(phone ringing)
(ringing stops)
(massage chair whirring)
-(phone ringing) -Oh my gosh. Fucking idiot.
Hello?
(crew member speaking)
(chuckles)
I’m getting them big. (laughing)
Er, well, I-I’m really conscientious about that.
I won’t go too big 'cause I don’t want to look fake.
I just want 'em where they’re...
I-- what you call kissable, I guess.
I don’t know what you want to call it,
but I want 'em peaked up though,
'cause they look a lot better if you do.
(phone ringing)
But I’ve become talented over the years and can do a lot,
but they don’t think you can. (sniffling)
(ringing continues)
reporter 1: Welcome back, guys. 2:46, happy Thursday.
We’ve been talking about this, uh, really interesting case
with the chimpanzees, and PETA, and sheriffs.
reporter 2: What happened to celebrity chimp Tonka?
reporter 3: PETA seized the chimps
with U.S. Marshal oversight, but one was missing,
a chimp named Tonka.
The animal rights group PETA did not believe it.
Missouri woman was accused of lying.
reporter 4: Now, we have tried to reach Haddix all day,
just before our 5 o’clock show...
(phone ringing)
Hear that phone going off?
That’s life every day. That gets ridiculous.
-cosmetician: Ready? -Mm-hmm, as much as I can be.
cosmetician: Okay.
Poke.
Tonia Haddix: It’s crazy.
To me, it’s like a "Where's Waldo?"
And that’s what I call this saga, "Where’s Waldo?"
(cosmetician speaking)
Tonia: There are some people that were saying
that I had Tonka hidden out.
Okay, where am I gonna hide a big chimpanzee?
Some of the monkey people kind of found humor in it,
saying that he’s in a drawer someplace in my trailer.
He’s, you know, whatever, whatever.
(curious music playing)
PETA thinks that I’m hiding a chimpanzee away.
I'm-- I’m the monkey mogul that’s hiding a chimpanzee,
a famous chimpanzee away.
It’s pretty hard to hide a monkey, I would imagine.
Tonia: A chimp, uh, yeah.
-cosmetologist: Did you? -Mm-hmm.
Hopefully, they’ll leave us alone,
but I don’t think so.
Nope, they’re assholes.
cosmetologist: Yeah.
(phone ringing)
♪♪
-Eric Goode: We good, guys? -crew member: Yeah.
Eric: So, we can start. So, where's Tonka?
His conditions and whereabouts are currently unknown.
Tonia: Tonk. Woop-woop-woop!
Are you a happy kid today?
Brittany Peet: Tonka is an adult male chimpanzee.
He’s in his 30s.
He would weigh in excess of a couple hundred pounds.
He’s a stocky big guy.
I don’t know what happened to Tonka, I really don’t.
What I know is that Tonia’s story is not true.
Tonka was passed away.
We had-- what happened was he, um, had--
had an event,
and we're assuming it was a stroke because...
Before PETA came and took the chimps,
Tonka was very ill.
And it’s sad, and-and the timing sucked,
because it was near an end of a court case.
(cage rattling)
Tonka!
We believe Tonka had a massive stroke.
We already knew he had an enlarged heart.
We did an assessment. His heart was huge.
A certified veterinarian sent PETA
a certified statement as well as x-rays with labs,
with everything supporting that Tonka
was in congestive heart failure.
The vet begged me to euthanize him.
He even stated that.
And that’s just what happened, and it’s a sad situation,
but nothing we can do about it.
When PETA said that they didn’t think he was dead,
I was just like, "Oh, really? Is it just--
"Is it time to put this to rest?
Is it--" Why would she do that?
Tonia: You're not running very fast, boy...
Alan Cumming: I hope, I hope, I hope he is alive.
But if he is, where the fuck is he?
-(water lapping) -(bird whistling)
(light music playing)
Hmm.
-Siri: Tonia Haddix. -Tonia. Okay.
When I was first approached about the project
and be a proxy director,
I didn’t really have any idea what that meant.
Even when I looked it up,
I still didn’t understand exactly.
But I definitely was a bridge. I come from the animal world.
I know about animals. I know these animal people.
Siri: Tonia Haddix.
-T! -Tonia (on phone): Hey, dear.
So where are we? What are we up to?
("Everybody's Talkin'" by Harry Nilsson playing)
♪ Everybody's talkin' at me ♪
♪ I don't hear a word they're sayin' ♪
♪ Only the echoes ♪
-♪ Of my mind ♪ -(mooing)
(grunting)
Tonia: Hi, buddy. You want some grain?
I’ll give you a little bit of grain, how 'bout that?
Come over here. Come over here.
Kiss. Good boy.
Mwah, good boy.
-(camel grunting) -Okay, tell me about it.
Say, "I want some grain."
We’re definitely not in Festus anymore.
(goats bleating)
I actually moved up to the lake in central Missouri.
28 acres.
The house needs, you know, inundated,
which we’re inundating it as we speak.
Come on.
