Family's Monkey Is Rare, as Is This Custody Battle

                      Each night, a Russian immigrant couple sets out with their two young ones to stroll through
                           the dusky streets of Manhattan Beach in southern Brooklyn.

                     The parents, Roman and Inna Flikshtein, greet their neighbors up and down Girard Street with
                     friendly nods and waves. Their 13-year-old daughter, Michelle, lags behind, slurping a Popsicle and
                     shuffling her feet. Their youngest, Cookie, lopes along beside them in her bright red miniskirt,
                    gleefully nibbling a peanut offered by a neighbor -- and occasionally dragging her knuckles on the
                     street.

                     "So what if Cookie is a monkey?" Inna Flikshtein said with tears in her eyes.
 

                     "She is part of this family. They want to take the baby from the mother. But she will die without us,
                     and we will die if we give her up."

                    To the Flikshteins and an outraged army of their neighbors, Cookie Flikshtein is a beloved -- albeit
                     simian -- member of the family. She may be a monkey, they say, but she has adjusted enough to the
                     human condition to spend evenings eating ice cream and watching the nightly news.

                     While the state attorney general's office agrees that Cookie is no ordinary monkey, it is not because
                     of her adopted human ways. She is a Cercopithecus diana, commonly known as a diana monkey, an
                     endangered species in need of special care. And after a protracted court battle, state officials have
                    won permission to take Cookie from the Flikshtein home and place her into an animal rescue
                     program at the Detroit Zoo.

                     The saga of Cookie Flikshtein has stirred tumultuous feelings on both sides of the fight. Backed by
                     several experts, adamant state officials have said the monkey does not belong in human society and
                     must be returned to her own. The family's neighbors, on the other hand, have threatened to barricade
                     the Flikshtein home on quiet Girard Street and struggle against Cookie's forced removal to the end.

                     "The whole neighborhood will fight, and fight hard," said Lubov Gruber, who lives down the block.
                     "We're going to sit here and not let people come near. We will protest this for as long as it takes.
                     We're crying every day.

                     It has already broken our hearts."

                     The Flikshteins are spending what will probably be their last days with Cookie reaching out to
                     prominent animal rights lawyers, writing television producers, beseeching them to tell their story,
                     and flipping through the photo album, which contains memories of simpler times: Cookie's arrival
                     at their home five years ago. Cookie's first birthday party. Cookie sitting in the living room with
                     Michelle and Mom and Dad.

                     "We agree with the law, but sometimes there must be exceptions," Mr. Flikshtein said as Cookie
                     perched jauntily on his arm. "We're not prepared for her to go. We're hoping for a miracle. I just
                     can't see myself without . . . " he tried to say. But his voice broke and he had to turn away.

                     Mr. Flikshtein, who came to this country from Odessa in 1977, has always been fascinated with
                     animals.

                     "I had owned dogs, birds, cats, guinea pigs, whatever," Mr. Flikshtein said. But the dream of Inna
                     Flikshtein, who left the Soviet Union a few years later, was always to own a monkey.

                     The Flikshteins say they acted within the law when they bought Cookie on Feb. 18, 1995, from The
                     Pet Den, an exotic pet store in Commack, on Long Island.

                     Mr. Flikshtein, the owner of a dental laboratory in Queens, still has the receipt for the $4,500
                     purchase. He has the paperwork from Dennis Borghese, The Pet Den's owner, certifying that it was
                     a legal sale.

                     Even Mr. Borghese himself originally thought the sale was good. "I acquired that monkey legally,"
                     he said. "I was personally unaware that it was an endangered species, but that's what the state has
                     said. It's a real shame all around."

                     For nearly three years, the Flikshteins lived in ignorant bliss, welcoming Cookie like one of their
                     own. They toilet trained her.

                     They built her an iron cage in the living room beneath some Picasso prints.

                     They even made plans to erect a "summer home" for Cookie on a grassy patch of their spacious
                     backyard.

                     The problems began in April 1998 when the family sought the advice of a professional monkey
                     handler, who Mr. Flikshtein claims wanted Cookie for himself. The monkey handler filed a report
                     with the city that Cookie had bitten someone on the block. Mr. Flikshtein dismisses the complaint
                     as a self-serving lie.

                     "This man told us, 'Cookie is beautiful -- I'd like to have Cookie for my own,' " Mr. Flikshtein said.
                     "He made that story up, hoping to get our Cookie for himself."

                     Once the City Health Department got wind that a rare diana monkey was living in Manhattan Beach,
                     they sprung into action. In August 1998, the State Department of Environmental Conservation
                     informed the Flikshteins that keeping Cookie was barred by state and federal law, and the agency
                     won a ruling in State Supreme Court in Queens for permission to remove the monkey from the
                     family's home. This month, the State Appellate Division refused to hear the family's arguments,
                     ending their case.

                     While the authorities would prefer for the Flikshteins to turn over Cookie voluntarily, the appellate
                     ruling has cleared the way for the monkey to be seized at any time. Officials, however, have not
                     released a specific date. "We would prefer not to take the animal ourselves," said Gail Hintz, an
                     assistant regional attorney with the state attorney general's office. "It just depends on how
                     cooperative the family is."

                     In court papers, state officials acknowledge that the Flikshteins did not realize Cookie was a
                     member of an endangered species, but they have argued nevertheless that allowing the monkey to
                     remain in Brooklyn "would merely induce illegal traffickers to sell to unaware buyers."

                     Calling the Flikshtein's attachment to Cookie "an egocentric view of a vastly different species," state
                     officials argued that the monkey should be "managed in a zoological park or sanctuary by
                     professional biologists both for its own protection and that of the general public."

                     Several monkey experts have supported the state's position, saying that Cookie is a beast of the wild
                     who deserves to live as nature intended, no matter how much attentive care she gets at home.

                     "This couple may think they love the animal, but they're misguided," said Dr. Shirley McGreal,
                     chairwoman of the International Primate Protection League in Sommerville, S.C. "If I were that
                     monkey I'd really want to join the other monkeys in Detroit."

                     Dr. McGreal said even the most domesticated monkeys assimilated to outdoor life, swinging in
                     trees and playing with other monkeys, within a matter of months. "It's a very short readjustment
                     time," she said. "Very rapidly they learn what they are. They know that they're not people."

                     The Flikshteins invited another monkey expert, Kathi Travers, to spend a week with Cookie in their
                     home and draw her own conclusions. Ms. Travers, who worked for 13 years for the ASPCA in
                     New York before becoming a full-time animal consultant, decided to support their cause.

                     "Ninety percent of the time I'm not in favor of keeping monkeys as pets," Ms. Travers said
                     yesterday from her office in British Columbia. "But this is a very unusual situation. You can't put
                     Cookie into a group of monkeys now."

                     These squabbles among the experts mean little to Manhattan Beach's Russian community, many of
                     whom have promised to stand with the Flikshteins should the authorities try wresting Cookie from
                     their home.

                     "It reminds me of the old Russia in the 30's when Stalin was killing innocent people," said Michael
                     Yumansky, Mr. Flikshtein's business partner, who emigrated from the former Soviet Union 11
                     years ago. "We came to America to live a better life and raise our families as we wanted. I hope we
                     were not wrong."
 
 
 
 

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