Seven complaints were filed on Wednesday March 12 by the L214 animalist association with the Saint-Brieuc prosecution (Côtes-d’Armor) and one near the Saint-Malo prosecution (Ille-et-Vilaine) against eight owners of pig farms, all located in the Côtes-d’Armor and providing the E. Leclerc supermarkets.
One of his complaints led the prosecution to open an investigation, said the France-Presse (AFP) agency (AFP), Fabrice Tremel, a public prosecutor of Saint-Malo.
Filmed in October and November 2024, The photos and videos broadcast Thursday by the association Show pigs living on their slurry, sows enclosed in narrow cages, and corpses of porcelets in advanced decomposition, abandoned in the middle of the animals.
“The fact that it is eight distinct farms shows that these are not isolated abnormalities but a structural, institutional cruelty, almost endorsed by Leclerc”denounces, to AFP, Amber Bernard, campaign manager against intensive farming for L214. In March 2024, the association had filed a complaint against a breeder with two pig farms in Morbihan also providing Leclerc stores, said Mme Bernard.
“Leclerc’s response was each time to say that these are exceptions and we stop working with these farms”she explains. “But we no longer want to hear their apologies, we want a firm commitment against these illegal practices”adds the representative of the association.
“Putting the breeders in the right direction”
In the eight farms targeted on Thursday, the piglets were mutilated without anesthesia and the pigs “Spend their lives locked up in buildings, without any access to the outside”denounces L214. Collected, sows cannot turn around “During half of their existence”.
“Beyond the criminal complaint, we aim for an E.Leclerc reaction because it is they who give the industry by stirring completely stammered volumes: they must push the breeders in the right direction”plead mme Bernard.
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In September 2024, the Saint-Brieuc prosecutor’s office said they opened a preliminary investigation following a complaint from L214 “For animal abuse” Aiming for a porcine farm in Côtes-d’Armor, whose pigs were then slaughtered in an E. Leclerc slaughterhouse. On February 20, L214 also filed a complaint against two partner pig farms from the Lidl France food distributor.