This week, the Federal Bureau of Investigation announced that it had added a 31-year-old American animal rights activist named Daniel Andreas San Diego to its list of “Most Wanted Terrorists.” Describing Mr. San Diego as a “domestic terrorist,” the F.B.I. warned that he “should be considered armed and dangerous.” According to the bureau, Mr. San Diego is wanted for the role he may have played in the bombings of two San Francisco-area office buildings.
The F.B.I. was careful to stress that it considers Mr. San Diego, and other extreme animal rights activists, worthy of being placed on a list headed by violent extremists like the leaders of Al Qaeda, Osama bin Laden and Ayman Al Zawahiri:
Animal rights and environmental extremism pose a significant domestic terror threat. To date, extremists have been responsible for more than 1,800 criminal acts and more than $110 million in damages. Currently, we are investigating approximately 170 such extremist incidents across the country.
San Diego, known to be involved with a group called SHAC - Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty - is wanted for his alleged involvement in bombing two biotech facilities that did business with Huntingdon Life Sciences, a company that conducts
animal experimentation for the medical
and pharmaceutical industries.
Huntingdon Life Sciences is a research company based in Cambridgeshire, England. The Times of London reports that the Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty campaign began “in the late 1990s when an undercover video showed employees holding a beagle puppy by the scruff of the neck and repeatedly punching it in the face.” According to SHAC.net, the Web site of the animal rights group, the disturbing footage of animal abuse was captured by a woman who worked undercover at the facility while making a documentary for a British television series called “Countryside Undercover.”
In the latest episode of the “Wanted by the F.B.I.” podcast, available on the F.B.I.’s Web site, or on iTunes, F.B.I. Special Agent Joe Schadler says that Mr. San Diego “advocated violence in connection with animal rights issues,” and may have planted a nail bomb alongside another bomb at a research facility “intended to harm or kill the first responders.”
On the Most Wanted poster for Mr. San Diego, the F.B.I. says that he may now be living in Costa Rica and explains what citizens wanting to claim the $250,000 reward for finding him should be on the look out for:
He is a vegan, and avoids consuming or wearing anything made with animal products. He also has distinctive tattoos - one on his chest is round and shows burning hills and plains with the words "It only takes a spark."
The F.B.I.’s character sketch also notes that he “is skilled at sailing” and “has worked as a computer network specialist and with the operating system Linux.”
This is not the first time animal rights activists have been called terrorists. In 1990, The Associated Press reported that Dr. Louis W. Sullivan, then the Secretary of Health and Human Services, said before a march in Washington by animal rights groups, including People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals: “I am saddened and a bit angry… that we have to put up with major disruptions to science by so-called animal activists who are, in fact, nothing more than animal rights terrorists.”
In an editorial on Wednesday, headlined “In defense of people,” the San Francisco Chronicle editorial board supported the F.B.I.’s pursuit of Mr. San Diego, a Marin County native, arguing that, “Activists who resort to deadly violence are terrorists, and should be treated as such.”
