Federal
Displaying 651 - 660 of 1081
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| The Least of the Sentient Beings' and the Question of Reduction, Refinement, and Replacement | The subjects of this article are biomedical research and animals. In raw percentage terms, the animals involved in experimentation are now overwhelmingly rats and mice, and, perhaps because they are rats and mice, they are used in large numbers, numbers in thousands and tens of thousands at some institutions. Legal, ethical, and practical accommodation to this fact on the ground presents a host of questions. There are questions of the cost of care. There are questions of the training of veterinarians, principal investigators, and laboratory personnel. With mice particularly, there are questions about the creation of conditions in an animal that do not yet exist, a future animal, by knocking out a gene and, as we say, "seeing what happens": new questions, really, that move us away from the traditional focus on the details of how an investigator treats a living animal. Then there are the central questions of weighing costs and benefits, of justification and the application of the three R's of reduction, refinement, and replacement, where it is not dogs or primates or marine mammals that are concerned, but rats and mice - for many, the least on the scale of concern for animals. Rats, mice, and birds have of course been recently exempted from the Animal Welfare Act. But that may be viewed as making the questions only that much more difficult, thrown back into the laps of researchers themselves and review boards, veterinarians, laboratory assistants, and university and corporate administrators, who for the moment can expect to have that much less outside guidance or mandate in deciding what to do. The overarching problem, which is how to think about rats and mice, not a new problem at all, but newly pressing. |
| Thorp v. District of Columbia |
Two officers were stationed in a church parking lot near the home of Plaintiff, Mark Thorp. The two officers claimed they saw and heard the plaintiff “forcefully strike” his dog. The plaintiff then took the dog inside and would not speak with the officers. The officers reported the incidence to a Washington Humane Society Law Enforcement Officer who applied for a search warrant of plaintiff’s home. The warrant was subsequently approved. The Lieutenant who led the team that executed the search warrant on the plaintiff’s home previously had a sexual relationship with the plaintiff’s ex-girlfriend. During the search, the officers secured the dog and concluded that the dog was uninjured and in good health exhibiting no signs of abuse. The search warrant was only approved for evidence of animal cruelty/neglect, however, the search continued even after the plaintiff’s dog had been found in good health. The plaintiff believes that the search continued because the officers wanted to find drugs in his home. Plaintiff believes that the search for animal cruelty was just a disguise so that the officers could search for drugs. The officers found in the plaintiff’s freezer two zip-loc bags full of capsules which turned out to be amphetamines. The plaintiff insists he had a prescription for the pills. A second warrant was issued for evidence of drugs and related materials. After the second search, the officers found additional drugs and drug paraphernalia in the house. The plaintiff was charged with animal cruelty and possession of illegal drugs, however, the prosecutor abandoned the case and all criminal charges were dismissed. Plaintiff brought this action seeking redress for his injuries against the Lieutenant who led the search and the District. Both parties filed Cross-Motions for Summary Judgment. Plaintiff claims his fourth amendment rights were violated under section 1983. Specifically, the plaintiff claims that the first animal-cruelty warrant application was deficient and made at the behest of the Lieutenant and that false information was used on the warrant application. The Court rejects this argument because the plaintiff abandoned the fact that the two officers fabricated the warrant application at the behest of the Lieutenant. The Court, therefore, concluded that the Lieutenant played no role in preparing or submitting the warrant application. Next the plaintiff contends that the Lieutenant’s reliance on the warrant was improper. The Court concluded that since the Lieutenant had no part int the warrant application, he had no reason to distrust its contents. The warrant was facially valid and as a result, the Court cannot hold the Lieutenant responsible for executing it. Plaintiff contended that the Lieutenant exceeded the scope of the first warrant because the rummaging around in closed spaces after the search was considered finished exceeded the scope. The Court disagreed and concluded that the warrant authorized a search for animals that were dead or alive and an animal can surely fit in a freezer. The Court said that the Lieutenant’s “judgment that the scope of the warrant was supported by probable cause may have been mistaken, but it was not plainly incompetent.” Next the plaintiff argues that the second warrant was invalid. The Court reasoned that since the Lieutenant could have reasonably believed that he had authority to search the freezer, it would also be reasonable for him to obtain a warrant based on its contents. Plaintiff also contended that the pills in the freezer were not in plain sight. However, the photos that the plaintiff used to prove his point