PETA has filed a Virginia Freedom of Information Act lawsuit against Virginia Tech, alleging that the university is unlawfully withholding records of experiments that resulted in the deaths of four minipigs.

Last year, PETA, an animal rights nonprofit headquartered in Norfolk, requested photos and videos of the experiments, in which lab staff administered high-pressure blasts to the brains of several Gottingen minipigs, after obtaining records from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. According to PETA, Virginia Tech refused to provide them, stating that those records are exempt under Virginia’s open records law.

In March 2024, the USDA cited Virginia Tech for seven separate alleged violations of the Animal Welfare Act between 2021 and 2023. The first alleged violation, dated Feb. 4, 2021

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