2001-2002: US Holding Company Buys Bank Loan of Animal Research Firm, Pressured by Animal Rights Organization into Selling

Stephens Inc logo. [Source: RehabCare]Life Sciences Inc, a New Jersey-based holding company, buys Huntingdon Life Sciences (HLS), a British research company accused of mistreating and torturing animals as part of its research (see 1998). Stephens Inc, an Arkansas investment company, buys HLS’s bank loan and becomes its senior lender. The animal rights organization Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty (SHAC) launches a Web site called StephensKills that is designed to inform animal rights activists “of the cruelty that Stephens Inc invests in as shareholders” in HLS. Activists from Britain and America come to Little Rock, Arkansas, to protest against Stephens, in an action that results in 26 arrests. During the following months, Stephens employees are harassed and the company’s fax machines are jammed. Stephens finally sells its investment in HLS at a loss, while denying that SHAC’s pressure influenced its decision. [Anti-Defamation League, 2005] CEO Warren Stephens says the company had been “aware of the activists, but I don’t think we understood exactly what lengths they would go to.” [Southern Poverty Law Center, 9/2002]