250 Muslim Families Killing Lambs At Farm Is A Health Risk

[Animal 0]

250 Muslim Families Killing Lambs At Farm Is A Health Risk, State Says



By Mandy Locke



SMITHFIELD (NewsObserver) Dec. 15, 2007 - At the state's urging, a Johnston County judge on Friday told a farmer he couldn't open his farm next week to Muslim families planning to slaughter lambs as part of an annual religious celebration.



The order means that about 250 Muslim families in Wake County will have to make other arrangements for slaughtering lambs they bought in advance of the three-day festival known as Eid al-Adha, or Festival of the Sacrifice, which begins Wednesday. Eddie Rowe left the courtroom Friday afternoon carrying a black book full of names of people who bought a lamb and the right to kill it on his farm next week.



His father, Kenneth Rowe, shook his head, saying, "They just can't mess with religion like that. It ain't right. The Bible says so."


The Rowes have long been in a tangle with the state over the mass slaughter of lambs on their 300-acre Princeton farm. State agriculture officials say the Rowes must build a custom slaughter facility, which the family says would cost $740,000. State officials say mass slaughters conducted any other way are unsanitary and threaten an outbreak of disease.


"When engineers, lawyers and students who have limited contact with animals come down from suburban centers to slaughter an animal, that's exactly the kind of high risk of spreading disease we're talking about," Barry Bloch, a lawyer with the state Attorney General's office, told Johnston County Superior Court Judge Tom Lock, who issued a 10-day injunction against the slaughters.


The two sides have been in court before, and in 2005, the Rowes preserved their right to carry on the tradition. The state Department of Agriculture fined them $10,000 for the practice the same year, though. The Rowes have yet to pay.



Despite the feud, the state's request for a restraining order took the Rowes by surprise Friday. Department of Agriculture representatives showed up at their farm late Friday morning and alerted the Rowes they planned to ask a judge to put an emergency stop to the slaughter planned for the festival.



The Rowes' customers paid $160 a lamb for Eid al-Adha, a holiday in which Muslims thank God for their blessings and their ability to share them with others. As part of the rituals of Eid al-Adha, many Muslims go to a local farm or slaughterhouse and buy a lamb or other animal to be slaughtered and shared among family, friends and charity.



Some Muslims, including those doing business with the Rowes, kill the animal themselves, in accordance with Muslim dietary laws. To be "halal," or permitted, the animal must be killed with a sharp knife across the throat. Both carotid arteries must be cut at once so that the animal bleeds quickly and dies quietly. A prayer is said before the knife is drawn.



The state can't stop the Rowes' customers from taking their lambs back to subdivisions in Cary and Raleigh and slaughtering them in the privacy of their own yard. The state law exempts people who kill animals of their own raising that they don't intend to sell.



But Glenn Barfield, the Rowes' attorney, said that being forced to kill the animals in their backyards will prevent customers from slaughtering the animals altogether, denying them their right to practice their religion.



Subdivision slaughter



Barfield also argued it was less sanitary to do it at a home.



"Once you've accepted home slaughter is OK, you must ask, is it better to do it one by one at a home or at a farm out in the country?" Barfield asked.



MAS Freedom, a national organization with a branch in Raleigh, offers an alternative Eid al-Adha observance, according to local director Khalilah Sabra. Muslims pool their money, and the foundation arranges for cows to be killed at licensed slaughterhouses.



The meat is delivered to a market, where it is cut and distributed by the society's service corps to charities.



"I think it would be better, more spiritually worthwhile, to utilize what's been arranged in the various Muslim communities, and let it benefit all of the community and not just the Muslims," Sabra said Friday night. "I think there's more of a spirit of giving."



As for the Rowes' operation, Barfield said the only way to undo the judge's halt on the slaughters would be to have some of the Rowes' customers challenge the order next week. Arguing that the order impedes their religious freedoms might have more sway with the judge, Barfield said.



Still, the state said it means to keep the Rowes from hosting these mass slaughters for good and will soon ask the judge to make the block permanent.



(Staff writer Orla Swift contributed to this report.)

mandy.locke@newsobserver.com or (919) 829-8927

http://www.masnet.org/news.asp?id=4624
Muslim American Society