Lolita, a killer whale that has lived in a tank at Miami's Seaquarium for 44 years, could move a step closer to freedom this week. After decades of campaigning, animal rights activists hope U.S. officials will include the orca on a list of endangered whales that frequent the waters where she was captured, off Washington state. That decision could trigger a lawsuit by activists who want to fly 7,000-pound (3.2-tonne) Lolita across the country and prepare her for release into the wild.
http://tinyurl.com/lkpodjc
An animal rights group has filed a first-of-its-kind lawsuit that seeks to establish the “legal personhood” of a cartoon-loving chimpanzee they say is being held prisoner on an upstate used trailer lot. The Nonhuman Rights Project filed the suit Monday in New York Supreme Court demanding that the monkey – a 26-year-old chimp named Tommy – be freed to live out his life in a sanctuary for primates. Court documents describe Tommy as “a cognitively complex autonomous legal person with the fundamental legal right not to be imprisoned.”
http://tinyurl.com/k9e2l5d
