The Philadelphia Insectarium and Butterfly Pavilion

The Insectarium was a museum about insects which was located in the northeast part of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Insectarium and Butterfly Pavilion, Botanical Garden construction, January 2017

History and features

The museum opened in 1992 and features displays of many types of live insects, mounted specimens, exhibits and hands-on activities. Examples of the live insects (and other arthropods) include honeybees, tarantulas, cockroaches, scorpions, spiders, praying mantis, millipedes, beetles, water bugs, ants, and crickets.

In 2017, the museum expanded and opened a 7,000-square-foot greenhouse for a year-round butterfly pavilion. At this time the business changed hands from Steve Kanya to John Cambridge.

Following a reported heist of rare live insects in 2018, the insectarium was the subject of a four-part, video titled Bug Out that was released in 2022.

Following release of the Bug Out video in March of 2022, a defamation lawsuit was filed in the Court of Common Pleas of Philadelphia County, Cambridge, et al. v. Feldman, et al., C.C.P. Phila. May Term 2022 No. 02657. The matter’s docket is available to the public at https://fjdefile.phila.gov/efsfjd/zk_fjd_public_qry_00.zp_disclaimer by accepting the court's disclaimers, selecting "Display Civil Docket Report," entering Case ID 220502657, entering the pass code to prove you are a human, and hitting the Submit key.

In 2024 the genre "Documentary" was removed from reference to the video. The case was settled September 20, 2024, with a confidential settlement agreement. As part of the agreement The Cinemart, producer of the video, agreed to place a statement on its web site which is available at https://thecinemart.com/bug-out.html. The statement reads as follows.

"The Bug Out series has been removed as part of a confidential resolution of a lawsuit arising from complaints by certain individuals who have asserted that Bug Out did not portray them accurately. To the extent any individuals depicted in the show, specifically but not limited to Dr. Cambridge, were not depicted accurately, it was not the intention of anyone involved in making the series to do so."

Pursuant to the settlement the video has been removed from sites where it had been publicly available.

Those interested in learning more about how and why the matter settled are directed to the transcript of a hearing in the defamation suit held by zoom before Judge Carpenter July 11, 2024. Information on getting transcripts can be obtained from the Office of Court Reporter and Interpreter Services, First Judicial District of Pennsylvania, 100 South Broad Street, 2nd Floor, Land Title Building, Philadelphia, PA 19110, (215) 683-8000, or https://www.courts.phila.gov/departments/courtreporters/

The Insectarium was evicted by the sheriff on May 30, 2023. The foreclosure is on appeal in 1278 EDA 2023 and 2091 EDA 2023 in the Superior Court of Pennsylvania. Information on such cases is available at https://ujsportal.pacourts.us/Home/CaseInformation. If you click on "Case Information" and then the "Case Information" drop down, you can see information on any case, including 1278 EDA 2023 and 2091 EDA 2023. Following the eviction, the plaintiff reported the building had been damaged. When the estate's attorney and the sheriff's deputy arrived, all the toilets, urinals, mirrors and windows were smashed. The animals from the museum had been moved to a conservation group called Wild Things Preserve. The plants and critters in the butterfly pavilion had to be destroyed pursuant to USDA licenses that governed possession of those non-native plants and critters.

External links

• Philadelphia Insectarium & Butterfly Pavilion - official website
• Garcia, Sandra E. (30 August 2018). "$40,000 Insect and Lizard Theft Was an Inside Job, Police Say". New York Times. Retrieved 6 September 2018.