And we plan to do a private petting zoo.
(chuckling) You are something else.
I’m trying to find four white ponies,
and I’m wanting to paint their mane and tails pink,
and I want them to be like unicorns.
I’m gonna put the heart sparkles on their butts and stuff.
But I want it all to be glitter, so it’s gotta be blingy,
'cause blingy is my deal.
And so, it’d be really cute.
♪♪
I do have a pair of gibbons which are endangered,
but for the most part, it’s going to strictly be out
of the endangered stuff,
so that we don’t have any issues, hopefully, so...
Huh, kids?
(horse grunts)
Tonia: I do brokering of exotic animals.
(plucky music playing)
Basically, I’m the middleman.
I can get any animal that you’re looking for,
and I get a brokerage fee for that.
Any baby or any animal that I broker,
I usually transport.
I don’t trust any other transporters,
um, to take care of my babies.
I buy the animal from private breeding facilities,
and then I’ll hang onto it until it does sell.
Or, especially with this petting zoo,
if you decide you fall in love with it,
and you keep it yourself.
I would advertise them on Facebook,
I would just put them on my page.
Word of mouth has gotten me way big
compared to what I was whenever I first started out.
I have a lot of zoo contacts.
That's how they generate more income,
by selling off babies.
They don't want it to be known, of course.
There's been a lot of celebrity clients that buy.
A full linebacker for the Cleveland Browns,
that type stuff.
I've dealt with all kinds of people
whenever it comes to the exotics.
(caller 1 on phone speaking)
(caller 2 speaking)
(caller 3 speaking)
(caller 4 speaking)
(caller 5 speaking)
-caller 6: Gimme a call back. -caller 7: Gimme a call back.
-caller 8: Just return my call. -caller 9: Gimme a call back.
-caller 10: Give me a call. -caller 11: Give me a call back.
caller 12: Call me back, goodbye.
(caller 13 calling)
My best year of brokering monkeys, uh, so far
has been about 350,000.
(squeaking)
You can easily make a million dollars
selling animals in a year’s time.
But I would trade this house and anything else that I own,
just to be back to where we were before PETA came
and took the kids.
(clicking tongue)
Hi, honey. Hi, boy.
I moved to start a new life.
That’s just my way of coping with what’s going on,
and the loss of the chimps,
'cause I’m really not dealing, honestly.
Oh, tell me this is not cool.
These are Connie’s chimps.
It really bothers me that they’re gone.
Um, I like to go-- what I call home.
I go to the facility.
Just kind of like reconnecting with Connie.
At first, you know, we really didn’t say a lot.
I just looked around.
You know, you expect to see the chimps.
When Tonka was alive, um, he was a big greeter.
Um, so it-- it was tough, to be honest with you.
Of course, a lot of tears. A lot of tears.
Tonky, can you wave? Good boy.
Can you show me your goggles?
Tonka, that kid.
Anybody that ever met Tonka will tell you that chimp
is the most amazing chimp in this whole entire world.
And I know a lot of other people that own chimps
will say, "No, my kid was the most amazing."
No.
He was the most amazing chimp you could ever run across.
He greets you by sticking out his tongue.
He doesn’t have a mean bone in his body.
His eyes are so, like they-- you just melt with him.
He had me from the word "hello."
He did movies his whole entire life
from the time he was, like, six months old on.
You got a problem, sweetie?
Tonia: So, Tonka was a humanzee--
half human, half chimpanzee--
because we put the human side into him,
and he was a chimpanzee.
Want to give me a kiss?
If I cried, he’d wipe the tear from my face,
because he didn’t want you to cry.
Or he’d reach out and pat the back of my head
and kiss my forehead.
Whatcha doing?
Sometimes I’d see him masturbating.
But he was always, uh, tactful with it,
'cause he always took his blanket,
and he would always do it under the blanket.
And I’d say, "Tonka, knock it off,"
and then he’d come over there--
(Dwayne speaking)
Yeah.
Alan: So, this is a sequence from "Buddy."
Oh, there’s Tonka, wearing roller skates.
How do you know that’s Tonka?
-I just recognize him. -Oh, so you can?
-Yeah. -Wow.
(Alan chuckles)
Eric: You know real chimps in films can't happen again.
Alan: No. No. Never.
And do you worry that people
are gonna accuse you of being a hypocrite?
Well, I don’t worry about it. It’s true. I mean, if you--
But that’s 30 years ago, and I, I have changed,
and the world has changed, and I freely, um,
you know, think they’re, uh, th-- they're right.
But I’m standing here to say that I was-- felt very lucky
to have that experience, but I realize now
that it was not in the animal's interests.
(chimp chittering on film)
That’s his handprint on-- that red bit.
And there’s a scene in the film where he’s painting.
I finished "Buddy" and I went straight to Europe
to make this really depressing film in Budapest.
My friend Caroline, who directed "Buddy"--
so I said, "Oh, I’m having a terrible time."
One day, she sent this picture,
and I sort of had that on my wall in Budapest
for all those months when I was making this crazy film.
