Michael Blake with Twelve
For immediate release
Protect Mustangs and Citizens Against Equine Slaughter file preliminary injunction Friday.
RENO, NV. (August 24, 2013) — Academy Award Winner Michael Blake, author of Dances With Wolves, and member of Protect Mustangs, joins Citizens Against Equine Slaughter and Protect Mustangs versus The United States Forest Service, a department of the United States Department of Agriculture; Jeff Ulrich, Santa Rosa District Ranger; The United States Bureau of Land Management, a department of the United States Department of the Interior, to stop alleged illegal and continuous roundups of federally protected wild horses and burros through the duration of the agreement ending on May 31, 2015. Attorneys, Jordan Beckett, of Ashland, Oregon and Charles A. Jones, of Reno, filed a preliminary injunction friday to safeguard federally protected wild horses in the vast Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest.
Blake states in his declaration he has received great inspiration, for decades, watching wild horses roaming free in Nevada. He believes that if they are rounded up, removed, killed or slaughtered, he would suffer harm by the loss of his inspiration.
Michael Blake writes in his book Twelve, The King:
“But he and hundreds of thousand like him are gone now from this beautiful land, and for that reason alone I could not stop as I traveled over four hundred miles of Nevada roads. Something evil is still afoot in this land, and it has left its imprint everywhere. In all those miles of open, free country, the mark of evil is present in what is absent. The wild horses are missing from the land.”
Blake is a long time admirer of the american wild horse. His book and acclaimed screenplay Dances with Wolves prominently features horses in the American West.
In the early ’90s he commissioned the first independent aerial survey of wild horses. They found the population on the range was much lower than the BLM’s overpopulation claim.
This summer the National Academy of Sciences announced there is no evidence to support the BLM’s rampant chant alleging overpopulation. Protect Mustangs has called for a moratorium on all roundups in order to conduct scientific population studies before using widespread fertility control. The conservation group is concerned wild horses are being managed to extinction by the BLM–the agency put in change of allegedly protecting America’s iconic wild horses.
“We filed in court to end this nightmare,” explains Anne Novak, executive director of Protect Mustangs. “We believe federally protected wild horses are at risk of going to slaughter as a result of the flawed roundups. We want this to stop now.”
“We are very thankful people have come together to save wild horses from auction but we never want to see this happen again,” says Dr.Lester Castro Friedlander, DVM, president of Citizens Against Equine Slaughter.
Esteemed wildlife biologist and author, Craig Downer, a member of Protect Mustangs, filed a compelling declaration filled with details from decades of studying the area.
“Most of the legal wild equid herds throughout the West have dangerously low populations and the ratios of wild equids to livestock/big game animals are ridiculously low,” explains Downer. “For example, in the Spring Mountain Complex of wild horse and burro herd areas, the Las Vegas BLM District and Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest plans to allow only one wild equid per seven thousand-plus legal acres. Here big game and to a lesser extent livestock outnumber and out-consume the wild equids many times over . . . . And here most of the Spring Mountain public waters have been fenced off so that wild horses cannot access them, but game animals, such as trophy bighorn sheep, can.”
Protect Mustangs and Citizens Against Equine Slaughter are challenging the entirety of the USFS decision authorizing an undisclosed number of roundups and an undisclosed number of horses to be removed from the range over the next two years. They filed their original complaint on Friday, August 16, 2013.
“While the first roundup has already been conducted, without further legal action these unbranded, wild horses will be continuously rounded up and removed from the range, impounded, and auctioned off to the highest bidder until May 2015,” explains Jordan Beckett, attorney for Plaintiffs. “The public’s unbranded wild horses are under the jurisdiction of the USFS and the BLM. They need to be managed in accordance with the National Environmental Policy Act and the Wild and Free Roaming Horses and Burros Act.”
Protect Mustangs is a California-based non-profit organization devoted to protecting native wild horses. Their mission is to educate the public about the indigenous wild horses, protect and research American wild horses on the range and help those who have lost their freedom.
Citizens Against Equine Slaughter is an Oregon-based non-profit organization dedicated to the protection of America’s wild and domestic horses.
