The 65 goats seized from environmental activist Nancy Burton last year and their offspring are now up for adoption, Attorney General William Tong said Tuesday.

Meanwhile the state’s criminal case against Burton, an outspoken Millstone Nuclear Power Station critic who was charged with animal cruelty in 2020, remains pending.

A judge granted the state custody of the goats in May, but Burton was granted a stay until October. Burton may also have to compensate the state for its care of the goats, which has been taking place at Janet S. York Correctional Facility in East Lyme and its “Second Chance” animal rehabilitation site. The question of compensation has yet to be resolved.

“These goats suffered extreme neglect and have been in state custody for well over 500 days. They deserve this chance for permanent, loving homes,” Tong said in a statement Tuesday. “State intervention is never our first choice. Resources and assistance are available to animal owners in need, yet was repeatedly refused in this case. I am grateful to our team in the Office of the Attorney General and at the Department of Agriculture who have fought for many, many months to secure this positive resolution.”

According to the Attorney General’s office, numerous goats were pregnant at the time they were seized from Burton’s Redding farm, which is why the number of goats up for adoption went from 65 to more than 90 while being cared for by the state.

When authorities seized the goats last year, they “discovered between 40-50 dead goats in multiple locations of the property in various stages of decomposition in plastic bags, piled underneath a tarp, inside trash containers, and partially buried,” according to the AG’s office.

“One recently deceased goat was found in a shelter, with straw around its hooves and displaced in a semi-circle pattern carved into the ground, indicating that the animal had been struggling for a significant amount of time before expiring,” the AG’s office continued in the release. “Authorities observed that the goats lacked adequate water. Several struggled to walk and needed medical attention. Some were visibly underweight, with missing or matted fur caked with mud and manure.”

Burton, of Redding, who has lived in Mystic, has been a thorn in Millstone’s side for more than 20 years.

She has said she has owned goats that were affected by Millstone’s nuclear radiation, claims that were denied by Connecticut’s Department of Environmental Protection in 2006. She has refuted allegations of abuse or neglect of her goats. And she has said the state took her goats not out of concern for the animals’ safety, but because she was monitoring nuclear radiation levels through their milk.

In a March news release for an event protesting her goats being kept at York, Burton highlighted her “public-spirited project to collect goat milk to have it analyzed for the presence of radioactivity from nuclear power plants.”

Burton did not respond to a request for comment.

When the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission convened last year to discuss the possibility of expanding license renewal for nuclear reactors to 100 years, potentially opening the door for Millstone Nuclear Power Station reactors to remain licensed until 2075 and 2085, respectively, Burton objected.

“In a desperate and extreme move to rescue the dangerous, dirty and failed nuclear industry, the NRC is considering extending the nuclear licenses of the nation’s 94 operating nuclear reactors, including Millstone’s, to 100 years,” Burton told The Day at the time, calling the idea “an extreme act of nuclear madness.”

The founder of the watchdog group Connecticut Coalition Against Millstone, Burton has helped bring lawsuits and file freedom of information requests regarding Millstone’s operation. She has publicly questioned Millstone’s waste storage practices and argued many times that the nuclear plant has a negative impact on the surrounding environment, particularly the waters of Long Island Sound. She has said that Millstone's water-discharge technology has led to "massive fish kills through its intake structures."

s.spinella@theday.com