It’s hard to describe how you have
a connection with an animal, you know, or, or a human.
Like, it’s-- you just-- something happens.
But ultimately, it is not a child,
and it’s not a human,
It is a wild animal.
Tonia: See, this is a crazy, crazy animal house.
Hi! Katie, Katie, Katie.
This is my baby I raised. Her name’s Katie.
She says, "I want my bottle, Mom."
(quirky music playing)
I’m not a big TV person.
I’m not a big social media person.
But it’s funny because, you know what they call me?
"Monkey mogul accused of faking death
of famous chimpanzee."
It cracks me up 'cause I’m like,
"Okay, first of all, I’m not a monkey mogul."
(chuckles) I'm not. Secondly is, is um,
faking the death of a chimp, okay?
For what, what good reason?
I mean, I’m trying to-- I want PETA to explain to me.
What, what good would it do for me to fake Tonka’s death?
Okay, I know for a fact
that PETA would never quit hounding you.
So, you wouldn’t be able to get to keep Tonka yourself.
So why-- I mean, what would be the real reason
behind faking Tonka’s death?
Because it serves no purpose for me.
reporter: Joining us now is Jared Goodman.
He’s been litigating this case since its inception.
Brittany: She has offered to let PETA search her house.
(Tonia speaking)
reporter: But you haven’t taken her up on that offer.
Jared Goodman: There’s no reason for us to believe
that Tonka is in her home.
She lives somewhere that, to our knowledge,
doesn’t have an enclosure for a chimpanzee.
Tonka is an adult and a dangerous chimpanzee.
He wouldn’t just, you know,
simply be living in the house like a child.
Chimpanzees are unquestionably quite cute when they’re young.
But because adult chimpanzees in particular are so strong,
they are incredibly dangerous to humans.
-(cage rattling) -(panting)
They require specialized enclosures.
(screeching)
They just have so much power,
it is so easy for them to harm a human being,
as we’ve seen with arguably the most infamous
animal attack of all time.
The chimpanzee Travis.
Trav, Trav! Come here! Come here!
Put your legs around my neck. Put 'em around my neck.
Give me a big kiss.
Come here.
(phone line ringing)
(ominous music playing)
operator (on phone): Stamford 911, what's your emergency?
(Travis screeching in background)
operator: What’s the problem there?
operator: Who's killing your friend?
(music fades out)
-(ocean waves crashing) -(seagulls cawing)
(birds squawking)
Kerri DeBlasi: My father was married four times,
and she was wife number two.
That’s it. Oh, here we go.
Yeah. Isn’t that cool?
That's a nice find.
There was so much negative news on TV
and in the papers about Sandy and Travis.
And I would just bite my tongue,
you know, just not say anything.
I just want people to know the truth,
because there was so much bullshit.
Sandy was funny as hell.
She really made me laugh.
She was a lot of fun to be around.
One day, she told me that she’s gonna get a chimpanzee.
And I said, "Where is she gonna get that from?"
And she said, oh, she knows this lady.
I think her name was Connie, and she was out in Missouri.
(kids exclaiming)
reporter: Connie Casey, who owns a company called Chimparty,
she’s also in the business of breeding
and selling chimpanzees as pets.
Kerri: And she said she’s gonna fly out to Missouri,
get this chimp.
40,000 bucks.
She went out and came home with Travis.
Cutest baby you ever saw. Really was.
Sandy Herold: What are you doing, huh, Travis?
Give me a kiss. (kissing noise)
That's it, squeeze it out.
Squeeze it. That’s a boy.
I love you.
Pedal, pedal, pedal!
Pedal, that’s a good boy. Hurry up, yay!
Go get her, Trav.
(laughing)
Nadina Truini: I remember Sandy saying to me,
"Don’t you love this little shit?
He’s so cute, isn’t he?" (laughs)
Give me some. Give me-- oh!
Sandy: Oh, that's nice. Make an alky out of him.
Kerri: Travis was like any other person in our family.
He was just the one that couldn't talk.
Sandy was his mom, and Jerry was his dad.
Sandy: Travis, go see Daddy. Go ahead, hurry up.
(urinating)
They trained him to use the potty.
(toilet flushing)
He knew how to use the microwave.
He would cook for himself and eat his snacks.
Sandy: We'll have to call his grandmother Connie up
and tell her how to feed the rest of the chimps.
Kerri: They taught him how to drive.
He could steer.
He knew which one was the gas pedal.
Any time you opened the car door, he would jump in.
He loved to go for a ride.
They went everywhere with Travis,
and he was never lonely, and neither was Sandy.
So, it was perfect.
Nadina: Sandy and Jerry built a towing business
from the ground up called Desire Me Motors.
And Travis became the mascot.
Kerri: The police were always in there.
They were good friends with all the police department.
Frank Chiafari: When I used to do traffic,
it would be a common sight to see Travis.
He'd be waving to you, had a big smile on his face.
