Gretchen Mogensen had a choice: tell the government where the baby giraffes were or go to jail. She chose jail.
The second-generation owner of a long-scrutinized roadside zoo in Southwest Virginia, Mogensen, 42, is more than halfway through a 100-day sentence that has landed her behind bars through Halloween, Christmas and New Year’s Eve, with an anticipated release date in early February.
The whereabouts of the two giraffe calves remain a mystery. The pair, born to two female giraffes seized by the government amid allegations of mistreatment, are thought to be about 8 months old. That would make them about 9 feet tall and 700 pounds.
Their disappearance is the latest chapter in a protracted legal battle over a menagerie of exotic animals once owned by the 50-year-old Natural Bridge Zoo, a saga that’s involved a confidential informant working undercover as a groundskeeper, back-and-forth allegations of animal cruelty, a dead giraffe, multiple civil court cases and the looming specter of criminal charges for the Mogensens, the dynasty that has run the attraction on their rural Virginia property since Gretchen’s father Karl Mogensen founded it in 1972.
The case galloped back into the spotlight recently when PETA announcedthat Alicia Silverstone of “Clueless” fame was joining it in offering a $50,000 reward for information leading to the baby giraffes’ whereabouts.
In a statement shared with The Washington Post through the organization, Silverstone, a vegan and longtime animal rights activist, called roadside zoos “the worst” (while noting she boycotts all zoos). She said she was eager to help when PETA came calling.
“Tearing babies away from their distraught mothers is devastating for both, and every day counts in making sure they get the help they need,” she said. “I remain hopeful that sharing this message will encourage anyone with information to come forward now.”
Animal welfare activists had gone undercover to help build the Virginia Attorney General’s case against Natural Bridge Zoo, and a state prosecutor suggested Mogensen is wrongly withholding information. But a cadre of supporters cast her as a martyr enduring jail rather than surrendering to an overzealous government — especially after an adult giraffe formerly owned by the zoo died in the government’s care. The death, those supporters say, raises questions over whether the would-be saviors of the animals have subjected them to exactly what the Mogensens are accused of: mistreatment.
In her latest defense, Gretchen Mogensen suggested the giraffe calves don’t exist. The claim appears in a federal lawsuit the Mogensens filed on Dec. 6 against the state Attorney General and others involved in the years-long probe of their zoo, alleging a “targeted campaign” that has subjected the family to unlawful search and seizure.
“Non-existent giraffe offspring,” the court document puts it, calling the demand that Gretchen Mogensen turn them over “impossible.”
Heidi Crosky, president of the Virginia Animal Owners Alliance, attended the trial that ended with the government taking possession of dozens of animals, including the giraffes. She is a staunch Mogensen defender and argues that the actions of the Attorney General, through its Animal Law Unit, have not benefited the animals.
“They claim they’re for welfare, but when you actually look at how it’s being executed and implemented, it’s doing the opposite,” she said in an interview with The Post. “For people who say this is about the animals, it’s really not. It’s about control and power. They really seem to be a law unto themselves.”
Representatives from the Virginia Attorney General’s Office did not provide answers to a list of questions from The Post or comment on the family’s claims. The Mogensen’s attorney in the federal lawsuit, Atlanta-based Mario B. Williams of Human Dignity and Rights LLC, did not reply to an email requesting an interview.
A PETA official dismissed the implication that there are no baby giraffes: “The existence of these calves has not been disputed until now,” said Daphna Nachminovitch, senior vice president of Cruelty Investigations.
Wrangling over the giraffes traces back to December 2023, when officials with the Attorney General’s Animal Law Unit descended on the zoo that has for years been in the crosshairs of regulators and animal rights groups. They seized more than 100 of its 500 exotic residents on suspicion of animal cruelty: white-faced capuchins, cotton-top tamarins, tortoises, lemurs, a mini donkey, a blue-tongued skink and others. Natural Bridge Zoo fed them improperly and kept them in small, dirty enclosures that lacked enrichment activities, Animal Law Unit director Michelle Welch argued at trial.
The jury awarded custody of dozens of animals to the government in March 2024 — a decision the Mogensens appealed and continue to fight, maintaining there was no mistreatment. Among them were the zoo’s four prized giraffes, which the family said in court documents were worth up to $1 million together: a male, Jeffrey, and three females named Wrinkles, Little Girl and Valentine.
Officials with the Attorney General’s office said in court records that the foursome had painfully overgrown hooves and needed more enrichment activities. The female giraffes were also subjected to back-to-back breeding, they said. The zoo has sold at least 14 giraffe calves aged 2 months or younger in the last decade, including to family-owned zoos in Ohio and North Carolina, and an exotic animal breeder and broker in Texas, according to state records.
