Protestors with the Animal Rights Coalition standing near SeaQuest Roseville on Saturday afternoon called for the interactive aquarium and petting zoo to stop operations.

This comes after 5 INVESTIGATES, in a joint investigation with ABC News, uncovered dozens of USDA citations against SeaQuest, documented employee allegations of Animal Welfare Act violations, and dozens more reports of customers getting bitten or scratched at SeaQuest locations across the country.

“We’ve wanted to do this campaign for years ever since they opened,” Animal Rights Coalition co-president Ashley Riddle said.

“We’re a very small organization, we don’t have a lot of bandwidth, and so to see KSTP-TV, as well as ABC News, take this on, we were like, this is our prime opportunity to help raise further awareness and have evidence to back it up.”

Standing with Riddle and roughly a dozen other protesters was former SeaQuest Roseville employee DJ Jones, who reported quitting last summer.

“As you got more accustomed to [the] job, they’d give you more stuff to do, and you’d see more behind the scenes,” they shared. “And that’s where it, kind of, it really goes off the rails.”

Jones and another former employee protesting held up a list of animals they say died prematurely during their combined year-and-a-half working at the Roseville location.

“There was definitely some animal neglect,” Jones said.

Several employees repeatedly documented hurt, bleeding, diseased and dead animals in photos and videos obtained by 5 INVESTIGATES this year.

Jones opted to speak publicly on Saturday even after SeaQuest sued another former employee in Idaho for allegedly violating their non-disclosure agreement, something the employee’s lawyer denies.

Everyone signs one, Jones said, adding that speaking up felt more important to them than any concern over a possible lawsuit.

Animal Rights Coalition volunteer and former animal sanctuary manager Dani Shulman, also protesting, said she recently visited SeaQuest in Roseville as a customer and was particularly taken aback by a lack of natural resources like sunlight, even for land animals.

“They have no access to forage or anything that’s, you know, insects or bugs or grass, or anything that actually provides them crucial nutrients,” Shulman added. “So it’s unfortunate because it’s kind of portrayed as this fun petting zoo.”

The Animal Rights Coalition plans to be back out protesting every weekend in July, Riddle said.

SeaQuest did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Saturday. In past reporting, the company has said that the health and safety of its animals is its “number one priority.”