Sheri Speede

Sherri Speede qualified as a Doctor of Veterinary Medicine at Louisiana State University and began practicing in 1985. Moving to the Portland, Oregon area in 1988, she soon became a partner in Pacific Veterinary Hospital, a successful southwest Portland practice. She sold her interest in the veterinary practice in 1995 so she could commit herself full time to animal activism.

Dr. Speede lived in Cameroon full-time from 1998 to late 2011. During this time, she collaborated with the Cameroon Government to found the Sanaga-Yong Chimpanzee Rescue Center, a forested home for orphans of the illegal ape meat trade, while she led conservation programs aimed at saving chimpanzees and gorillas from extinction. With Edmund Stone, she established In Defense of Animals - Africa (IDA-Africa) as the U.S. base of support for the work in Cameroon. Currently, splitting her time between Cameroon and the United States, she serves as Director of IDA-Africa and Sanaga-Yong Chimpanzee Rescue Center.