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Jon Campbell: Janae, how do you feel about squirrels? Like, scale of 1 to 10.

Janae Pierre: I'm going to say 5. I have nothing against them, but they're no friend of mine. Why? What's up?

Jon Campbell: I want to tell you about a woman and a squirrel that totally upended her life. Hello, this is Jon. Her name's Monica.

Monica Hector: Hey, Jon. This is Monica Hector with Monica Ann Photography.

Jon Campbell: She is a photographer in Missouri. She takes photos of weddings and graduations.

Monica Hector: Been in business for about 10 years.

Jon Campbell: One morning she woke up to a barrage of messages from people on her Facebook page for business.

Monica Hector: Probably 500 different messages, whether on my page or a personal message to my page.

Janae Pierre: Messages from who?

Jon Campbell: She didn't know. She had no clue who they were. They were just saying nasty, vile things.

Monica Hector: Yes, you're a killer. You're horrible. You should go to hell. You should die. I can't believe you did this.

Jon Campbell: They attack her business. There's these fake, nasty reviews on her business page.

Monica Hector: It just went on and on and on. It's pretty disgusting.

Jon Campbell: You start getting these, you have no idea what's going on. How do you even figure out what happened?

Monica Hector: It was probably six or seven hours later that a friend of mine sent me a message and said, "Hey, check out this news story. This is what's going on."

Jon Campbell: It's this story that a lot of people may have heard last year. It's about a pet squirrel named Peanut who had been seized and ultimately killed by state and local authorities from this guy's house in upstate New York because he didn't have a license to have the animal. People were blaming a woman named Monica. It was so clear to Monica Hector, in that moment that this was a case of mistaken identity.

Monica Hector: I had no clue who Peanut the squirrel was. All they did was look at people with the name of Monica Ann. They didn't look for anything else.

Janae Pierre: This is NYC Now. I'm Janae Pierre. Today, we dive into the story of Peanut the squirrel. It's a story that didn't just upend the life of Monica Hector. It moved like a tidal wave across mainstream and conservative media in the lead-up to last year's presidential election.

Speaker: Fury is growing after America's most popular critter--

Speaker: Was seized from his owners.

Speaker: Have you seen the videos of the squirrel? He's like-- He's a genius.

Janae Pierre: It's a story of what some call government overreach of an Internet mob blaming innocent people. Like so many viral sensations, it grabbed headlines and then faded away over time. WNYC reporter Jon Campbell recently got his hands on hundreds of documents and recordings through an open records request with the state of New York. They tell a fuller story about just how far the backlash around this squirrel went, about how the state's Environmental Conservation Agency was inundated with death threats, and how this one particular skirmish in the online culture wars had a real-life impact on how the agency enforces laws.

Matt Krug: Initially, right afterwards, we weren't allowed to do any wildlife seizures for months and months and months.

Janae Pierre: Just a heads up, this episode contains explicit language and harm to animals. If you're not up for that or if you're listening with children, this story may not be for you.

Jon Campbell: Janae, over the past few months, I have just dove into squirrel social media. Did you even know that existed?

Janae Pierre: No. No judgment, Jon. Do your thing. You're a hard-working guy.

Jon Campbell: Anything for the job. There is a whole Internet subculture that's dedicated to squirrels.

Monica Hector: This is one of our baby microsquirrels.

Jon Campbell: Facebook pages. Thousands of people-

Speaker: Say hi, chipper.

Jon Campbell: Instagram, TikTok.

Speaker: Look at this fat ass squirrel.

Jon Campbell: Peanut the squirrel is among the most famous squirrels there are on the Internet.

Mark Longo: Hi, guys. If you've never met Peanut, welcome to Peanut the Squirrel's Instagram page.

Jon Campbell: His owner, Mark Longo, spent years posting these videos of him.

Mark Longo: Boop, boop, huboob. Peanut is an eastern gray squirrel, but due to a genetic mutation in his genes, he is black and brown.

