From Peril to Sanctuary: Toby the Chimpanzee’s Story

The Center for Great Apes reports that Toby has been settling in well to his new home. Curious and playful, he’s been excited to engage with his new caregivers and is enjoying new toys, enrichment items, soft blankets, and the chance to make his own decisions and have some agency over his own life and how he spends his days — likely for the first time in his life.

One choice he’s made so far: Sleeping outside on a warm Florida night, in a nest he made himself from those new blankets. (The next evening, it rained, and Toby wisely decided to collect his blankets and move them back inside for the night.) 

While Toby is currently staying in a temporary enclosure during a quarantine period — a safety measure taken with every new sanctuary resident in order to protect all the primates living there — he has been able to see and hear other chimpanzees for the first time in more than three decades. Caretakers have observed Toby quietly watching another chimpanzee housed nearby and intently listening to the long calls of orangutans from across the sanctuary grounds. 

When the quarantine period is complete, he’ll begin the process of integrating with other chimpanzees at the Center for Great Apes — perhaps even having the chance to meet some of his siblings who already called the sanctuary home. (Toby’s father, Joe, also lived at the sanctuary until his passing last year. Joe was captured from the wild and had been transferred between a number of different facilities in his life, eventually arriving at one owned by “Joe Exotic” of Tiger King infamy, before ultimately finding sanctuary. At the Center for Great Apes, Joe’s friend group included Angel, a chimpanzee who was rescued from a cruel animal trainer in the entertainment industry through an Animal Legal Defense Fund lawsuit more than 20 years ago. Angel is still living happily at the Center for Great Apes.)  

Another positive change for Toby: Adjusting to a new, species-appropriate diet. Previously, he’d reportedly been fed a diet that consisted largely of pizza, burritos, and Mountain Dew. 

A Cruel Industry Nears Its End 

Chimpanzees and other nonhuman primates suffer greatly when kept as “pets” or used for entertainment. Toby was born at an Oklahoma roadside zoo and was just an infant when he was taken away from his mother to be sold as a “pet” — a life that chimpanzees are emphatically not suited for. In order to sell wild animals in the pet trade, breeders typically separate them from their mothers very prematurely. In the wild, a young chimpanzee would remain with their mother for years in a socially complex family group. Instead, Toby was deprived of seeing another member of his own species for almost his entire life — one of the most severe forms of psychological torment that a primate can suffer. 

During the more than three decades Toby spent in rural Indiana, he was denied the opportunity to engage in the behaviors that come naturally to chimpanzees, such as swinging, climbing, and roaming (in the wild, they might travel multiple miles per day). It is believed that he experienced little to no veterinary care during these years. While multiple sanctuaries and accredited zoos had reached out with offers to provide Toby a better life, none was ever accepted by his late owner. 

Countless chimpanzees and other primates have been forced into an unnatural and inhumane life of captivity as personal “pets.” All too often, this has ended in tragedy for the chimpanzee, and for the humans around them as well. Many will remember the story of Travis — a chimpanzee who, like so many others sold into the pet trade, was raised similarly to a human child, but as he aged became much too strong and, predictably, exhibited too many wild tendencies for his human family to handle. In Travis’s case, this ultimately led to him attacking a friend of his “owner,” being stabbed by the woman who had once raised him as her child, and finally being fatally shot by a police officer.   

Fortunately, Toby is believed to be one of the last chimpanzees to live in a private home (or in his case, garage) in the U.S. But it’s believed that thousands of other primates are being kept as “pets” in homes that cannot possibly meet their complex social, emotional, and physical needs. And alarmingly, a recent report found a marked increase in primate sales conducted on social media, with over 1,600 primates being found offered for sale across just four social platforms during a six-week period in 2025. 

You Can Help 

So many people needed to come together for Toby’s story to end happily. From the concerned member of the public who first raised the alarm, to the sanctuary operators and staffers who made Toby’s rescue possible, to the animal protection experts, advocates, and government officials who ensured his safe release, Toby’s story is one of collaboration — and the need to protect other primates like him continues. 

ALDF is fighting to protect chimpanzees and other primates from the cruel pet trade, approaching the issue from multiple angles including regulatory work and legislation. 

Your voice is needed: Congress is considering a bill called the Captive Primate Safety Act that would ban the private ownership of apes and monkeys throughout the U.S. Federal legislation like this is important, because without it, the animals (and public safety) rely on an inadequate patchwork of state and local laws that vary wildly by jurisdiction.  

The Captive Primate Safety Act would not only protect all nonhuman primates like Toby from living in inhumane and dangerous conditions in private homes, but would also ban the interstate and foreign commerce in these vulnerable animals for the pet trade — a key enforcement mechanism.  

Two-minute action: Send a message urging your federal lawmakers to support the Captive Primate Safety Act! And if you’re not already receiving updates from the Animal Legal Defense Fund, join our email list or follow us on social media to find more opportunities to take action for primates and other animals.