billy a male asian elephant roams in his habitat at the elephants of asia exhibit at the los angeles zoo on april 18 2017 the main thing is dealing with billy and his health koretz said at the hearing there are several petitions to free billy from the la zoo one of them has over 400000 signatures 151 cher and lily tomlin are among the thousands of people who want to see the los angeles zoo free billy the elephant at the hearing the councilmembers called for the zoo to bring in three outside medical experts for them to assess billy and his living condition lewis did not respond immediately to a call requesting further comment this isnt a vendetta against the zoo koretzs director of communications alison simard told abc news billy who has spent over 20 years in the la zoo was the subject of the hearing yesterday where paul koretz and others pointed out multiple issues with billys living conditions richard vogelap file when the council brought up the the zoo making attempts to collect genetic material from billy in a particularly invasive procedure lewis pushed back saying that billy is free to walk away during the procedure the city first made a proposal to move billy to a sanctuary back in 2009 but this proposal was passed on he also endured hard surfaces that were not considered good for his feet and joints hes just been extraordinarily limited zoo director john lewis was present during the hearing and defended himself and his staff through the testimony given from the council i wouldnt move this motion forward if i wasnt convinced that there was already clear evidence that he is in a mentally and physically bad position as a result hes shown abnormal behavior as a result of the detrimental impacts according to the motion i dont want him to end up a statistic like the many elephants that have died in the care of the la zoo cher said in the video of the hearing richard vogelap file billy a male asian elephant roams in his habitat at the elephants of asia exhibit at the los angeles zoo on april 18 2017 cher and lily tomlin pose together at the london premiere of the film tea with mussolini march 18 1999 zumapresscomnewscom file a motion in the council was filed which argued that for many years billy was kept alone in a small enclosure i and many others in the community have watched the city council rely on and be misled by the zoos representation about the health and welfare of wild animals in their care lily tomlin said in a video of the committee hearing posted on councilman paul koretzs website