Jon Campbell: Sometimes, the squirrel is holding waffles. Sometimes he's jumping off the fridge onto Mark's hip.

Mark Longo: Peanut is very playful right now. He's trying to--

Jon Campbell: A lot of times, he was wearing a cowboy hat, a little tiny squirrel cowboy hat.

Mark Longo: I finally got Peanut out of bed, mainly because I was cleaning his room and he was pissed off at me. I wanted to pop on again with you guys. I did a short one this morning.

Janae Pierre: How did Mark Longo get Peanut in the first place?

Jon Campbell: Here's how Mark tells the story. This is tough to verify, tough to fact-check, but about eight years ago, Mark says he was working in New York City, and he came across a dead adult squirrel in the road. Not too far away, he said he saw a baby squirrel.

Mark Longo: I ran in the middle of the street in hopes I could shoo him out of any oncoming traffic. I didn't want him to get hit as well. He ended up crawling up my leg.

Jon Campbell: Do you remember what part of the city, roughly?

Mark Longo: I would say in 34th Street. I put him in my pocket, got in the car, and drove him home.

Janae Pierre: A squirrel in the pocket. That sounds like a Disney movie or something.

Jon Campbell: Yes, it really does. At first, Mark says the Disney ending he was going for was one where this squirrel goes on to live in the wild.

Mark Longo: We thought what would be best for him was to do what's called a soft release. We initially just slowly incorporated him into our backyard, but it failed, and he ended up getting attacked and losing half of his tail. He did become a strictly indoor squirrel after that, and he became best friends with our cat.

Janae Pierre: Peanut becomes Mark's pet squirrel.

Jon Campbell: Yes, and the squirrel becomes a star.

Speaker: Everybody, meet Peanut the squirrel.

Speaker: Peanut the squirrel will be on with us, and his owner, Mark.

Speaker: Hello, Mark and Peanut the squirrel. Nice to see you. Welcome to the show.

Mark Longo: Thank you so much for having us.

Jon Campbell: Mark and his wife, Daniela, they try to seize on this new celebrity status for Peanut, and they start this animal sanctuary upstate near the city of Elmira, right on the Pennsylvania border.

Mark Longo: My wife and I sat down and said, "You know what? We have a squirrel who's made a really big impact on social media. How can we utilize his platform to go out and help advocate for more animals?" We asked everybody to come up with a name, and P'Nuts Freedom Farm was really where that stuck. Most of y'all know that we have about 60 horses, 100 goats, a pack of sheeps, donkeys, pigs, bunnies, and a squirrel.

Jon Campbell: As of now, they say they have about 400 animals.

Mark Longo: If you guys do me a huge favor, I was hoping to get a bunch of you to donate a few dollars to our fundraiser right now. This will really solidify what P'Nut can do here.

Janae Pierre: This sounds innocent so far. When does it start to go wrong?

Jon Campbell: Here's the thing. Squirrels are generally, in a lot of states, considered to be wildlife, and wildlife isn't meant to be contained.

Janae Pierre: Right.

Jon Campbell: You can't keep a squirrel as a pet in New York. You can get a license that lets you rehab a squirrel for release into the wild, or an exhibitor license that lets you keep a squirrel for educational purposes. Mark didn't have either of those, although he later took a test to start the licensing process.

Mark Longo: To be honest with you, I never really saw this to be an issue, considering the longevity of how I've had him, the fact that there are multiple squirrel families in New York state. At no point did I just go, "Yes, f these people. I've had him for so long, I don't need to do this."

Jon Campbell: Early 2024, that's when the complaints start coming in.

Matt Krug: Our folks began receiving complaints about an individual using a squirrel in social media posts and videos, and TikToks.

Jon Campbell: I talked to Matt Krug. He's the vice president of the Police Benevolent Association of New York. That's the union that represents environmental conservation officers.

