A federal judge has revoked Chimp Crazy star Tonia Haddix’s bond after she was arrested Saturday.
The star of HBO’s 2024 docuseries was cuffed, minus her signature blonde wig, after allegedly failing to pay court-ordered legal fees to the animal rights group PETA.
The arrest came after federal agents allegedly discovered an unregistered “mature female chimpanzee” hidden away in a cage in Haddix’s Missouri home during a July 9 raid.
The judge ruled Thursday that Haddix had violated the terms of her bond by having the chimp in her basement and must be jailed until her sentencing on August 7, according to St. Louis Public Radio.
Haddix, who had been ordered in 2020 never to own another chimp, is awaiting sentencing after she pleaded guilty in March to three felonies for lying to a federal judge about the fate of another secret chimp, Tonka.
Haddix had claimed in court that Tonka, a movie chimp who appeared in George of the Jungle and Buddy, died shortly before authorities came to seize him in 2021 from the now-defunct Missouri Primate Foundation, Haddix’s controversial chimp breeding facility.
That lie unraveled when Tonka was found alive in the basement of her home in 2022. Haddix had bragged on Chimp Crazy—directed by Tiger King’s Eric Goode—about fooling the court and keeping Tonka hidden.
PETA subsequently accused her of committing perjury, leading to her guilty plea in March.
Authorities said they found the second chimp on July 9 in the same house where Tonka had been stashed.
Officials had grown suspicious that Haddix was housing the chimp after pretrial service officers conducted an unannounced visit to her home in April and found what they believed to be fresh dung, according to court records.
In addition to violating her bond agreement, Haddix also allegedly broke state law by failing to register the chimp, St. Louis Public Radio reported. PETA said that the chimp has been safely confiscated.
Federal guidelines suggest a sentence of 10 to 16 months, according to St. Louis Public Radio. But in a July 23 memo, prosecutors argued for four to five years, in part due to Haddix’s bond violations.
“Tonia Haddix has again defied court orders and locked a highly social chimpanzee in a tiny basement cage, without the companionship of other chimpanzees, appropriate care, or even the ability to feel sunlight on her skin,” PETA Foundation General Counsel Brittany Peet told Rolling Stone in a statement. “This person clearly won’t stop hurting animals unless and until she’s facing a long stay behind bars herself, and PETA is calling for the court to issue her the harshest possible sentence.”
The Daily Beast has reached out to Haddix’s lawyer for comment.
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