And sometimes they would pull up next to me,
and I would play with him. I loved him.
Sandy: Throw it to Dad.
Jerry Herold: Give me the ball. Give it to me. Hey!
Sandy: Trav!
Kerri: They went everywhere with Travis.
And everybody wanted to meet him.
Maury Povich, he met,
and Sheryl Crow.
There was a TV commercial with Morgan Fairchild.
Morgan Fairchild: We've been rescued.
From high prices.
Old Navy. Now, that's a great discovery.
He was just everywhere, and everyone knew him.
Everyone knew Travis.
This was when he got so-- so big.
It’s like a, a toddler that gets big,
and you can’t control him, and he’s a pain in the ass.
You'd tell him to stop doing something.
If he didn’t feel like stopping, he wasn’t gonna,
so it was like, "Knock it off," you know?
When Travis was about six or seven,
is when Sandy started realizing
that he was a little more than she could handle.
But that was her son, so she was going to make it work.
She just kept pretending that everything was fine.
(distant sirens wailing)
reporter: A chimp in diapers.
Travis, all 170 pounds of him, leaped from his owner's SUV.
(dramatic music playing)
For several hours,
he commandeered the intersection,
causing residents of the neighborhood
to be ordered back into their homes.
He was running around the street, spanking people,
and it was kind of humorous at the time.
reporter 1: Travis the chimp played
in the middle of the street, rolled on his back.
reporter 2: Two hours later, Travis decided he’d had enough,
and came back to his owner.
Kerri: Sandy said he wanted ice cream.
That’s how they got him back into the car, ultimately.
reporter: Isn't this the way the movie
"The Conquest of the Planet of the Apes" started?
"Take your hands off me, you damned dirty ape!"
♪♪
(music fades out)
Kerri: After that, the laws changed in Connecticut.
They called it the Travis Amendment.
If anyone had a primate that was 50 pounds or more,
they had to have a permit.
But they never enforced it.
Sandy was warned by the mayor this cannot happen again,
or there will be serious repercussions.
(solemn music playing)
After the incident, Travis was confined to the house.
Hadn't been to the shop.
Hadn't been for a car ride.
Everything was being brought into the home now for Travis.
He went from being the famous chimp
to the unseen chimp.
(music fades out)
-What do you want me to do? -(softly whimpering)
Alright, we're gonna go do something in a few minutes.
-Wait a couple minutes. -(Travis chittering)
Sandy: Let him eat, Trav.
Kerri: He was just stuck home and not be able to say,
"Hey, take me with you," or "Please, don't go.
Please don't leave me here."
I had an owie, there, look.
Sandy: Look, check Daddy's owie out.
Check the owie. Which one?
Nadina: Roughly a year after the incident
in downtown Stamford,
Jerry had suddenly become sick.
He was rushed to the hospital,
and was diagnosed with stomach cancer.
Sandy: That's the one, yeah!
Nadina: He never returned home.
(somber music playing)
After Jerry died, Travis was very despondent
and heartbroken, just as Sandy was.
Kerri: The house at that point started looking very different
than when Jerry was alive.
Sandy would go on a lot of shopping sprees.
It made her happy to buy things for herself
and things for Travis.
But Travis was still very depressed.
He was rocking back and forth, and he did it all day.
I would try to talk to him and I’d say,
"Travis, it’s okay."
You know, I would, like, just try to distract him.
And he would stop for a minute and just look at me,
and then he would go right back to rocking.
What are you doing? You got so big.
You're a big boy now.
One day, Sandy said to me, "Hey, why don’t you bring
your sons over to play with Travis?"
My son, Tony, he’s over six feet tall
and he’s a big guy.
You wanna come play, Travis? You wanna come play?
-(Travis huffing) -Yes, you do!
(laughter)
Sandy: Yeah, put your pants on first.
Put your pants on.
Here, put your pants on. Put your pants on, here.
Kerri: He gives you his foot. Aw, he's a good boy.
Sandy: Okay, okay. Now, give Kerri a kiss.
Kerri: Aw, he can check out your feet.
Tony: Oh, the shoe's going...
-(Kerri laughing) -I lost my shoe privileges.
Kerri: Travis grabbed Tony’s boot.
He wanted Tony to chase him.
So, Sandy said, "Chase him, Tony, chase him."
Sandy: You're a big kid!
Tony: He’s a roughhouser. He likes to roughhouse.
See, look at this, look it. He has a smile on his face.
-Kerri: Get him, Tone, go ahead. -Sandy: Easy! Easy! Hey! Hey!
Tony: Chill, chill. Get him off.
Sandy: Trav! Trav.
That's enough, that's enough.
-(ominous music playing) -(Travis huffing)
♪♪
And I was like, oh, shit. Look at that, man.
(music fades out)
Nadina: February 16, 2009,
Sandy and I had plans,
actually for three o’clock that day.
She called me and she said, "I’m gonna be a little late.
"I’m having problems with Trav.
I-- He doesn’t want-- he wants to go for a ride."