One expert, Jenessa Gjeltema of the University of California Davis and the Sacramento Zoo, told The Post that calves would ideally stay with their herd for one to two years. But males may need to go sooner than females, before they get territorial, and because transporting a full-grown giraffe becomes complex, she said. Their long necks make them vulnerable to whiplash in stop-and-go traffic.
Although the other animals were taken the day of the raid, Jeffrey, Wrinkles, Valentine and Little Girl were left at the zoo for months, even after the jury awarded them to the government, records show.
Before the Attorney General’s office picked up the animals, two apparently became pregnant. The zoo cared for the animals in the meantime, with a September 2024 post on its Facebook page describing feeling “crushed at being accused of neglecting those same animals I’ve devoted my life to.”
“While the giraffes were seized, they never left the park, and have remained with us, alive and healthy, and the girls pregnant,” continued the post. “Ten months later and they have not died as they were so insistent they would.”
Not long after, in October, Virginia Attorney General Jason S. Miyares (R) announced that his office had found new homes for the four and would immediately relocate them.
“Animal cruelty cases are the ones that break your heart,” he said in a news release. “Wrinkles the Giraffe and her family will find safe, loving environments who know how to care for them. My congratulations goes out to our Animal Law Unit for stepping up and bringing justice to Wrinkles and her playmates. Every Virginian with a heart looks forward to seeing Wrinkles in her forever home.”
The Mogensens insisted that their animals were being “stolen” and mounted a campaign against the removal, according to court records. A Virginia State Police officer testified that the night before, when a team showed up to move Jeffery, the first of the foursome, Karl Mogensen, threatened to shoot those involved in taking the animals. The officer said he spoke to Karl Mogensen, who claimed he did not mean any harm and was “frustrated with the Attorney General’s office and how they could come in and do something like this to him.”
As workers hired by the state spent hours trying to corral Jeffrey on Oct. 3, 2024, Gretchen Mogensen live-streamed the turbulent process, reading off license plate numbers and names of people involved and accusing the judge overseeing the case of corruption. An investigator with the Attorney General’s office later testified in court that people made threats against the office and Animal Law Unit. The home of a giraffe transporter was broken into while he was moving the giraffe, court records state without elaborating.
Jeffrey made it to his destination, but the Virginia Court of Appeals placed a stay on moving the other giraffes amid an appeal from the Mogensens. The stay was later lifted, but by then it was too cold to move the other three giraffes and a decision was made to wait for spring.
During an inspection in April, which Gretchen Mogensen had delayed a day, investigators with the Attorney General’s office determined the two giraffes were no longer pregnant. Their womb areas appeared smaller and a fluid thought to be afterbirth was on one of their backsides, the investigator testified. She said a veterinarian who was with her also did visual observations to confirm they were not pregnant.
But the calves were nowhere to be found.
In May, the state sent workers to retrieve Little Girl, Valentine and Wrinkles. Gretchen Mogensen again took to Facebook, posting videoof the hours-long battle to get Valentine into a trailer as the giraffe at times whipped her neck and kicked her legs. “Inhumane Method of Seizing a Giraffe,” said the caption.
En route to the animals’ new home, workers made an alarming discovery: Valentine had died.
The Attorney General’s office confirmed the death in July to the Cardinal News, after months of online speculation by Natural Bridge Zoo and its supporters. The office said a preliminary necropsy found stress from the relocation was not a factor and suggested medication administered by Natural Bridge Zoo might be at fault, the Cardinal News reported.
Crosky, of the Virginia Animal Owners Alliance, isn’t buying it. “That animal was perfect in every way until they started chasing her for hours and hours,” she said.
Gretchen Mogensen’s posts about the giraffe transport — and her refusal to answer questions about the whereabouts of the calves — were what landed her in trouble with the judge overseeing the zoo case. During a September hearing, she offered no evidence in her defense; her lawyers said the state was using the proceeding as an investigative tool to compel her to give up information to build a criminal case against her. Rockbridge County Judge Christopher B. Russell found her in contempt of court and ruled that she could clear herself by revealing the giraffes’ location or otherwise report to jail.
She appealed, but was unsuccessful and reported to the Rockbridge County Jail on Oct. 29. As she has sat behind bars, speculation over the baby giraffes has continued.
What is known is the fate of the three adult giraffes. Jeffrey, Little Girl and Wrinkles ended up at a new luxury attraction on 530 acres about an hour outside Atlanta, according to USDA records included in court filings. At Georgia Safari Conservation Park, they live in a barn attached to a luxury suite where, for $1,200 a night, visitors can experience “a privileged vantage point to connect with the Park’s giraffes.” Park President Mark Conrads said in a statement that the park is “focused on conservation and animal welfare” and “any guest interactions are limited and entirely at the giraffes’ discretion.”
From time to time, they appear in TikTok videos and news segments about the venue. All have been renamed.
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