Elephants are not people, Colorado Supreme Court rules

An attempt to free five elephants from a Colorado zoo was rejected after a court ruled that elephants are not people.

An animal rights group argued that Missy, Kimba, Lucky, LouLou and Jambo were effectively imprisoned at the zoo and had submitted a request to be moved to an elephant sanctuary.

He attempted to file a habeas corpus petition on behalf of the animals, a legal process that allows a person to challenge their detention in court.

The Colorado Supreme Court said the issue came down to “whether an elephant is a person” and therefore had the same freedom rights as a human being, and ultimately decided it did not.

It ruled 6-0 in favor of an earlier district court decision that said the state’s habeas corpus process “only applies to people, and not to nonhuman animals.”

This was true “no matter how cognitively, psychologically or socially sophisticated they may be,” state Supreme Court Justice Maria Berkenkotter added in her speech. decision.

While calling the five elderly African elephants “majestic,” the court ruled that the lawsuit could not be brought “because an elephant is not a person.”

The Nonhuman Rights Project (NRP) requested that the elephants be moved from the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo to a “proper elephant sanctuary” in 2023.

The group argued that animals had a right to freedom because they were emotionally complex and intelligent animals.

He claimed the elephants were showing signs of “trauma, brain damage and chronic stress” and were effectively “imprisoned” at the zoo.

The Cheyenne Mountain Zoo rejected the claim, arguing that the elephants had received extraordinary care, and was supported by a district court.

After the Supreme Court ruling, Cheyenne Mountain Zoo called NRP’s lawsuit “frivolous” and said it had “wasted” time and money on the case.

He accused the group of “abusing the court systems to raise funds” and claimed that their goal was to “manipulate people into donating to their cause by relentlessly publicizing sensational court cases with relentless appeals to their followers to donate.”

NRP said the decision “perpetuates a clear injustice, asserting that unless an individual is human, he or she has no right to liberty.”

“As with other social justice movements, early losses are expected as we challenge an entrenched status quo that has allowed Missy, Kimba, Lucky, LouLou and Jambo to be relegated to a life of physical and mental suffering,” said the group in a statement.

An earlier attempt by the NRP to release an elephant named Happy from New York’s Bronx Zoo was rejected after the court ruled that it was not legally a person.