And now, he took the keys.
(phone line ringing)
Charla Nash had called at that moment.
Charla would babysit Travis when needed.
She knew him since he was a little itty-bitty
when he first came to Stamford, Connecticut.
Charla was gonna come over and help her get Travis in.
(ominous music playing)
Kerri: When Charla arrived,
Travis was right in the driveway
when she got out of her car.
She did have an Elmo doll that she had picked up.
Travis was a big fan of Elmo.
She thought this is the best thing,
to show him Elmo, he'll be happy.
And instead...
it was horrific.
(Travis screeching)
(screaming)
operator: What is the monkey doing? Tell me what the monkey's--
operator: He ripped her face off?
Sandy: He tried--
operator: Is the monkey still by your friend,
or can you get close to your friend?
Sandy: Please.
operator: Okay, I need you to calm down for me.
I know it's hard, okay? I know it's hard.
(dispatcher continues indistinctly)
I remember on my radio comes a call.
And at first, I’m like, "Monkey?"
Frank: And I wait a minute, I go, "This is the chimp."
(dispatcher speaking)
Frank: I get up. It’s a long driveway.
(Sandy speaking)
Frank: I see Sandra.
She’s trying to stab the thing with a little knife in the back,
trying to get it.
(Sandy speaking)
(overlapping chatter)
Frank: Now, the chimp turns around and looks at me.
So, he comes over to my car and he starts shaking the car.
(overlapping chatter continues on phone)
(Travis screeching)
Like "Jurassic Park," if you remember when
in the movie, when the thing was shaking,
that’s what was happening.
This thing had so much power and strength.
(car rattling)
I’m not ashamed to admit I was frightened.
And I took the gun out.
If he tries to get me, I'm-- I have to--
I have no choice. I have to kill him.
(police radio chatter)
He pulls around and he comes to my door.
And I’m looking at him. We’re looking at each other.
He pulls the door right off.
(dark, ominous music playing)
And then he raises his hands up.
And he growls.
All I see are these big teeth with blood dripping.
He gave me a second, and I tell people,
I swear this is true.
I didn’t hear it, but it was like a connection.
And he said to me, "Please do it."
Like, "I can’t take it anymore."
-(Travis screeching) -(Sandy speaking)
Frank: Sandra, stay in your car.
-(gunshots) -Sandy: Shoot him!
(Travis screams)
He still didn’t go down, and he just looked at me.
And then, he ran back into the house.
♪♪
(Sandy speaking)
♪♪
Frank: He ran into his cage. And that was it.
(police officer speaking)
Frank: After he went in the house, I got out.
And I saw Charla on the ground.
I couldn't really see any injuries yet at this point.
I just saw her body there.
And the ambulance who was waiting up the block
were allowed to come in now to take her out.
-(somber music playing) -(sirens wailing)
Frank: It was a horrendous, terrible scene.
What he did to her.
Sandy: That’s Charlie. And she was feeding Travis.
reporter 1: They knew each other well.
Travis the chimp and his victim, Charla Nash.
The injuries so devastating, at first, emergency responders
couldn’t tell if she was a man or a woman.
reporter 2: Nash lost her eyes, her nose, the jaw.
(Charla Nash speaking)
attorney: Following an investigation
by the Stamford Police Department,
based on the evidence presented at this time,
no criminal prosecution is warranted in this case.
No one made Mrs. Herold aware in any way
of the risk entailed in keeping the chimpanzee.
She told me not to tell anyone.
She said if the police that day had made her strip down
and looked at her body,
they would have seen her covered in bruises.
Sandy: Trav, give Kerri a kiss.
Give her a kiss. Listen, Trav.
Travis was a ticking time bomb.
She overlooked that,
because she was thinking about herself.
♪♪
(music fades out)
speaker (on TV): This is Maggie Klein,
and this dashing fellow is called Joe Mende.
Tonia: Oh, Mr. Tonka.
He is such a cute little man.
(laughing) Tonka's like, "What?"
(laughing)
Jared: The issue of captive-bred chimps
like Travis and Tonka has been on PETA's radar for decades.
To understand how they got into this situation,
you have to go back to 1973.
Richard Nixon: This is the most far-reaching
and comprehensive message on conservation
ever submitted to the Congress
by a President of the United States.
Jared: The Endangered Species Act was signed into law
to protect species on the verge of extinction.
Wild chimpanzees were protected,
but those who were held in captivity were left out
to allow for their continued use
in laboratories, zoos, and for entertainment.
-I forgot, I gotta burp you. -(audience laughing)
(applause)
Jared: With the lawful pipeline for wild chimpanzees
closed in the United States,
breeders like Connie Casey flourished.
reporter: There are currently 18 chimpanzees
living in Connie and Mike’s home.
A baby chimp going price right now is about $65,000.
Jared: Advocacy groups like PETA
have worked to expand their protections.
Angelica Huston: Using great apes
causes a lifetime of suffering.
Don’t use great apes in your work.