Matt Krug: This individual was using it for social media and generate revenue that way.

Janae Pierre: That puts him on their radar.

Jon Campbell: Yes. More complaints come in in May, there's a complaint from someone who says they're a licensed wildlife rehabber, and they mention his OnlyFans account.

Janae Pierre: What? A squirrel with an OnlyFans account? Goodness.

Jon Campbell: No, no, no. Not the squirrel. Not the squirrel. Mark has an OnlyFans account.

Mark Longo: I use my OnlyFans to help generate more funding for my non-profit animal rescue.

Jon Campbell: The subscription service where users can sell sexually explicit pornography directly to their fans.

Mark Longo: I don't like to talk about it on Peanut's page because it's Peanut's page and not everybody wants to talk about that crap.

Jon Campbell: Mark says he never mixed the two, but his username is Squirrel Daddy, and his profile does make clear that he's "Peanut's dad".

Mark Longo: At no point would you be able to go on Peanut's page and scroll down and go, "Oh, he's got an OnlyFans page." Let's face it, it's 2025. It's not illegal. It's not a secret. That's normal life these days.

Janae Pierre: These complaints are coming in. What do New York State authorities do?

Jon Campbell: What happens next, we know because of these documents that we got from the State Department of Environmental Conservation, which employs actual police officers who uphold environmental law. These documents show that an officer spoke to Mark by phone, and Mark said that Peanut was at his old house in Connecticut. The officer then goes back to the person who originally complained, and he says, "It's a squirrel. I'm not going to get a search warrant for a squirrel." It's that comment right there that's almost ironic because officers eventually would get a search warrant. That's largely because Mark keeps posting. In July, the same person who complained notices something new, a raccoon in one of Mark's videos.

Mark Longo: Hi. I don't know if the service cut out a little bit. Are you guys still there? [laughs]

Janae Pierre: What's this raccoon's name, Jon? Please tell me it's not Cashew.

Jon Campbell: It is not Cashew. It's Fred.

Mark Longo: This is Fred Word, guys. Can you say hi to everybody, Fred Word? Are you guys still there? [laughs]

Jon Campbell: Here's the problem, Jenae. Raccoons are classified by New York State as a "rabies vector species." That means they can carry rabies, sometimes even without symptoms. Matt Krug of the union that represents environmental conservation officers says it's a serious thing.

Matt Krug: Rabies, as some people may or may not know, it's like 99.999% fatal in people and animals when they get it. It's not something that we mess around with in any way.

Janae Pierre: The raccoon is a really big game-changer for the agents.

Jon Campbell: Yes, they see it as a public health concern, and they decide to act. That's when 10 to 12 officers and other people from the New York State D.C. show up at Mark's farm. They've got trucks, they've got guns, and they've got a search warrant signed by a local judge.

Mark Longo: They came into my house, they even asked my wife her immigration status. They asked me if I had cameras in my house. They had a criminal judge sign a search warrant to come and take these animals. I called my wife, I was able to get a short call off and told-- I said, "He's here. Hide those animals."

Jon Campbell: Mark talks to these agents, he says the animals aren't in the house.

Mark Longo: I lied right to their face. Anybody in my position would have done the same thing. We love our animals unconditionally. At the end of the day, people are going to defend their lifelong pet.

Jon Campbell: He lets the officers in, they start searching. This is all according to documents that we've obtained through open records requests. Mark's wife, Daniela, comes clean about Fred the raccoon, and she points them to a closet where he was in an unzipped suitcase. You say you or your wife did not put Fred in the suitcase. Correct?

Mark Longo: She literally just put him in the closet. He found my suitcase and fell asleep in my suitcase.

Jon Campbell: Then the officers eventually find Peanut. He's in a whirlpool tub, he's underneath some clothing.

Janae Pierre: Did the officers find anything else?

Jon Campbell: Yes, they sure did.

Matt Krug: They walked into the kitchen, and there was a assault rifle sitting in a chair.

