Viola is a 58 yr old abused elephant who recently escaped the Carson & Barnes Circus in Butte, Montana. 

Viola has escaped at least two other times—in 2010 and 2014.
Her latest break for freedom comes after decades of being forced to perform grueling and painful tricks and being abused in other ways at the hands of Carson & Barnes and Jordan World. The circus’s workers were previously caught on video electroshocking elephants and beating them with a sharp steel-tipped weapon called a bullhook.

In 2021, a PETA investigation revealed that Viola was being forced to perform daily despite suffering from chronically swollen feet and signs of other ailments affecting her rear legs.

Elephants learn crucial social and behavioral skills from their mothers and other relatives, with whom they share intense emotional bonds. Instead of experiencing this in their natural homes, elephants used in circuses are exploited and hauled from place to place to perform meaningless circus tricks.

Animals in circuses are often beaten, shocked, kicked, or cruelly confined in order to train them to be obedient and do tricks.

Due to their physical size, complex social needs, high level of intelligence, large home ranges, diverse diet and large behavioural repertoire, the full welfare needs of elephants cannot be met in captivity. A life in captivity for elephants is inherently cruel and leads to suffering throughout their long lives.

Elephants are removed from companions to be bought and sold, and frequently transported in terrible conditions, have no level of autonomy over their lives, to the extent where they are trained to defecate into a bucket on command.

Tell Carson & Barnes Circus and Jordan World Circus to let Viola go live in a sanctuary. She’s earned them money long enough!