‘Absolutely dedicated:’ Tucson animal rights activist Jamie Massey dead at 71

Local animal welfare advocates are mourning after the death of a Tucson man who spent decades fighting locally for laws against rooster fighting, greyhound racing and puppy mills.

Those advocates say Jamie Massey, who died earlier this month, had worked since the 1990s to combat animal cruelty. Authorities confirmed Massey died on Dec. 11 at 71 years old.

“Jamie was really a hero to many us,” said Karen Michael, who volunteers and serves on the board of directors at both the Animal Defense League of Arizona and Humane Voters of Arizona.

The latter group, she said, evolved from a group Massey had started, Arizona Lobby for Animals. The group is now a 501(c)(4), which enables the group to endorse political candidates who champion animal protection policies.

She said they’d worked together on numerous animal welfare bills, often watching them fail in the state legislature.

Through his activism, Michael said, he often coordinated large numbers of volunteers and shone a spotlight on numerous animal rights issues, ranging from those in Southern Arizona to nationwide. “He had such a drive to help animals and he just would not give up.”

Wayne Pacelle, president of Washington D.C.-based Animal Wellness Action, learned about Massey’s death Tuesday. He said he worked with Massey in the late 1990s to outlaw rooster fighting in Arizona, one of the last states to do so.

Pacelle said he was working to have bans placed in Arizona and Missouri. Once those initiatives, he said, rooster fighting was outlawed in Oklahoma, New Mexico and Louisiana.

“The efforts in Arizona was really the beginning of a wave of anti-cockfighting legislation,” Pacelle said. 

He also helped lead the a successful initiative around 2006 to ban veal crates and gestation crates for pigs.

Karyn Zoldan said she worked around 2008 with Massey to gather signatures on ballot measures that would prohibit the now-defunct Tucson Greyhound Park in South Tucson from giving dogs anabolic steroids or other performance-enhancing drugs and prevent the dogs from being kept in minimum-size cages for more than 18 hours.

She’d already written numerous letters to the editor of the Arizona Daily Star at the time, when Massey called her asking if she wanted to help.

“He gathered all these people around him and was able to educate people and bring these things to their attention,” she said. “He made me aware of a lot of things.”

The city of South Tucson didn’t enforce the measure when it became an ordinance, she added, it did alert the community to what was happening, which contributed to the decline in the popularity of dog racing at the site.

Tucson Greyhound Park stopped holding races when then-Gov. Doug Ducey signed a bill banning them statewide. The park closed completely in 2022.

In 2009, Michael said, Massey led a volunteer campaign that convinced the Tucson City Council to prohibit pet stores from selling dogs sourced through puppy mills. However, that ordinance and similar policies throughout Arizona were overturned in 2016.

Zoldan described him as a lifelong vegan, fan of rock ‘n’ roll music and an avid birdwatcher. “He was a very kind man, and he had a great sense of humor.”

Michael said Massey played the penny flute, did magic tricks and knew how to juggle, and he often shared those talents with residents at area nursing homes.

“He was absolutely dedicated and totally committed to animal protection,” she said. “At the same time, he had so much compassion for humans as well.”

Zoldan said she last saw him at a fundraising event months ago. He looked fine, she said, and his death was unexpected. 

According to Michael, he’d made an effort to visit another animal rights activist, Jim Shea, while he was going through hospice care.

“It meant everything to him,” she said of Shea. “I thanked him for that the last time we talked.”