DxE investigator and animal rescuer Zoe Rosenberg is on trial in Sonoma County, California. She is facing years in jail for rescuing four sick and injured chickens from Perdue’s Petaluma Poultry slaughterhouse. All media requests to record the trial have been denied, but you can follow along through these Court Watch summaries, on our Perdue Rescue Trial X account, on our Instagram, and on UnchainedTV. Check back regularly for new updates. Want to take action? Sign the petition at RightToRescue.com and share the news with your friends and family.

Monday, September 15th

WATCH RECAP VIDEO

Monday court covered pre-trial motions, which will determine how trial will unfold, including which witnesses will be allowed to testify and about what. The key decisions made by the judge today included that witnesses unfortunately will not be allowed to testify about investigations that occurred prior to 2023 or that occurred at facilities other than the Petaluma Poultry slaughterhouse, but that Zoe will be allowed to talk in a limited way about how these investigations influenced her beliefs and motivation. This includes how the decision by Sonoma County law enforcement to allow the rescue of Rose, one injured bird from a Petaluma Poultry factory farm, shaped her belief in the legal right to rescue animals. 

The judge also ruled that evidence regarding the conditions of the birds rescued by Zoe from the slaughterhouse will be allowed! Carla Cabral, the primary caretaker of the birds after they were rescued, will be allowed to testify, and it is very hopeful that their veterinary records will be allowed to be introduced as well. 

A lot of issues related to witnesses and their testimony were left unanswered and Judge Gnoss indicated that he will hold “402” hearings. In these hearings, attorneys will argue about the testimony in advance outside the presence of the jury. 

One other update is that Zoe is getting her ankle monitor removed. The judge agreed to the removal after Zoe’s attorney, Chris Carraway, argued that requiring Zoe to wear the monitor in the presence of the jury could bias them against her. 

Thanks for following along!

Tuesday, September 16th

Tuesday’s court sessions continued to cover pre-trial motions. Some of them were quite logistical, such as disclosing witness orders, or repeats and clarifications of discussions that happened yesterday (once again, the prosecution brought up the fact that the veterinary records were allowed in, and they tried once again to have the judge change his mind). The prosecution made several pre-trial motions including that

• The defense not be allowed to discuss the potential sentence 
  
  • The judge granted this
• The defense not be allowed to discuss why other people who also participated in the rescue were not charged 
  
  • We objected to this, and the judge ruled that we would be allowed to question Detective Joerger (a key investigator from the Petaluma Police Department) as to how many people were arrested and how many people she referred for prosecution
  • The point of this is that over a dozen people participated in the rescue, yet only Zoe and her prior co-defendant Raven were prosecuted 
• The defense not be allowed to introduce evidence to evoke sympathy for Zoe
  
  • The judge denied this due to it being too overbroad, but he indicated the prosecution could object if it feels they are being ‘prejudiced’ by a line of questioning
• The jurors be escorted in and out of the courtroom through a different route to avoid seeing the court supporters
  
  • The judge indicated he may address it if it becomes an issue, but did not make a ruling now
• The prosecution be allowed to question witnesses about their support and involvement in Measure J, a 2024 ballot measure to ban factory farms in Sonoma County
  
  • The judge denied this
• The prosecution be allowed to question witnesses about the investigatory manual that DxE released in fall 2023
  
  • The judge ruled that the prosecution would only be allowed to do this on cross-examination 

The prosecution also attempted to bring in evidence of Zoe’s other “bad acts” (i.e. other investigations and rescues, including rescues at Reichardt in 2019). The judge ruled that this would only be allowed in cross-examination if Zoe’s direct testimony “opens the door” to this. The judge also ruled that the prosecution will not be allowed to bring up other DxE actions unless the prosecution can show Zoe directly participated in or organized them. It’s clear that there will be an extensive discussion outside the jury between Zoe’s initial testimony and her cross-examination. 

With that, all pre-trial motions have been addressed! The issue of jury selection and scheduling was also discussed. Both sides have now come to an agreement about a jury questionnaire. A double panel of jurors will be called starting on Thursday afternoon. 

Wednesday, September 17th

Judge Gnoss does not hold trial court on Wednesdays so we're off today.

Thursday, September 18th

The long process of jury selection began today! About 80 potential jurors arrived at the courthouse in the afternoon and were given a brief overview of the case and a list of potential witnesses so that they could identify any conflicts of interest. They are all now aware that the case involves a felony conspiracy charge and has something to do with Petaluma Poultry. 

The judge is now estimating that the trial could go until the end of October! This obviously poses a large hardship on the jurors. All jurors claiming economic and personal hardship filled out forms to be evaluated by both sides. About half the jurors claimed hardship. The jurors not claiming hardship (or who had their hardship requests denied) were instructed to fill out the jury questionnaire that was previously agreed upon by both sides. After that, they were excused and instructed to return on September 29th (when the second part of jury selection for this group will resume). Both sides will be able to review the answers to the jury questionnaire in order to expedite the rest of jury selection; for example, if someone indicates on the questionnaire they are unable to be unbiased, they will be struck from the jury pool.

We expect another similarly sized pool of potential jurors to go through the same process tomorrow.

Friday, September 19th

Court today was an exact replica of yesterday with a new pool of about 80 jurors. Once again, over half the jurors were dismissed for hardship reasons. The length of the trial and the high profile nature of the case is making finding a jury extremely hard. For that reason, two more double panels of prospective jurors (nearly 200 more people) are being summoned for next week.

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