Nonhuman
Rights Project
September 2015
The refusals to allow further review were disappointing. But we are in the very early stages of our long-term multi-state strategic litigation campaign to change the legal status of nonhuman animals like Tommy and Kiko from mere “things" to legal “persons" who possess such fundamental rights as bodily liberty and bodily integrity.
Earlier today [September 2], the New York State Court of Appeals returned from its summer vacation and denied the requests of hundreds of litigants for leave to appeal. Among them were both Tommy's and Kiko's cases.
First, we are not discouraged in the least!
The refusals to allow further review were disappointing. But we are in the very early stages of our long-term multi-state strategic litigation campaign to change the legal status of nonhuman animals like Tommy and Kiko from mere “things" to legal “persons" who possess such fundamental rights as bodily liberty and bodily integrity. As Justice Jaffe noted in our Hercules and Leo decision, the courts move slowly, but the day is drawing near when the courts will recognize their rights. Our legal team has already been discussing where and how to re-file Tommy's and Kiko's cases in the appropriate courts. It has begun reworking the pleadings and memoranda to try once again to win their freedom.
Second, Tommy's case was the first time any appellate court had ever been confronted with our arguments.
The Court ruled against us because it claimed—without any evidence—that chimpanzees could not shoulder duties and responsibilities, despite the fact that a vast number of humans cannot shoulder duties and responsibilities, either. The next time we encounter that argument we will be more than ready to show how legally wrong it is.
In Kiko's case, the appellate court twice assumed, without deciding, that Kiko could be a legal person, then decided the case on the ground that our use of habeas corpus was improper because we were not demanding absolute release of Kiko, but his transfer to a sanctuary.
No court in New York had ever said this before. Not in more than 200 years. Indeed, in Justice Jaffe's comprehensive 33-page opinion in Hercules and Leo's case, she expressly refused to follow the Kiko decision on the ground that the appellate court with jurisdiction over her court had ruled the other way.
Third, we are not alone in our view that our arguments have merit.
During Hercules and Leo's hearing, Justice Jaffe asked: "Isn't it incumbent upon the judiciary to at least consider whether a class of beings may be granted a right or something short of a right, under the habeas statute?" In addition, "letter briefs" filed by Harvard Law's Laurence H. Tribe (the preeminent constitutional law professor in the U.S.); The Center for Constitutional Rights (which has more experience litigating habeas corpus cases than any other organization in the world); and University of Denver law professor Justin Marceau (on behalf of a number of habeas corpus legal scholars) all supported the NhRP in our efforts to bring before the courts our arguments on behalf of unlawfully imprisoned chimpanzees.
Thanks in no small part to our amazing supporters as well, public support for the NhRP continues to swell.
Please keep sharing our unique, focused mission with your friends and colleagues (and encourage them to sign up for this newsletter!). Every week we hear from people from all over the world who feel thrilled and moved to have discovered our campaign.
We understand how you feel, and we feel honored to have taken on what will be an ongoing fight—not only on behalf of the many humans who know it's time to punch a hole through the legal wall that separates all humans from all nonhuman animals, but above all, our nonhuman animal plaintiffs, who continue to suffer in captivity the way any self-aware, autonomous being would - TED Talk: Chimps have feelings and thoughts. They should also have rights.
This fight is for them.
Thank you as always from the entire NhRP team! We are already on the move.
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