actually belies this claim because the Court could clearly make out the same clear plastic baggies with pills in both pictures. Next the plaintiff argues that the warrantless field test of the methamphetamines was improper. The Court concluded that field tests of methamphetamine are not recognized as a search and therefore do not implicate Fourth Amendment protections. Even if that were the case, qualified immunity would shield the Lieutenant from civil liability. Next the plaintiff argues that his arrest was without probable cause. The Court stated that given the amount of drug evidence that was found in the second search, there was enough probable cause to arrest the plaintiff. Next the plaintiff argues that the execution of the warrants unnecessarily cause property damage. The plaintiff failed to challenge this claim because he did not accompany it with specific points of law to support it. The Court refused to decide this matter. Finally, plaintiff argues that the officers unlawfully seized more than $53,000 in cash from the apartment. This claim also falls outside of the lawsuit because the plaintiff failed to make mention of it in his complaint. The plaintiff lastly alleges that the district negligently supervised and retained the lieutenant and he asserts a claim of abuse of process. The plaintiff failed to show that the Lieutenant engaged in behavior that should have put his employer on notice that he required additional training or that he was dangerous or otherwise incompetent. As for the abuse of process claim, plaintiff alleges two acts: Lieutenant’s arrest of him and the seizure of his property. The court held that the Lieutenant’s warrantless actions cannot sustain an abuse of process claim. The Court ultimately granted the Defendant’s Motion for Summary Judgment and denied the Plaintiff’s Cross-Motion for Partial Summary Judgment. |
| Tilikum ex rel. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, Inc. v. Sea World Parks & Entertainment, Inc. |
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| Tilikum, Katina, Corky, Kasatka, and Ulises, Plaintiffs, by their Next Friends, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, Inc | In this case of first impression, five wild-captured orcas named Tilikum, Katina, Corky, Kasatka, and Ulises (collectively, the “Plaintiffs”), seek a declaration that they are held by the Defendants in violation of Section One of the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, which prohibits slavery and involuntary servitude. Plaintiffs were forcibly taken from their families and natural habitats, are held captive at SeaWorld San Diego and SeaWorld Orlando, denied everything that is natural to them, subjected to artificial insemination or sperm collection to breed performers for Defendants’ shows, and forced to perform, all for Defendants’ profit. As such, Plaintiffs are held in slavery and involuntary servitude. Plaintiffs also seek an injunction freeing them from Defendants’ bondage and placing them in a habitat suited to their individual needs and best interests. |
| Tillett v. Bureau of Land Management | In this case, plaintiff (proceeding pro se) filed suit against the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) challenging its management of wild horses on the Pryor Mountain Wild Horse Range (PMWHR). Plaintiff filed suit challenging BLM’s fertility control and gather programs. BLM argued that plaintiff’s claims should be denied as a matter of summary judgment. The court ultimately held that plaintiff failed to provide any “legal authority” or “jurisdictional basis” for the remedies in which she was seeking. The court held that BLM was within its own authority to rely on its own data and surveys of its programs and was under no obligation to review its programs based on plaintiff’s alleged observations. Finally, the court held in favor of BLM as a matter of summary judgment. |
| Toney v. Glickman | Plaintiffs were in the business of selling animals to research facilities. The Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) found that they had committed hundreds of violations of the Animal Welfare Act, 7 U.S.C. §§ 2131 et seq. The ALH then imposed what was, to that point, the harshest sanction, $200,000, in the history of the Act. The Judicial Officer affirmed the ALJ's findings and denied the Plaintiffs' request to reopen the hearing for consideration of new evidence. While the 8th Circuit affirmed most of these findings, it held that the evidence did not support all of them. Accordingly, the court remanded the matter to the Department for redetermination of the sanction. The court also affirmed the Judicial Officer's refusal to reopen the hearing and denied the Plaintiffs' Request for Leave to Adduce Additional Evidence. The Plaintiffs were free, however, to seek leave to offer this additional evidence on remand to the extent it was relevant to the sanction. |
