Alex Pacheco
Founder of 600 Million Dogs which is dedicated to ending animal overpopulation by developing single-dose, permanent lasting, birth control Spay and Neuter Cookies, to replace spay and neuter surgery and euthanasia as methods of population control.
2000-2005: Co-Founder of the world's largest nonprofit animal adoption website, Adopt-A-Pet.com which now has over 100,000 homeless animals and over 1,000 humane societies participating.
1985-1995: Vice President for 10 years of the non-profit New England Anti-Vivisection Society, an animal protection lobbying related organization with working assets of eight million dollars.
1980-2000: Four years after graduating from high school, he co-founded the world's largest and leading animal rights organization, PETA. He served as Chairman for 20 years before leaving in 2000, during which time the organization was described by the New York Times as the animal movement's "mover and shaker". As Chairman he was in charge of PETA's investigators, lobbyists, lawyers and fundraising staff. PETA currently generates $35 million in annual revenue with two million members.
He served as PETA's lead undercover investigator and legal tactician, successfully defeating and out maneuvering a long list of adversarial Cabinet level federal agencies, such as the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the U.S. Department of Defense, the USDA, the NIH, NASA and numerous others; including winning many landmark cases against many of the nation's largest corporations such as General Motors and Exxon. His precedent setting work includes the first police raid of an animal research facility; the first confiscation of animals from a biomedical laboratory, the first arrest, prosecution and criminal conviction of a biomedical scientist on charges of cruelty; the first, second and third terminations of federal research grants due to cruelty; the first closing of a U.S. Pentagon animal laboratory, the closing of the world's largest horse slaughtering company, and more.
Additional successful campaigns include forcing dozens of major corporations such as General Motors (at the time the world's largest corporation), Texaco, Exxon, Mobil Oil, L'Oreal, Avon, Revlon, Amway, Benetton and others, to end various inhumane practices.
Pacheco planned and executed landmark undercover investigative work inside a federally funded research facility, producing a civil and criminal case cited by film director Oliver Stone and others, as thecase that launched the U.S. animal rights movement: The Silver Spring Monkeys. Spanning 15 years, the cases were heard before the U.S. Supreme Court twice, involved hundreds of Members of Congress, over 55 U.S. Senators, and led to hearings and passage of federal animal protection legislation.
Pacheco was the undercover investigator and directed the lobbying and litigation throughout the 15 year international campaign, leading to a Harvard University study on how to defeat the animal protection movement, commissioned by the American Medical Association, which described Pacheco as a "folk hero".
Pacheco started PETA with no funding, no college degree, no staff and no experience; he played a key role in building the organization from scratch to the point where anyone can mail an envelope from anywhere in the U.S., with nothing more on the envelope than "PETA" written on it, and the letter will still be delivered.
He was awarded the Crew Member of the Year Award by the Sea Shepherd Conservations Society (Animal Planet's TV series Whale Wars).
Voted into the U.S. Animal Rights Hall of Fame.
Awarded The Peace Abbey Courage of Conscience Award.
For one year lived with seven Brothers and three Priests while studying to become a Catholic Priest in the Scholastic Program for Ecclesiastical Students at Ohio State University.
Deans List Ohio University 1976-77, Ohio State University 1977-78, George Washington University,1979-1980. Left George Washington University to co-found PETA instead of graduating.
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