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Media Contacts:
Anne Novak, 415-531-8454, Anne@ProtectMustangs.org
Photos, interviews and video (Preview) available upon request
Links of interest™:
Preliminary Injunction filed Friday: http://protectmustangs.org/?p=5056
Read the complaint here: PM Complaint CAES Protect mustangs v USFS BLM
Sign the petition to Defund the Roundups: http://www.change.org/petitions/defund-and-stop-the-wild-horse-burro-roundups
Last week’s press release with links of interest:
For immediate release
Alleged violations put iconic wild horses at risk of disappearing
Coalition against slaughter and for the protection of mustangs files lawsuit
RENO, NV. (August 16, 2013)–Protect Mustangs, the California-based conservation group, dedicated to protecting native wild horses and Citizens Against Equine Slaughter(CAES), the Oregon nonprofit, have filed a lawsuit against the Bureau of Land Management and the USDA Forest Service asking for an injunction on their intent to impound unauthorized livestock in conjunction with the Fort McDermitt Tribal Council on and in the vicinity of the Humboltd-Toiyabe National Forest. The coalition hopes to prevent wild horses from loosing their protections and going to probable slaughter.
“This may be the first time that protected mustangs are being auctioned off for alleged slaughter en masse and publicly with the tacit approval & cooperation of federal officials,” explains Anne Novak, executive director for Protect Mustangs.
Right now hundreds of wild horses are being fattened up at a Fallon, Nevada auction yard for the sale because the Forest Service allegedly rounded up wild free roaming horses in violation of the 1971 Wild Free Roaming Horses and Burros Act and in violation ofNational Environmental Protection Act (NEPA).
“Horse slaughter is cruel and inhumane and we need to stop it,” says Dr. Lester Friedlander, DVM and president of Citizens Against Equine Slaughter. “This stealth roundup is a heinous act toward our icons of liberty.”
“The U.S. Forest Service needs to comply with the Wild Free Roaming Horses and Burros Act as well as NEPA before rounding up hundreds of potentially wild horses–especially when the BLM’s nearby Owyhee gather plan doesn’t authorize this action,” states Jordan Beckett, attorney for Plaintiffs Citizens Against Equine Slaughter and Protect Mustangs.
The Judge has not ruled on the complaint filed by Protect Mustangs and Citizens against Equine Slaughter as of this moment.
Protect Mustangs is devoted to protecting native wild horses. Their mission is to educate the public about the indigenous wild horse, protect and research American wild horses on the range and help those who have lost their freedom.
Citizens Against Equine Slaughter is a non-profit organization dedicated to the protection of America’s wild and domestic horses.
# # #
Media Contacts:
Anne Novak, 415-531-8454, Anne@ProtectMustangs.org
Patience O’Dowd, 505-610-7644, patience_odowd@yahoo.com
Photos, interviews and video (Preview) available upon request
Links of interest:
Read the complaint here: PM Complaint CAES Protect mustangs v USFS BLM
U.S. Judge refuses to block NV tribe’s mustang sale, The Associated Press,http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/08/15/3565447/us-judge-in-nv-asked-to-block.html
Protect Mustangs www.ProtectMustangs.org
Citizens Against Equine Slaughterhttp://www.noequineslaughter.org/
Beckett Law Office, P.C. http://www.roguevalleylawyer.com/
Jones Law Firm http://cjoneslawfirm.com/
Wild Free Roaming Horse & Burro Act http://www.wildhorseandburro.blm.gov/92-195.htm
NEPA http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Environmental_Policy_Act
Roundup footage & abuse: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yF49csCB9qM (Preview)
PLAINTIFFS’ PRAYER FOR RELIEF
Plaintiffs respectfully request that this Court:
1. Declare that the USFS and the BLM violated the National Environmental Policy Act, the Wild and Free Roaming Horses and Burros Act, the Administrative Procedure Act, and their implementing regulation in implementing the Fort McDermitt Horse Gather;
2. Order the USFS and the BLM to withdraw the Notice and 2013 Horse Gather Agreement until such time as the agency demonstrates to this Court that it has adequately complied with the law, including but not limited to putting the 2013 Agreement through notice and comment procedures, ordering DNA testing to determine the origin of captured wild horses, ordering the BLM and USFS to comply with the law to determine ownership of the wild horses, and ordering the BLM and USFS return to public lands or the HMAs all seized or removed wild, free-roaming, and unbranded horses being held at Fallon Livestock Auction;
3. Enjoin the USFS, the BLM, and their agents from proceeding with the Fort McDermitt Horse Gather, or any portion thereof, unless and until the violations of federal law set forth herein have been corrected to the satisfaction of this court;