Jared: And in 2015, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
finally declared that all chimpanzees
were fully protected.
But even now, due to limited resources or interest,
the government rarely enforces the law
for captive animals.
That’s really where PETA and our legal team
is able to step in to help fill the gap.
The closure of a controversial zoo in Horry County.
reporter 1: PETA filed a lawsuit. ..
reporter 2: Eighteen violations...
reporter 3: Inadequate primate housing...
reporter 4: The River Zoo in Roswell...
reporter 5: The zoo will be permanently closed.
reporter 6: PETA is putting its foot down.
Jared: But there are likely many more chimpanzees
currently in private ownership.
reporter: Then in July, PETA seized the chimps
with U.S. Marshal oversight, but one chimp was missing.
(birds chirping)
Jared: That's really what all of this is about.
That's why it's incredibly important for us
to find Tonka.
Because if we don't get him to a sanctuary,
nobody else will.
That's for you, and...
Oh, my gosh. No, you know what?
I’m mad about this. Very angry.
I will not eat these anymore
because they took the bars off this,
-because PETA required... -Dwayne Cunningham: Oh!
Tonia: ...they can’t be in cages.
Is that not ridiculous?
Barnum and Bailey had these cookies
for how long?
-I... -I didn’t know.
No, I love them, but I’m just-- I mean, honestly.
See, this is where you-- a lot of people
don’t realize how bad PETA
really outreaches stupid stuff like this.
(uneasy music playing)
I know, baby girl. Give me a kiss first.
Nope. Give me a kiss.
Eric: So, what makes PETA so sure Tonia is lying,
and that Tonka's alive?
Jared: We asked where Tonka was,
because we still hadn’t received proof of his death.
And she said that Tonka was cremated.
The court had ordered that Tonia provide evidence.
So, Tonia Haddix showed me an email.
This email was from a man named Jerry Aswegan,
and it said that Tonka died.
And he burned him on a burn pit at about 165 to 170 degrees,
and what was left was just ashes.
There were no bones anymore.
First, it turns out that Jerry Aswegan
was Tony Haddix’s husband...
um, something that neither the email nor her lawyer
told us about.
And also, that temperature is simply impossible.
If you think about your oven at home,
you can’t cook anything at 170 degrees.
It probably doesn’t even go that low.
But, Jerry and Tonia stood by the fact
that Tonka was cremated in his backyard
in a manner that allowed them to just scoop up some ashes
at the bottom of the, the burn pit.
I don’t know enough 'cause I’m not, you know,
I don't do-- I'm not an embalmer.
I’m not a funeral home director.
I’m not anything with a funeral home.
But, um, apparently, when they wrote the statement
initially the first time, 'cause they were in a rush
to get it, um,
they accidentally left off a zero on the temperatures.
The temperatures were correct.
It was just the zero was left off.
Dwayne: By "they," you mean Jerry?
Tonia: Yeah.
I had him write a sworn statement
and send it to the courts with the appropriate temperatures.
And that is appropriate temperatures,
and they can’t deny that, but guess what?
Jared acted like he never even seen that,
and, and all-- You know, that--
He never would acknowledge the fact that it was corrected.
Dwayne: So, you have Tonka’s ashes?
Mm, oh yeah.
♪♪
It looks like dirt, but it’s very fine.
If they want to have a little scoop of the ashes,
more power to 'em.
But I’m tired of him being an ass
and insulting my integrity.
I think my relationship with Tonia
would be accurately described as acrimonious, um,
and that’s mostly from her end.
I would say he’s the devil’s spawn,
but I know he has a mother.
He’s a bastard. He’s a dick.
I always watch his Facebook page to see if his wife dumps him.
My God, it’s Pee-Wee Herman.
Pee-Wee Herman. Pee-Wee Herman.
I have voodoo dolls of Pee-Wee Herman.
Contempt! Contempt! Another piece of paper!
He checks my Facebook page.
The dumbass accidentally sent me a friend request.
I very much look forward to the day
when I can close that tab and never reopen it.
I tried to run him over the last time we left the courtroom.
I am going to slap the shit out of him.
I don’t want to kill him, I just want to maim him.
He's lucky that he jumped up on the curb,
or he would have been ran over.
(friend speaking on phone)
(Tonia laughing)
Her personal attacks, uh, were so inconsequential to me
that I don’t really remember precisely what they were.
(phone ringing)
Tonia: Okay, guys, he’s calling right now.
Hello?
You know what, I’m done with all of this stuff.
I am so done with it, it’s not even funny.
The "Where’s Waldo?" type situation.
Jared (on phone): What, what "Where's Waldo?" situation?
You don’t know about "Where’s Waldo?"
Jared: I’m familiar with the book.
If you think I like the situation,
you're really out of your damn mind.
You don't have the feelings that I have for those kids.
You don't-- you have not had to go through everything
that I have had to go through.
I'm so done with this situation
because I'm the one who got to be villainized.
I went up there out of the kindness of my heart
to help Connie and to help those chimps.
