A global ring accused of producing and spreading videos of monkeys being tortured and even killed has been exposed by an investigation by the BBC’s World Service. At least 20 people in the United States and two in Indonesia are under investigation, including an Oregon man who was indicted last week. The investigation found hundreds of customers in the U.S. and other nations had joined social media groups used to share the disturbing content and were paying to see the torture of long-tailed macaques, even requesting specific forms of abuse.
According to a statement from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Oregon, David Christopher Noble, 48, was arrested on June 13 and charged two days later with having “knowingly conspired with others to view, encourage, and fund animal crush videos as part of an online group using an encrypted chat application.”
Three other people suspected of involvement in the ring are U.S. nationals Mike McCartney, known by his online moniker “The Torture King”; Stacey Storey, a grandmother in her 40s from Alabama known online as “Sadistic”; and a man whose real name the BBC withheld but who used the screenname “Mr. Ape,” who allegedly ran one of the biggest online torture groups from his mother’s home in Florida.