NYC Woman in MONKEY MEAT Smuggling Trouble
Photo: Mamie Manneh, Monkey & Meat from Recipezaar
A few years ago, I watched a PBS special on 'bushmeat' or monkey meat in Africa and how the gorillas and monkeys populations were briskly being decimated, due to the high demand for food in many countries. The meat was sold on the black market and in some places openly. I sat in horror as I watched the meat being sold, and the footage of the dead carcasses, but I did not think for once, that the meat would be the center of a court case here in the U.S.
I know many would argue, including monkey meat eaters, and Koreans who eat dog meat, that their eating of monkeys and dogs is no different from people eating beef, chicken, pork, or fish. Bushmeat can be any wild animal. Okay. I get it. But MONKEY??? LOL. It's still a big yuck for me. I don't condemn those who eat it, but monkeys are too high up on the food chain for me. Next is humans. If you have tasted monkey meat before, and it tastes like anything other than chicken, please let me know in vivid detail what it tastes like. An inquiring mind wants to know. Thanks.
Back to the story. Mamie Manneh, 39, a Staten Island resident and native of Liberia is fighting a federal monkey meat case. She is currently in jail for for trying run over a lady she suspected of sleeping with her husband, according to AP news.
AP reports:
"One of the few worshippers left, Leona Artis, says the congregation's appetite for monkey meat is deeply misunderstood.
Take Thanksgiving.
"Where some people have turkey, we'll have monkey meat," Artis said. "Nobody ever ate it, got sick and died from it. I've been eating it all my life. It's delicious."
The monkey meat case dates to early 2006, when federal inspectors at JFK Airport examined a shipment of 12 cardboard boxes from Guinea.
They were addressed to Manneh and, according to a flight manifest, contained African dresses and smoked fish with a value of $780.
Instead, stashed underneath the smoked fish, the inspectors found what West Africans refer to as bushmeat: "skulls, limbs and torsos of non-human primate species" plus the hoof and leg of a small antelope, according to court papers.
Three days later, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service agents were at Manneh's door, where she told them she ran a smoked fish importing business." READ MORE...
The New York Times reports:
"A case that came before a federal judge in Brooklyn this week may — some believe for the first time — send someone to prison for importing bushmeat — in this case, pieces of baboon, green monkey and warthog.
No law specifically bans their importation, but Mamie Manneh, 39, of Staten Island, an immigrant from Liberia, is accused of falsely labeling her delivery and failing to obtain proper permits, charges that could bring a maximum prison sentence of five years. Her lawyer has made a motion to dismiss the indictment, arguing that bushmeat has spiritual significance and Ms. Manneh’s actions were protected under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act."
Photo Credit: Monkey Meat, Recipezaar.com
I'm not so sure I'd trust monkey meat from a health perspective either.