If you don't think that I live with it every day,
that I failed those kids, you're out of your damn mind.
(Jared coughing)
Jared: (coughing) Excuse me.
Okay, is that all?
(light music playing)
(phone ringing)
(Dwayne speaking)
Yeah.
Hello?
-Connie Casey (on phone): Hey. -Hey.
Tonia: Um, I’m at home.
A little bit ago got off, the phone with Jared Goodman.
Tonia: Well, uh, him and PETA were assholes, of course.
-Um... -Connie: Yeah.
Tonia: Which I expected it, you know.
(Connie speaking)
Tonia: Yep.
(Connie speaking)
Tonia: Yep.
(Connie speaking)
Tonia: I love you too, okay?
-Connie: Okay, bye. -Tonia: Okay, bye.
♪♪
(crew member speaking)
(Tonia speaking)
(chuckles) Yeah, okay.
♪♪
My husband will tell you he gets after me.
"Why do you tell everybody your life story?"
(chuckles) Because I have nothing to hide,
and because I’m just an open book.
And so, I’m like, "Why shouldn’t I?"
I don'’t understand why I keep getting to be the bad guy here,
and I’m tired of it.
I’ve asked PETA several times,
what is it that you want for me to prove you that he’s dead?
So, now I’m asking them. I’m challenging them.
Prove to me that he’s alive.
-(energetic music playing) -(plane engines roaring)
Jared: We knew that Tonka was still out there somewhere.
So, we had to exhaust every possible option
and look for him.
That included sending folks to facilities
to look around for him.
Jared: Hiring private investigators
to take a look at places
where we think he might potentially be.
Of course, monitoring and scouring the internet
for any indication where he might be.
(phone ringing)
Talking to individuals who might have information.
(pigeons cooing)
And really left no stone unturned.
(phone ringing)
I came to accept early on in this case
that it was going to be unpredictable.
But we certainly weren’t expecting
to get a call from a psychic.
Brittany: Tonia's friend confided to her psychic
that it seemed like Tonka really was alive.
Tonia had texted this friend
long after Tonka had supposedly died
saying that she was out getting groceries for Tonka.
-(line ringing) -The psychic reached out to us
and we were able to submit a subpoena
to get copies of those text messages.
And this confirmed, of course, what we already knew,
Tonka never really died.
With this evidence, we were finally able
to get her back into court
to try to find out what happened to Tonka.
(curious music playing)
Judge Perry (on video call): Alright, good morning.
This is Judge Perry. I’m here in the case
of counterclaim plaintiff PETA, uh, against Tonia Haddix.
Miss Haddix, please raise your right hand.
You do solemnly swear or affirm that the testimony
you are about to give in this cause is the truth,
the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God?
-Yes. -Judge Perry: Thank you.
Morning, Miss Haddix.
We’re here today to get the answer
to a very simple question.
Where is Tonka?
♪♪
(music stops)
(silence)
Tonia: You froze.
Judge Perry: Yeah. Um,
Mr. Goodman is not-- is frozen.
(plucky music playing)
Now, everybody’s frozen.
♪♪
Jared: Very sorry about that.
But can you hear me sufficiently now, Judge?
Judge Perry: Yes.
Jared: Miss Haddix, are you able to see a document
on the screen now that says "Tonia"?
Tonia: It appears to be a text.
Jared: You said, "I was at Cy," C-Y,
"and could not talk, no signal."
You see here, your next message
was that "Tonka needed groceries."
♪♪
Right.
Which is a capuchin of mine.
I name-- I got a new capuchin, a rescued capuchin,
and I call-- I named that capuchin Tonka.
So, I was getting Tonka groceries, yes.
Jared: Uh, when did you get this other capuchin?
I got that other capuchin, um, in, um, January, like Janu--
No, that’s not true. Okay, I’m trying to think.
I got that capuchin,
so it’d be July, July 5th.
(crying) What ha-- what happened was I went down,
and I went over to the cage where Tonka was.
And he was still sleeping while I flipped on the lights.
(solemn music playing)
And he didn’t move, and I kept calling his name.
(echoing thud)
I call him Tonky B, and so I’d say "Tonky B, Tonky B,"
and he didn’t respond, and I--
I watched for breathing.
He didn’t breathe, and I waited for a while.
When he didn’t breathe, we have PVC pipe down there,
small PVC pipe.
(sniffling) Um, it's small in diameter,
but it's long.
And we went ahead, and I just went ahead
and poked him with that PVC pipe.
And whenever he did respond, his arm just kind of flopped.
And so, I just went ahead and waited a few more minutes.
♪♪
And then I opened the cage door, and he was dead!
(wailing) I gotta stop!
I can’t do this!
Judge Perry: Hold on just a second.
Counsel, we’re gonna take a 10-minute recess
so, uh, you can compose yourself.
Okay, thank you.
(sobbing)
(softly) He is such a fuckin' bastard.
prosecutor: Miss Haddix, I just want to let you know
that your microphone is still on.
