306 • Alternatives to Animal Use in Research, Testing, and Education 
tive and passive cruelty , these concepts are dis- 
cussed under this single rubric. Special duties of 
care, such as those imposed in some States on ani- 
mal carriers, pet stores, and others, generally do 
not affect research facilities (39). 
General Provisions 
State anticruelty statutes often incorporate pro- 
hibitions on both active cruelty and failure to 
meet a generally described duty of care. Under 
these laws, several elements must be proved to 
sustain a conviction and penalty: 
• The mistreated animal must come under the 
statute’s coverage. 
• The person charged with infliction or neglect 
must similarly be subject to the reach of the 
law, as must the conduct complained of. 
• The act complained of must not be the sub- 
ject of any exceptions to the statute. 
• There must be no statutory defenses that can 
be sustained against the act complained of. 
• The prescribed level of human knowledge or 
intent must be present if required by stat- 
ute. Most States, however, do not require cul- 
pability to be proven (33). 
Culpability depends on the presence of a speci- 
fied state of mind at the time of the commission 
of the act. Except for statutes that create liabil- 
ity without culpability, conduct must generally 
fall into one of the following categories to result 
in the commission of an offense: 
• Intentional; Knowing, or Willful: The in- 
dividual must be conscious of his or her con- 
duct, intend his or her voluntary actions or 
failure to act, and know or should know the 
actual consequences. 
• Recklessly Negligent: This lesser level ap- 
plies to an individual who is aware of and 
consciously disregards a substantial and un- 
justified risk to another interest (the animal’s 
interest in avoiding cruel treatment). 
• Negligent: This lowest level of culpability, 
also known as criminal negligence, applies to 
an individual who fails to perceive a substan- 
tial and unjustified risk incurred by his or 
her action or inaction. The standard applied 
in cases of criminal negligence is proof of a 
gross deviation from the standard of care ob- 
served by a reasonable person in similar cir- 
cumstances. 
Many statutes incorporate more than one level 
of culpability (33,36). 
The other type of criminal statute, often com- 
bined with those that prohibit specified acts of 
cruelty, deals with nonfeasance or omissions. 
These laws establish a minimum duty of care 
toward an animal by making it a crime to fail to 
meet that duty in some specified way. Their ob- 
jective is general care of covered animals, rather 
than protection from immediate harm. If no de- 
gree of culpability is required, defenses applica- 
ble under active statutes are not available. None- 
theless, if words like “willfully,” "intentionally,” 
or "knowingly” are used, then the appropriate de- 
gree of culpability must be proved. The most com- 
prehensive "duty-of-care” statute is Virginia’s Ani- 
mal Welfare Act, which requires all companion- 
animal owners to provide adequate food, water, 
shelter, and space, as well as humane care and 
treatment and veterinary care necessary to pre- 
vent suffering. The maximum penalty upon con- 
viction is a fine of $100 (117). 
The variability of the basic elements of anti- 
cruelty statutes is demonstrated by a recent re- 
view by the Animal Welfare Institute of laws in 
the 50 States, the District of Columbia, Puerto 
Rico, Guam, the Virgin Islands, and the Canal 
Zone. The Institute found the following: 
• Definition of "Animal”: Twenty-nine anti- 
cruelty laws protect "any animal,” including 
all living creatures except humans. Nineteen 
others provide no definition at all, and others 
apply the word to domestic animals, captive 
animals, or warm-blooded creatures. 
• Culpability: Thirty-two jurisdictions have 
prohibitions on specified types of cruelty 
with no qualifying phrases— i.e., no require- 
ment for proof of a particular state of mind 
on the part of the person charged. The other 
23 have one or more of the qualifying phrases 
described above. 
• Food, Water, and Shelter: Statutory prohi- 
bitions against failure to provide for basic ani- 
mal survival vary in both definition and inter- 
pretation. Thirty -two jurisdictions have laws 