Jon Campbell: A short-barreled weapon that the officer suspected was not compliant with New York's gun control laws. Were your members aware, upon looking at it, that it may not be compliant?

Mark Longo: Yes. I told them that the gun wasn't mine. I provided the contact information to the owner of the rifle, who happens to also be on the mortgage and the deed of the property. They tried to get me to sign paperwork claiming that it was mine, and I refused to sign it.

Jon Campbell: Then there's this one other key thing that happens. Really, the biggest key thing here. As a biologist was putting Peanut into a crate, the state says Peanut bit her.

Janae Pierre: Oh, that is not good.

Jon Campbell: I asked Matt Krug about this.

Matt Krug: Mark Longo over and over and over again raises doubt about that bite.

Mark Longo: We have not gotten any evidence to say this happened.

Jon Campbell: He's on social media every single day.

Mark Longo: There was no visible bite marks on the gloves.

Jon Campbell: What do you say to him when he says that?

Matt Krug: Someone was bitten by this creature.

Janae Pierre: They take Mark's animals. From what you've told me about Mark so far, it seems like he's pretty attached to Peanut.

Jon Campbell: Yes. At this point, he's just left wondering.

Mark Longo: Hi, everyone. I just wanted to update all of you. The DEC will not tell us whether or not Peanut is alive or not, so I can't give you a definitive answer of whether or not he's still here with us. I just want to say thank you for everybody who signed--

Janae Pierre: Coming up, what happened to Peanut and Fred?

Mark Longo: Peanut was the best thing that ever happened to us.

Janae Pierre: And how their seizure by state authorities last fall continues to reverberate today.

Matt Krug: We were essentially handcuffed to do our jobs after that.

Janae Pierre: Jon, let's do a quick recap. We've met Mark Longo and his pet squirrel, Peanut. We know that Peanut is this Internet sensation, and he has hundreds of thousands of fans on social media. Now there's this seizure. What happens when a squirrel bites anyone?

Jon Campbell: What happens next is all laid out in those documents we got through the open records request. It shows that by the time of this search at Mark Longo's home, the DEC agents had already consulted with the local health department. Now that a DEC staffer reported being bitten, the health department determined it was best to test both of the animals for rabies. Jenae, the only way you can do that, you have to put them down and decapitate them. To look at their brain.

Mark Longo: Hi, everyone. I don't know how I'm going to say this. [sobs] I just want to say thank you to all of you. [sobs] Peanut was the best thing that ever happened to us.

Janae Pierre: I'm guessing Mark's followers had a pretty strong reaction to this.

Jon Campbell: It blew up fast. By the way, the rabies tests were negative. This starts the chaos.

Mr. Cuomo: Mark Longo, the man who just lost the squirrel, joins us now.

Mark Longo: This sucks.

Mr. Cuomo: How are you taking it?

Mark Longo: Mr. Cuomo, I just want to say thank you so much for inviting me on the show. What happened today and what transpired throughout this week has been nothing short of a tragedy and a disgrace to the New York State.

Jon Campbell: You got to remember, this was just days before the presidential election.

J.D. Vance: The craziest thing. Look--

Jon Campbell: You had J.D. Vance, who was the vice presidential candidate, talking about Peanut on the campaign trail.

J.D. Vance: Is it really the case that the Democrats murdered the Elon Musk of squirrels?

Jon Campbell: Joe Rogan, the big-time podcaster, he brought it up on his podcast, which gets millions of listens.

Joe Rogan: Why would you kill that cute little squirrel that was obviously a pet and trained from the time it was a baby? It was really cute.

Mark Longo: This was a really bad situation for the DEC. I think they didn't see any of this coming. I think they thought this was another day in the office. I don't think this was the first time they've ever done something like this, but this is the first time that they were caught by millions of people.

