NRA LAWSUIT SETS LEGAL PRECEDENT FOR DEFENDING HUNTER’S RIGHTS

ON DECEMBER 23, 2010. POSTED IN LATEST NEWS, LEAD AMMUNITION BAN PROPONENTS, LEGAL NEWS

Although the case is still pending and a final ruling is yet to be issued, the National Rifle Association’s (NRA) intervention on behalf of its members in the case Center for Biological Diversity v. U.S. Bureau of Land Management, et al., has already resulted in several legal victories.

The Center for Biological Diversity’s (CBD) lawsuit, filed on January 27, 2009, alleges that the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) are illegally mismanaging federal lands in Arizona. CBD contends California condors in Arizona and elsewhere are becoming ill or dying as a result of scavenging game that was shot by hunters using lead shot or bullets. NRA has collected thousands of documents via public records act requests over the last year. Many of these documents raise doubts about the veracity of that claim. In fact, many documents obtained by NRA indicate that claim is based on faulty science, and plainly show that California condors were reintroduced to Arizona based, in large part, on express promises by FWS and other agencies that the “reintroduction” would not impact hunting.

A January 13, 2010 court ruling granting NRA's motion to intervene was recently published in the official Federal Rules Decision Reporter. The Federal Rules Decisions Reporter is a compendium of selected United States District Court rulings that specifically interpret and apply the Federal Rules of Civil and Criminal Procedure. Publication of this court ruling is important to hunters and NRA members because it sets legal precedent and confirms that there is a "significantly protectable interest" in hunting that justifies intervention by hunters’ rights groups like NRA in the increasing number of lawsuits filed by so-called environmental groups against state and federal natural resource, game and land management agencies. Groups like CBD often file lawsuits alleging improper regulatory action or inaction in managing public lands and natural resources in an attempt to advance their anti-hunting agenda.

The publication of the decision followed an earlier partial victory by NRA where NRA’s legal arguments caused the CBD to abandon and dismiss its California condor related Endangered Species Act (ESA) claims rather than litigate them. CBD’s ESA claims were based in part on an incorrect belief that “any take of [California] condors from the use of lead ammunition would be a per se violation of the ESA.” CBD revised its lawsuit and dropped the ESA claims that it was primarily using as part of an attempt to obtain a ban on the use of lead ammunition for hunting.

On December 10, 2010, NRA filed its "summary judgment" brief. Several other briefs have also been filed, and all remaining briefs will be filed by the end of February 2011. A hearing date will be set after the court receives all of the briefs. Because NRA intervened in the case on a narrow issue regarding the use of lead ammunition in northern Arizona (and the case has many other elements), it is possible the lead ammunition related aspect of this case may be resolved as early as this spring.