While the litigation is ongoing, Cornare, a regional environmental protection organization in the northwest of Colombia, announced October 15 they had begun sterilizing the pod using the contraceptive drug GonaCon administered by dart guns, and through surgical sterilization.Īt least 24 of 80 hippopotamuses who are being cared for at a center in Doradal, Antioquia, have been sterilized before they die out. This has had detrimental consequences for the local ecology, as well as reported attacks on local fishermen. They are now believed to be the largest so-called 'bloat' of hippopotamuses outside of Africa. The semiaquatic ungulates were left to roam Hacienda Napoles and continued breeding. to conduct discovery for use in foreign proceedings, the court recognized the hippos as legal persons with respect to that statute, the court recognized the hippos as legal persons with respect to that statute,' ALDF said in a statement.Īn expert prepares a dart to put hippos to sleep in order to sterilize them at a care center in Doradal, Colombiaīefore he was shot dead by police in 1993, the cocaine baron purchased exotic animals to live on his ranch, including flamingos, giraffes, zebras and kangaroos.Īfter his death, all but the hippopotamuses were sold to zoos. Litkovitz's ruling was based on a United States law that allows an 'interested person' in foreign litigation to request U.S.
The Animal Legal Defense Fund made the request on behalf of the plaintiffs, the 'Community of Hippopotamuses Living in the Magdalena River,' which has been trying to save about 120 hippopotamuses from being slaughtered. Judge Karen Litkovitz, of the United States District Court for the Southern District of Ohio, issued the ruling Tuesday after the nonprofit Animal Legal Defense Fund (ALDF) filed an application seeking to allow two experts in nonsurgical sterilization of wildlife to provide testimony supporting a Colombian lawsuit to stop a cull. Pablo Escobar's famed hippos - who have thrived in Colombia since the notorious drug lord was killed almost 30 years ago - got a stay of execution after a United States federal court ruled that animals can be recognized as legal persons.
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