this year "to breed, confine and experiment on primates at its facilities in South Carolina."
Mace said that records show the primates are subjected to "painful and deadly experiments."
"While in the care of Alpha Genesis, monkeys have frozen to death, died of dehydration, and been killed by other distressed primates," Mace wrote in the letter, while requesting a briefing on the situation.
Mace pointed out that monkeys have escaped before from Alpha Genesis, and said federal inspectors had cited the company for violating the Animal Welfare Act as recently as September 2022. CBS News has asked Alpha Genesis to respond to Mace's allegations.
An investigation by CBS affiliate WTOC found that in 2022, Alpha Genesis received eight violations from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, including a housing facilities violation and a veterinary violation.
The report found that the first eight months of 2022, six monkeys were placed in wrong enclosures – one animal was found dead from "trauma caused by the resident animals in the enclosure," and four animals required subsequent veterinary care
On Wednesday, 43 monkeys being held at the research facility in Yemassee, South Carolina broke loose from their enclosure after a caretaker accidentally failed to secure the gate, Westergaard told CBS News. Of 50 primates inside, only seven stayed behind as the rest of the group proceeded to roam free just outside of the facility property.
Westergaard likened the state of affairs to "a playground situation" and said at the time the animals were "just being goofy monkeys jumping back and forth playing with each other." Attempts to bait the creatures initially failed, and local police warned residents in the area to secure the doors and windows of their homes to prevent any of the escaped primates from entering.
With 11 of the monkeys still on the loose, Westergaard said Tuesday that recovery crews felt they had developed some solid leads to find the runaways.
"Late this afternoon we spotted a few more monkeys close to the traps, and heard others cooing in the forest," he told CBS News. "We'll be back at it before dawn tomorrow and will continue for as long as it takes. We appreciate the continued support from the community, and from the public at large as well."
