Media Coverage About SAEN Stop Animal Exploitation Now

New Mexico Tech assistant professor disciplined after investigation reveals mice abused, neglected in study

From Rick  Nathanson, ABQJournal.com, March 5, 2023

A researcher using laboratory mice at the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology in Socorro has had his research privileges terminated after allegations surfaced that the rodents were not being cared for properly.

Concerns about the mouse colony, used as part of a federally funded cancer study, were first reported by a staff member in 2021 and only brought to light last week in a written complaint to New Mexico Tech President Stephen Wells from Michael A. Budkie, executive director of the animal rights organization Stop Animal Exploitation NOW!, or SAEN.

The complaint asked Wells to “take immediate action to correct serious abuses” regarding the animal research at the university, and that the university return the federal money used to fund the research.

In response, the university said the alleged abuse was reported, investigated and corrective action taken. It also acknowledged that there was enough evidence to substantiate the allegations.

Federal funding for the mouse study was $95,166, of which $47,280 was spent before the project was terminated, according to Mikell Coleman, the university’s director of research compliance. The unspent portion had not yet been awarded, so there’s nothing to return, and “the process in cases like this does not include returning the expended funds,” Coleman, said.

In his complaint, Budkie reviewed specific abuses that reportedly occurred, including leaving mice without food or water, “some of whom resorted to cannibalism,” and allowing inexperienced personnel and undergraduate students to conduct surgical procedures on living mice without supervision.

The incidents of alleged abuse and neglect, as well as violations of protocol and record keeping, all occurred in 2021.

The reason SAEN, which is based in Milford, Ohio, is now filing the complaint letter with the university is because the documents regarding the university’s investigation and disposition of the allegations were only recently obtained via a Freedom of Information Act request, “and that process is never quick,” Budkie said Tuesday.

The university had filed the paperwork with the federal government because the animal research was federally funded, and for labs to be eligible for that funding they must show that the care provided to animals is in compliance with federal standards, Budkie said.

In responding to questions from the Journal, raised by SAEN’s release of its letter on Feb. 27, Coleman said in a statement that in addition to termination of the researcher’s privileges, funding for the research was terminated voluntarily by the university, which “effectively ended that type of research at New Mexico Tech.

Coleman also noted that the researcher, Stewart Thompson, an assistant professor of psychology and education, was a member of the university’s Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee, the governing body that approves and reviews animal research practices. Thompson was subsequently “disallowed from participating in the investigation in any capacity other than as its subject,” Coleman said.

Documents received via the FOIA, also made available by SAEN, showed that the university’s Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee determined that there was enough evidence to substantiate the allegations.

New Mexico Tech reported those findings to the National Institutes of Health Office for Laboratory Animal Welfare.

“The IACUC and Research Compliance staff take animal welfare seriously,” Coleman said. “The conduct was discovered and reported, thoroughly investigated, and subsequently adjudicated. The corrective actions taken were the most severe actions the IACUC and the New Mexico Tech Research Office had the authority to take.”

See also:
Return to Media Coverage