Making a case for 'sacred' meat
BY ANTHONY M. DESTEFANO. Newsday
During a search of a Staten Island garage last year, federal agents made a disturbing find: Among packages of smoked fish and clothing they discovered 33 pieces of African bushmeat, including the arm of a primate and pieces of a small rodent known as a cane rat. Now the garage owner, a Liberian immigrant named Mamie Jefferson, 39, finds herself a defendant in what her attorney believes is one of the first cases in New York, and perhaps the country, that involves charges of bushmeat smuggling. The case pits federal officials who believe bushmeat poses health concerns against some West African immigrants here who say the eating of cooked flesh of wild animals is a sacred act that is worthy of protection under federal religious-protection law.