In April, WCW launched a billboard campaign to expose how the Stokes Veterans Affairs Medical Center (VAMC) in Cleveland, OH is one of only three VA facilities still conducting painful taxpayer-funded experiments on dogs. 

Now, documents obtained by WCW through the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) show that from March 2016 through March 2017 Stokes spent $38,000 of taxpayers’ money to purchase 30 mixed-breed hounds for use in invasive and deadly lung experiments.

The dogs included puppies, retired breeders, and dogs described in Stokes’ records as “friendly,” “shy & submissive” and “skittish.”  Stokes experimented on and killed some of the dogs within days of their first birthday.

In late April, Stokes VAMC told the Washington Free Beacon that all five of the dogs it purchased in March 2017 were “adopted out.”  They weren’t. The new records obtained by WCW show that Stokes had killed three of these dogs more than a month before. The other two dogs were adopted out, and coincidentally (or not) the decision to do so was made on the exact same day that WCW sent Stokes a request for records related to all dogs currently being used in experiments.

Of the 30 dogs purchased with taxpayers’ money by the Stokes VAMC from March 2016-March 2017, 27 were killed in experiments.

These revelations about VA misleading the public about its dog experiments follow WCW and media criticized the VA for denying its own well-documented evidence that it uses puppies in painful experiments at the Richmond VA.