Magistrate Tosses Trapping Lawsuit
Group: Species Act Was Violated
A federal magistrate has dismissed a lawsuit alleging that state Game and Fish officials violated the Endangered Species Act by permitting trapping in an area designated for the recovery of the endangered Mexican gray wolf.
The lawsuit, filed by the environmental organization WildEarth Guardians in February, continued a public policy debate over the wisdom and legality of New Mexico allowing the use of leg-hold traps, intended for coyotes but capable of snagging wolves, in national forests designated for wolf recovery.
Former Gov. Bill Richardson, an advocate of the wolf recovery project, issued an executive order in July 2010 to halt commercial and recreational trapping in New Mexico’s portion of federal forests where lobos roam while the issue of whether trapping harmed the wild wolf population was studied over a sixmonth period. Despite the executive order, the Game and Fish Department allowed coyote trapping to continue because coyote hunting is not regulated by the state.
A study by the U.S. Geological Survey, released in August 2011, showed that trapping by people not connected to the recovery effort had injured seven wolves, leading to two wolf deaths and two leg amputations.
Before the study’s release, Game and Fish commissioners, most of whom were appointed by Gov. Susana Martinez, lifted the trapping
ban. They did so based on a department recommendation that said the study showed trapping accounted for only a fraction of documented wolf injuries and deaths in the recovery area.
U.S. Magistrate Lorenzo Garcia on Monday dismissed the suit with prejudice, meaning it cannot be refiled.
Game and Fish Director Jim Lane, who was named as a defendant in the suit along with Game Commission Chairman Jim McClintic, called the decision a victory for “real conservationists,” state authority over wildlife management and the “integrity of the Endangered Species Act.”
Wendy Keefover of WildEarth Guardians called the decision disappointing, adding: “It seems to us under the plain language of the Endangered Species Act that one can neither harm nor trap an endangered species, and clearly that’s what’s happening.”
The lawsuit alleged that state officials violated federal law and rules by failing to exercise “due care” to avoid taking wolves when they allowed coyote trapping in wolf range. The judicial ruling issued Monday concluded that federal rules requiring the exercise of due care to avoid injury to wolves applied to the trapping itself, not the “regulation or licensing of trapping.”