Jon Campbell: This is where innocent bystanders get dragged into this Internet culture war moment. People online started looking for somebody to blame, and one name started circulating almost immediately. Her name was Monica Kessler. She's a photographer from Texas.

Janae Pierre: What's Monica's connection to this?

Jon Campbell: It's not totally clear. Monica Kessler was active in these private Facebook groups that are huge dedicated to rehabbing squirrels and squirrels in general. Best I can tell, there was some dispute between her and another person that was active in these groups. All of a sudden, Monica's name and contact information start popping up, and people were accusing her of being the one that filed the complaint with the DEC that got all of this started. Kessler said she had nothing to do with it. You can actually see that in the documents that the state says they have no record of Monica Kessler filing a report. Here's where it spirals, because once her name was out there, those other Monicas who were photographers, they start getting targeted, too.

Monica Hector: I know it's just caused havoc in my life.

Jon Campbell: People like Monica Hector in Missouri, who we heard from earlier.

Monica Hector: If you've noticed, my Facebook page has not had a post since Thanksgiving because I can't post to it.

Jon Campbell: You can't post to it because why?

Monica Hector: People will not leave me alone.

Jon Campbell: Oh, so if you post something, it's like a wave of Peanut the squirrel messages?

Monica Hector: I hope you die. I hope someone takes care of you like they did Peanut kind of things. I've had one photography shoot since that has happened. One, and I've booked absolutely no weddings this year.

Jon Campbell: That's not usual.

Monica Hector: About 15 to 20 weddings a year.

Jon Campbell: I mean, there's got to be a feeling of helplessness here. Right?

Monica Hector: Yes, most definitely.

Jon Campbell: Is there anything you can do?

Monica Hector: As of right now, local law enforcement, I have talked to the local county prosecuting attorney, which I've turned over all the death threats and things of that sort to him. The last word from the Attorney General's office in Missouri was that they were going to turn this over to the FBI.

Jon Campbell: I talked to another Monica from Northern California who said the same thing. Death threats, business ruined, all because they shared a first name.

Monica: They were telling me that I should kill myself. They said, I hope your kids die because this is what you deserve for what you did. Granted, I didn't do anything.

Janae Pierre: It's just not a good time for Monicas at all.

Jon Campbell: No, not at all. The DEC starts getting flooded with calls and threats from all over the country.

Voicemail: I live in Southern Illinois.

Jon Campbell: I got hundreds of voicemails under an open records request.

Voicemail: Watching the national news and what you guys did to that guy's squirrel and raccoon. You guys are disgusting fucking communists.

Voicemail: You are evil, evil people. You will not get away with this.

Voicemail: Yes, Joe Namath is my cousin. The famous quarterback that played for the New York Jets. What you folks did to that squirrel, Peanut, it makes me sick.

Jon Campbell: There were bomb threats that came in via email that forced thousands of workers to work from home for a period of time.

Voicemail: Your agents that raided Mark Longo and took and killed Peanut and Fred, they still need their heads removed with a fucking bat.

Voicemail: I am going to kill and murder everyone who is involved in the Peanut situation.

Jon Campbell: Anybody whose name was on the DEC's website was being targeted, their families too. The union rep for the DEC officers told me the police had to provide round-the-clock protection for some of DEC's top management. Even going as far as having to take their kids to the school drop-off and pick-up line.

Voicemail: Fuck you, you communist bitches in New York. Trump.

Janae Pierre: This clearly isn't just about a cute little squirrel named Peanut anymore. It's about rage and politics. What some call government overreach, even. What does Mark make of this, and how all of this is playing out?

Jon Campbell: I asked Mark about all of that. Some of the voicemails. There was the Monica Kessler situation. Who do you think deserves blame for that? Why do you think that part of this happened?

Mark Longo: To be honest with you, I don't know. I've always been somebody that said, "Hey, we're going to fight this fight. We're going to do it the legal way." The last thing I wanted anybody to do is go out and threaten anybody. I came out and made multiple statements. That's not why we're here, guy. This is not about exacting revenge. I have never blamed Monica Kessler.

