“Gypsy Lawson took the rhesus macaque monkey on a flight from Thailand to Los Angeles in the United States. The 29-year-old drugged it with sleeping pills and hid it under her blouse during the trip. A month later she bragged about the monkey she called Apoo to a shop assistant who then called police.”

Seems pretty cut and dried, but there was an interesting wrinkle to the story. Seems that Ms. Lawson is a Pagan and turned to a local Pagan e-list for magical/energetic “help” in smuggling the monkey out of Thailand.

“On their way back, Ogren reportedly emailed an online witches and pagan community asking for “last-minute energy” to help them smuggle the animal.”

Doing some more digging, I found a Spokesman Review article from July that gives a bit more detail regarding this online request.

“The following day, the indictment alleges, Ogren sent an e-mail to “NE Washington Witches and Pagans” at a Yahoo account “and asked for last-minute energy” to help them safely smuggle the monkey into the United States. “The Witches group replied by e-mail ‘consider it done,’ ” the indictment says.”

I can’t seem to find the list at Yahoogroups any longer, so perhaps the negative publicity forced it to close down, but a serious question remains: why didn’t these Pagans realize an illegal act was taking place and report it? Indeed, why did Witches and Pagans offer spiritual aid to enable this foolish woman to smuggle an animal into the country? Leaving aside the serious legal issues involved here, there are also moral and health-related issues involved in keeping primates as pets.

“If you try to keep them as pets you’re creating a mentally disturbed animal in 99.9 percent of the cases,” said Wright, director of conservation, science and sanctuary at the zoo. “The animal will never be able to fit in any other home. Never learn how to get along with other monkeys. And, more often than not, will end up with a lot of behavioral traits that are self-destructive.”

The article about Lawson’s conviction should have read “she bragged about the monkey she called Apoo to a local Pagan list, many members of that group then called the police”*, that it didn’t should cause us to examine why members of the Pagan community were enablers in this drama rather than heroes. As for “Apoo” the monkey, he is now safe at a primate rescue center in Oregon.

* This isn’t to say we should all become informants for any perceived or suspected violation of law, there is a range of justifiable opinion on certain ordinances, and such a thing as unjust laws, but the ethical course here was rather plain and obvious.
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