| Tranchita v. Callahan | This case involves a motion for a temporary restraining order (TRO) and preliminary injunction by Plaintiff Tranchita against Colleen Callahan, Director of the Illinois Department of Natural Resources (IDNR). In 2019, agents of the IDNR seized four coyotes Tranchita was raising at her home. After the seizure, three of the four coyotes died, and the remaining coyote, Luna, is elderly and in poor health. Tranchita seeks return of Luna from the coyote rescue center where Luna now resides. The IDNR contends that it will not release Luna until a court declares that the Plaintiff can legally possess her. By way of background, Tranchita is a wildlife exhibitor and educator who has cared for orphaned coyote pups since 2006. In 2016, Tranchita forgot to obtain another Breeder Permit and then failed to do so for the successive three years. Consequently, while she possessed a USDA Exhibitor License, she did not possess the required Illinois state licenses to keep coyotes. In 2019, Plaintiff sought relief in Illinois state court, which found that should she regain possession of Luna again, she must possess a Breeder Permit. The court did not consider whether that permit alone was sufficient or whether a Hound Running Permit is also required. Plaintiff then voluntarily dismissed her state court complaint and, four months later, filed a six-count verified complaint under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. After that filing, Plaintiff moved for a TRO and preliminary injunction enjoining Defendants from (1) requiring her to hold a Hound Running Permit in order to keep Luna in Illinois; and (2) seizing Luna so long as Tranchita holds a current Breeder Permit. Tranchita seeks prospective declaratory and injunctive remedies that are all directed to allowing her to keep Luna in Illinois without a Hound Running Permit. The court first examined Tranchita 's likelihood of success on the merits for her five claims: her “class-of-one” equal protection claim, preemption claim, free exercise claim, procedural due process claim, and substantive due process claim. As to the first "class-of-one" claim, the court found that Tranchita's displeasure and disagreement with Defendants’ failure to enforce the Hound Running Permit requirement against other alleged violators likely does not give rise to a class-of-one claim. Further, the court found Tranchita was not likely to success on her claim asserting that the AWA preempts the IDNR's policy requiring an individual who wants to possess a coyote to obtain a Hound Running Permit. The court rejected Plaintiff's argument that hound running in Illinois constitutes an “animal fighting venture” that the AWA prohibits. Indeed, the court noted that the state definition for "hound running" includes when an authorized species "pursued with dogs in a hound running area, but not in a manner or with the intent to capture or kill.” Further, the court noted the Seventh Circuit held that Congress did not intend for the AWA to preempt or ban state legislation, like the Wildlife Code, that regulates wild animals. Tranchita also asserts that the Hound Running Permit requirement violates her rights under the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment. The court found that Hound Running Permit requirement is neutral and generally applicable and is rationally related to a legitimate government interest" (i.e., regulating who can keep coyotes (and where) in that it requires an individual who wants to raise a coyote to do so on at least ten contiguous acres of land). Because the Hound Running Permit requirement appears to be supported by a rational basis, Tranchita is not likely to succeed on her Free Exercise claim. Finally, Tranchita brings claims for procedural and substantive due process violations. The court stated that, to succeed on this contention, Plaintiff must provide something that happened after April 2019 that could arguably return her property interest in Luna or provide her with a new, independent property interest in Luna. However, the court found that Plaintiff did not have a property interest in Luna at the time of the seizure because she did not have a Breeder Permit at that time. Because Tranchita has not demonstrated that she is likely to establish a protected property interest in Luna, she has failed to show that she is likely to succeed on either due process claim based on this interest. Tranchita's argument that her current Breeder Permit (issued without the concomitant Hound Running Permit by Illinois) protects her property interest also failed to persuade the court because the law states that "[n]o fur-bearing mammal breeder permits will be issued to hold, possess, or engage in the breeding and raising of striped skunks acquired after July 1, 1975, or coyotes acquired after July 1, 1978, except for coyotes that are held or possessed by a person who holds a hound running area permit under Section 3.26 of this Act." That granting of the Breeder Permit without the necessary Hound Running Permit required by law led Tranchita to her last argument: "the IDNR's custom and policy of issuing her Breeder Permits and allowing her to keep coyotes without a Hound Running Permit created an entitlement to possess a coyote based on a Breeder Permit alone." In fact, Tranchita points out that IDNR issued her a Breeder Permit on several separate occasions without requiring her to first have a Hound Running Permit while she already possessed coyotes. The court noted that a protected property interest may “arise from mutually explicit understandings," but the plaintiff bears the burden of demonstrating the existence of a mutually explicit understanding. Here, the Court was "skeptical" that sufficient evidence existed to demonstrate a department-wide custom or policy. In essence, the court found Tranchita had no likelihood of succeeding on the merits of the claims. The court did briefly engage in addressing the preliminary injunction factors. With regard to her claim that she will suffer irreparable harm in the form of Luna's imminent death, the court noted that the harm must be "likely" rather than just "possible." Tranchita's delay in seeking preliminary injunctive relief (four months after she withdrew her state court claims) undermines her irreparable harm argument. While the court was sympathetic and concludes that Luna's death would constitute irreparable harm to Plaintiff, it was not enough to persuade the court that death is likely absent the issuance of a TRO or injunction. Finally, on balancing the harms and public interests, the court found they do not weigh decidedly in Plaintiff's favor. Thus, the court denied Tranchita's motion for a TRO and preliminary injunction. |
