CAMDEN COUNTY, MO (KMOX) - U.S Marshals arrested 55-year old Tonia Haddix Saturday afternoon in Camden County after a Missouri state court judge found four companies affiliated with the wild animal broker and her husband, Jerry Aswegan, in contempt of court for ignoring orders to hand over financial records and other related documents to PETA.
Tonia Haddix was released from the Camden County Sheriff's Department (Sunday) morning. Her husband was not arrested, but is expected to be according to a release from PETA.
PETA Foundation General Counsel for Captive Animal Law Enforcement Brittany Peet has released the following statement:
"PETA spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to find Tonka, get him out of the cage in Tonia Haddix's basement, and move him to the spacious sanctuary where he's now thriving, and Haddix can't keep dodging the court's orders to pay back the money she owes. PETA trusts this jail time will be just a taste of the longer sentence she'll face next month.
Haddix pleaded guilty earlier this year to two counts of perjury and one count of obstructing justice for lying to a federal judge about Tonka's whereabouts and disobeying a court order to surrender him to PETA, as revealed in HBO's Emmy-nominated Chimp Crazy docuseries.
In 2023, PETA served Aswegan with a subpoena for the documents as part of its efforts to collect the $225,000 in attorneys' fees and costs Haddix had been ordered to pay after she lied to the court. Aswegan ignored PETA's subpoena, forcing PETA to file a motion in November asking a federal judge to order him to respond and find him in contempt. The federal judge granted the motion and later gave Aswegan a deadline to defend himself against the civil contempt accusation, which Aswegan missed. PETA then subpoenaed the companies directly through the state court.
