The home of a UCLA researcher was attacked for the second time in four months ““ likely by animal rights activists, university and law enforcement officials said Tuesday.
An incendiary device was left at the home of Edythe London, a professor of psychiatry and biobehavioral sciences and molecular and medical pharmacology at the David Geffen School of Medicine, who uses monkeys in her nicotine research.
FBI spokeswoman Laura Eimiller said the device did ignite and caused property damage, though authorities do not believe anyone was at home when the incident occurred.
Eimiller said no one has yet claimed responsibility for the event.
London’s home was also vandalized in October, and an animal rights activist group called the Animal Liberation Front claimed responsibility for that incident.
London’s house was flooded after a garden hose was inserted through a window and left running in the house.
At the time, a communique from the Animal Liberation Front accused London of addicting primates to methamphetamines.
At press time, the Animal Liberation Front had not released any communiques regarding the most recent attack on London’s home, nor had they claimed responsibility for it.
Though the university has never disclosed the exact nature of London’s research, Chancellor Gene Block was quick to condemn the attack.
“These kinds of deplorable tactics have no place in a civilized society,” he said in a statement. “UCLA is working closely with the FBI and other law enforcement agencies to bring to justice those responsible for this and other acts of violence against our researchers.”
The university maintains that its scientists comply with all laws governing the treatment of animals in research laboratories.
And in November, London wrote an op-ed piece in the Los Angeles Times emphasizing the importance of her research.
“To me, nothing could be more important than solving the mysteries of addiction and learning how we can restore a person’s control over his or her own life,” she said in the piece. “We must not allow these extremists to stop important research that advances the human condition.”
London is not the first UCLA scientist to be targeted by the Animal Liberation Front.
In June 2006, the group attempted to firebomb the home of another researcher, though the device failed to ignite.
And one year later, another incendiary device was placed next to the car of a UCLA ophthalmologist, though it also failed to go off.
Eimiller said the FBI and the Joint Terrorism Task Force are working with UCLA officials on all the cases and are considering the possibility that they are all connected.
“That’s certainly something we’re looking at,” she said. “We haven’t ruled that out.”
So far, no arrests have been made, and UCLA and the FBI continue to offer rewards for information leading to the resolution of the cases.