| Triumph Foods, LLC v. Campbell | This case was brought by a group of pork producers and farmers to challenge the Massachusetts' Prevention of Farm Animal Cruelty Act on the grounds that it violates the dormant Commerce Clause by improperly regulating interstate commerce. The Act would require pork producers to phase out certain means of pig confinement in order to sell pork products in Massachusetts. In response, the state filed a motion to dismiss arguing that there is no causally connected harm to the pork producers, which the court denied. The court first evaluated the slaughterhouse exemption, which exempts sales from the requirement that they must take place within Massachusetts if the buyer takes physical possession of the pork while on the premises of an establishment inspected under the Federal Meat Inspection Act. Plaintiff argued that as an out-of-state pork processor, it could not take advantage of this exemption, even though it operates entirely federally inspected facilities, because it ships its product into Massachusetts from out-of-state and, its buyers do not take physical possession of its product while at its facilities. The court found that this exemption has a discriminatory effect, and vacated the order in part to allow the court to consider whether the Act with the slaughterhouse exemption severed is preempted by the Federal Meat Inspection Act. |
| Tuman v. VL GEM LLC |
In this case, Tuman sued the owners of her apartment complex, VL GEM LLC and GEM Management Partners LLC, after the apartment complex refused to allow her to keep an emotional support dog in her apartment to help her deal with her post-traumatic stress disorder. Truman argued that she was discriminated against after she requested a “reasonable accommodation” for her disability, in violation of the Fair Housing Act (FHA). The defendants argued that Truman failed to provide sufficient medical documentation of her need for the support dog and therefore were not liable for discrimination under the FHA. The court found that Truman was able to establish a disability under FHA by showing that her PTSD “causes her to have severe anxiety and difficulties with socialization.” The court held that this satisfied the requirement under the FHA that the disability must “substantially limit one or more major life activities.” Since Truman qualified as disabled under the FHA, the court turned to whether or not she had provided the apartment complex with sufficient documentation and notice. Ultimately, the court found that Truman had provided the apartment with sufficient documentation because she provided them with a note from her doctor stipulating that Truman needed an accommodation in order to cope with her disability. Lastly, the court found that the apartment complex knew of Truman’s disability and request for an accommodation and still refused to allow her to have a dog, which resulted in a violation under the FHA. As a result, the court found for Truman. |
| Turner v. Ferguson | On March 5, 2017 Lori turner was attacked by her neighbor’s (“Arndt”) dog which required her to receive 11 staples to close the wound on her scalp. She also suffered bites on her shoulder and wrist that would later require surgery. Pursuant to local regulations, the neighbor’s dog was quarantined for a ten-day period. Lori mentioned to officers that the City of Gelndale had recently enacted an ordinance that allowed for an officer to declare a dog vicious which then required the owner of the dog to adhere to certain requirements like securing the dog in a kennel when it was outdoors and maintaining liability insurance for dog bites. On March 14, 2017, Officer Ruppel issued a citation to Ardnt under a Glendale ordinance for damage caused by dogs, however, he did not declare the dog vicious under the vicious-dog ordinance. Officer Ruppel reasoned during deposition that he chose not to do so because he considered Ardnt grabbing the dog by the neck and Lori walking up and petting the dog (prior to Ardnt’s action) provocation. Lori filed suit against the officers she interacted with over the course of the next year claiming that the officers denied her equal protection of the law by refusing to declare Arndt’s dog vicious and by failing to protect her from loose dogs in the neighborhood. Lori had repeatedly contacted the police department over the course of a year about how she did not like the outcome of her dog bite case and about loose dogs in the neighborhood. Lori specifically alleged that the officers treated her with animus. The Court ultimately found that the evidence in the record did not support a class-of-one equal protection claim. Officer Ruppel’s decision to not declare Ardnt’s dog vicious was supported by a rational basis. Additionally, no evidence existed that suggested that the Glendale police department intentionally and irrationally treated Lori’s complaints about loose dogs in the neighborhood differently than it treated similar complaints by other citizens. The Defendant’s motion for summary judgment was granted. |