{"id":412426,"date":"2026-07-26T00:02:11","date_gmt":"2026-07-26T00:02:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/412426\/"},"modified":"2026-07-26T00:02:11","modified_gmt":"2026-07-26T00:02:11","slug":"federal-officials-investigate-video-of-man-kicking-sea-lion-at-la-jolla-cove","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/412426\/","title":{"rendered":"Federal officials investigate video of man kicking sea lion at La Jolla Cove"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Federal law enforcement officials are investigating a viral social media <a href=\"https:\/\/facebook.com\/reel\/2495461264262663\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">video<\/a> in which a man kicks a sea lion, which apparently occurred at a San Diego County beach on Wednesday night.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said on Friday that its Fisheries Office of Law Enforcement has the case.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cNOAA Fisheries, Office of Law Enforcement is investigating reports of a video on social media that shows an interaction between an individual and sea lion, allegedly in La Jolla Cove,\u201d an NOAA Instagram post said. \u201cIn the video, the individual appears to be kicking the sea lion. This is an ongoing investigation, and we cannot provide further details at this time.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Sea lions are federally protected under the Marine Mammal Protection Act. Actions or attempts to harass, harm, pursue, feed, capture, injure, restrain (no matter how temporarily), or kill may be punishable through fines or jail time.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cIf you witness a potential Marine Mammal Protection Act violation, the best way you can help is to report the incident immediately to the NOAA Fisheries Office of Law Enforcement at 800-853-1964,\u201d the NOAA said. \u201cInvestigations are most effective when detailed information is provided. Please provide as much information as possible regarding the incident witnessed.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The video has gotten national news coverage and sparked outrage among animal advocates, including PETA, the Sierra Club and others.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cAssault is ASSAULT, no matter the species. This abuser laughed while harassing and kicking a sea lion who was desperately trying to escape,\u201d PETA said in a statement Friday. \u201cThanks to everyone who reported it; the case is now under investigation. Leave animals ALONE, and always speak up when you witness abuse.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Some news outlets have reported that the San Diego Police Department was involved in the case, but a department official said the SDPD was not notified of the incident.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cThe incident was reported to Fish and Game, who referred it to NOAA,\u201d Lt. Cesar Jimenez told City News Service on Saturday. \u201cSDPD was not notified when the incident occurred.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Federal law enforcement officials are investigating a viral social media video in which a man kicks a sea&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":412427,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[97557,74,76,75],"class_list":["post-412426","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-diego","tag-la-jolla-cove","tag-san-diego","tag-san-diego-headlines","tag-san-diego-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/412426","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=412426"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/412426\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/412427"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=412426"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=412426"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=412426"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}