Okay, thank you.
-You’re welcome. -(resumes sobbing)
♪♪
Judge Perry: Alright, uh, Mr. Goodman, you may proceed.
Jared: Thank you.
(Frederick clearing throat)
(Tonia softly speaking)
(dramatic music playing)
Frederick "Rick" Snow: I worked in Bosnia, working mass graves
for the International Commission on Missing Persons.
I worked in Kosovo as an agent of the United Nations.
But I’ve never worked a case with a chimpanzee,
let alone one that was allegedly cremated.
So, it immediately piqued my interest.
My name is Rick Snow, I’m a forensic anthropologist.
I work with fragmentary remains, mummified remains,
uh, decomposed remains, burned remains.
Having read the affidavit, uh, written by Jerry Aswegan,
uh, red flags began to appear to me very quickly.
(flames crackling)
The story that was told was that they cremated Tonka
in a burn pile.
Jerry Aswegan had recovered ashes of Tonka,
described as uniform size
with no discernible bone fragments,
and gave them to Tonia Haddix.
(music fades out)
(car beeping)
(dramatic music resumes)
These are partially fleshed pig bones and cow bones,
We’re gonna be cremating these today
in a commercial crematory.
They’re gonna serve as a very good surrogate
for what we would expect the bones of Tonka to look like.
♪♪
(machine beeping)
(crew member speaking)
What? You asking me?
For what, that?
I think they said another hour.
(dramatic music continues)
(music fades out)
(remains rattling)
This is one of the larger fragments here.
Uh, you can see that this is easily identifiable as, as bone.
Most of this is actually large fragments.
These fragments, or very similar to it, would have been found.
Dean Achord: So, at this point, you know, we'll go ahead
and we'll put it in the processor.
Rick: Uh-huh.
Dean: And that pulverizes it down
into one almost consistent type of powder.
(processor whirring)
This is what everybody thinks cremains look like.
But as we’ve just seen,
they don’t even begin to approximate powder
until they’re put in the processor.
This is what they said, uh, represented the ashes of Tonka
and it's simply not the case.
Jared (on video call): Is there any evidence to show
that Tonka’s body was burned at this location?
Rick (on video call): In my opinion, it’s inconceivable.
At least as it’s described in the information that I’ve read.
Did you ever explore that site?
Was you ever asked by PETA to ever explore that site?
-No, I didn’t. -Tonia: Okay.
And I wasn’t asked.
Tonia: Okay.
I guess-- I guess after--
I-I guess that’s all I have for you.
Um, that’s it. (sniffling)
reporter 1: Tonia Haddix often sobbed in court,
so passionately, that the judge often had to take breaks
as Haddix broke down.
reporter 2: A PETA lawyer told the judge
Haddix refused to cooperate.
reporter 3: Haddix fought back, and quote,
“I can't provide him to you guys if he died,
and my whole thing is, I know I talk big..."
(reporter's voice fades out)
Judge Perry: Alright, I am going to just cut to the chase here
and tell you what my ruling is on this.
There is a lot of inconsistent and implausible evidence
presented by Miss Haddix.
It is my belief that Miss Haddix makes things up.
She has done that consistently throughout this case,
and she’s doing it again here today, I believe.
But does that convince me that Tonka is alive
and she has hidden him?
No, it does not.
When what I wanted to know is, is this chimpanzee
alive or not?
And based on all the evidence
I’ve heard here today, I cannot say.
I am certainly not declaring that he is dead.
What I am saying is that I cannot find
that he is still living,
and so I am denying the fourth motion for contempt.
If Mr. Goodman were to come up with actual evidence
that Tonka is still alive,
then I will expect they will be right back in front of me
with another motion for contempt.
And there’s nothing in my order here today
that precludes them from doing it.
Alright, thank you all very much.
Court is in recess.
Thank you.
(clapping) We won, guys.
(excited, rapid breaths)
We fuckin' won.
Yeah, but we gotta just keep him hidden.
♪♪
(phone line ringing)
Hey, I won.
Connie (on phone): Oh, yeah?
Yes, I won. They have to leave us alone
unless they can get evidence that he's alive, so we won.
Connie: Oh! Oh, my God.
We won, Connie.
("Gut Feeling/(Slap Your Mammy)" by Devo playing)
(monkey hollering in distance)
(hooting and huffing)
Hi, baby.
(Tonia chuckles)
♪ Something about the way you taste ♪
♪ Makes me wanna clear my throat ♪
♪ There's a method to your movements ♪
♪ That really gets my goat ♪
♪ I looked for silver linings but you're rotten to the core ♪
♪ I've had just about all I can take ♪
♪ You know I can't take it no more ♪
♪ I've got a gut feeling ♪
♪ I've got a gut feeling, feeling ♪
♪ Centered 'round long time ago on your ability to torment ♪
♪ I've got a gut feeling ♪
♪ I've got a gut feeling, feeling ♪
♪ I've got a gut feeling ♪