Less than a month after the story of Peanut the Squirrel and Fred the Raccoon made headlines, Mark Longo, the owner of the two animals whose tragic deaths sparked public outcry and sparked a movement, launched its own token.
Longo spoke in a Twitter video about how he came to deal with the story of Peanut and Fred and decided to launch a new token on Solana called Justice for Pnut and Fred (JUSTICE) to honor the memory of his pets.
“The government is not going to get away with this,” Longo said. “Justice will be served, not just for Fred and Peanut (…) We will show the world that it is not acceptable to cross the line.”
He also accused the crypto community of profiting from his personal trauma.
“The crypto world took my tragedy and profited from it in every way possible,” Longo claimed, describing the ordeal as “one of the most devastating things” in his life.
“The fact that people want to make money from this is just despicable,” he said.
After speaking out about how the crypto community allegedly took advantage of the incident, Longo then announced that he was launching the new token.
“It’s the one piece I’ll be affiliated with forever,” Longo said. He did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Members of the PNUT community pushed back, pointing out that approximately $50,000 in donations had been made to Longo, that they claim he immediately sold.
At the time of writing, JUSTICE has a market capitalization of over $53.8 million and has over 14,000 holders, according to Solscan datawhich was created using the DeFi coin platform, Pump.fun.
Where the story began
Peanut the Squirrel (stylized as P’Nut) and Fred the raccoon lived with Mark Longo at his animal sanctuary in Pine City, New York. P’Nut has become an internet sensation with over 500,000 followers across social media platforms.
New York State environmental officers searched Longo’s home on October 30, citing laws against keeping wild animals as pets. Both animals were euthanized on November 1 after P’Nut allegedly bit someone during the seizure.
The incident sparked widespread outrage and became politically charged in the run-up to the US presidential election.
Days after the story went viral, Vice President-elect J.D. Vance said at a rally in Sanford, North Carolina, that Trump was “on fire” about euthanasia, criticizing what they saw as “government overreach.”
Elon Musk, who supported Trump during the election campaign, describe the situation as “messed up” before continuing with a flurry of tweets about P’Nut. This prompted crypto Twitter to escalate pump and hype the Solana-based coin created based on this, following Musk’s comments and associating it with PNUT.
Lawsuits and exhibits
The case behind PNUT is not the first time that a coin has given rise to actual lawsuits or threats.
On November 21, Philip Banks, the artist behind the viral “Chill Guy” meme, said he pursue legal action against the same coins using his art, declaring that he would “publish withdrawals on things related to profit.”
The banks’ artwork has been used on various coins, particularly with another Solana-based token, CHILLGUY, whose market cap grew from $13 million on November 19 to over $517 million on November 22, according to data from CoinGecko.
Edited by SĂ©bastien Sinclair
Daily debriefing Newsletter
Start each day with the biggest news stories of the day, plus original features, a podcast, videos and more.