Verona, beagle dogs mistreated for drug testing: multinational reported

Beagle dogs, used as guinea pigs and subjected to drug experiments and tests without respecting ministerial protocols, are also victims of mistreatment up to and including death caused by the tests themselves or by euthanasia. They were discovered by the Carabinieri of the Cites group together with the soldiers of the Investigative Unit of the Environmental and Forestry Police of Verona, who denounced a Venetian multinational pharmaceutical company and some of its staff.

Serious irregularities

In particular, it emerged that 14 people - including representatives of the multinational known in the pharmaceutical research and development sector, Aptuit of Verona - were reported for serious irregularities in the detention and use for the purposes of experimentation of numerous beagle specimens. Seventeen beagles, fortunately, were found still alive and were saved, before being entrusted to associations for the necessary care and essential physical and psychological rehabilitation.

The inspections

In addition to the company managers, managers and veterinary doctors of the local health authority of Verona were also reported by the Carabinieri for "ideological falsehood committed by the public official in public documents", since - it was reported by the investigators themselves - "by declaring falsely in the reports relating to the inspections assigned to them at the premises of the Aptuit headquarters, they guaranteed the multinational the possibility of continuing with the criminal conduct already in progress and subsequently ascertained". During the investigations, several inspections and searches were carried out, including digital searches, thanks to the use of specialized IT expert personnel. An enormous amount of documentation was in fact acquired and examined by the investigators who, in this regard, also made use of well-known technical consultants specialized in the matter.

The investigation

The investigation, called "Beagle nightmare" and which lasted almost two years, had been delegated by the Public Prosecutor's Office at the Court of Verona even after inspections previously carried out at the disposal of the Council of State as part of a series of administrative disputes.