Jon Campbell: Just to push back on that. At some point, I think you did post perhaps an image of her. Do you regret that at all, given the threats that she did get?

Mark Longo: I do not agree with everything that she had gone through. Again, in my opinion, if you had nothing to do with it, I am literally right here. Since this has happened, at no point has any bit-- I had her lawyer call me, and he was laughing about the situation.

Jon Campbell: I reached out to Monica's attorney to ask about whether that call happened and whether it happened as Mark Longo says it did. I haven't gotten a response.

Janae Pierre: It's really not often that we hear from folks when they're in the middle of a social media firestorm like this one. What is Mark up to now?

Jon Campbell: Mark has sued, saying he's lost a lot of money after losing Peanut, both him and his animal sanctuary. The squirrel was a really powerful fundraising tool, he says, and he's also pushing for a new law called Peanut's Law. This is a bill in Albany that would require animals to be quarantined, to be watched for rabies symptoms, rather than euthanized. It's a long shot. Janae, even without that law, Matt Krug, the union rep for the Environmental Conservation officers, he says this incident has rattled leadership at the Department of Environmental Conservation. Remember, the agency was flooded with death threats.

Matt Krug: I know they were scared. That definitely did have a ripple effect.

Jon Campbell: Let's talk about the post-Peanut ripple effects. Does this continue to have an effect on your members and your members' work, more importantly?

Matt Krug: Absolutely. Initially, right afterwards, after we got through all the threats, we weren't allowed to do any wildlife seizures for months and months and months. We weren't allowed to execute any warrants without the acting commissioner's approval. Some of these were simple warrants, and we're waiting weeks and weeks and weeks to be able to execute them and go on, do our seizure, do our investigation because we still have a job to do, essentially. It's environmental protection.

We went through a process, right afterwards, where we weren't allowed by management to even do our road checkpoints during big game season, looking for illegal wildlife, deer being transferred back across state borders, loaded guns.

Jon Campbell: That directive was directly tied to the Peanut thing, you think?

Matt Krug: Absolutely. We were essentially handcuffed to do our jobs after that. We had an officer quit who had 17 years on, said, "The department doesn't have my back. This isn't worth my family being threatened."

Jon Campbell: He also says officers are struggling to get prosecutors to take on their cases in the months following the peanut saga. The local district attorney didn't respond to my request for comment. The state Department of Environmental Conservation declined my request for an interview. Just to be clear, Mark Longo hasn't been charged with any wrongdoing, and there's no indication he will be. What do you want the public to know about your members and the work they did that day and leading up to that day?

Matt Krug: Our members are professionals. We go through a six to seven-month police academy. We got a warrant, we followed our procedures, and we were doing our jobs.

Jon Campbell: From your perspective, it was by the book?

Matt Krug: Yes. Correct. This was done by the book, following the criminal procedure law with a signed warrant from an elected judge, and charges were pending. Felony charges for the gun should have been pending, and this defendant should be arrested for this because if this individual, if it was a poor kid in downtown Albany with the same gun, he'd already probably be in state prison. This instead, is a social media "star" and utilizing all the press and publicity, and hasn't been charged yet, but he should be.

Jon Campbell: Anything else you want to touch on, anything we missed?

Matt Krug: If you weren't completely turned away, we are doing another civil service test in November of 2025. I hope you'll sign up for the test because you can really do some good for the environment and be on the front line. Take our test, become a conservation officer. We're looking for the best-qualified candidates for it.

Janae Pierre: Jon, thanks so much for your reporting on this. I'm really hoping you don't switch career fields.

Jon Campbell: My pleasure, Janae.

Janae Pierre: That's WNYC's Jon Campbell. Thanks for listening to NYC Now from WNYC. I'm Janae Pierre. We'll be back on Monday.

 

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