The Ninth Circuit affirmed a lower court decision rejecting claims that the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) violated the ESA when it placed commercial fishing restrictions on sub-regions of the Pacific Ocean inhabited by the endangered western distinct population segment of Stellar sea lion...

A district court held unlawful BLM's methodology for assessing the impact of federal actions on the northern spotted owl as well as its failure to offer for sale a declared amount of timber from two western Oregon districts. Under the Oregon and California Lands Act of 1937 (O&C Act), once BLM d...

A district court granted environmental groups' motion to intervene in a landowner's lawsuit challenging FWS' critical habitat designation for the dusky gopher frog in portions of Louisiana and Mississippi. The landowner, who owns property that falls within the designation, argued that the designatio...

A district court ordered three men to pay South Africa $29.5 million in restitution for illegally harvesting and importing into the United States large quantities of West Coast rock lobsters from South African waters in violation of the Lacey Act. But because the men already paid $7 million to South...

The D.C. Circuit upheld FWS's determination that sport-hunted polar bear "trophies" may no longer be imported into the United States under the Marine Mammals Protection Act (MMPA) as of the effective date of the ESA listing rule for the species. In May 2008, FWS determined threatened status for the ...

The Ninth Circuit affirmed a lower court decision denying an environmental group's request to preliminarily enjoin the U.S. Forest Service's approval of a timber sale in the Shasta-Trinity National Forest. The group argued that the Service failed to adequately evaluate the cumulative effects of the ...

The Ninth Circuit reversed a lower court decision dismissing a Japanese whaling research organization's piracy claims against an environmental activist group. The researchers hunt whales in the Southern Ocean pursuant to a permit issued under the International Convention for the Regulation of Whalin...

A district court dismissed with leave to amend environmental groups' lawsuit against EPA alleging that it violated the ESA by failing to undertake required consultations regarding the effects of 382 registered pesticides on endangered and threatened species. The groups seek a broad remedy—an injun...

A district court issued a permanent injunction ordering the state of Washington to repair or replace culverts under state-owned roads that that block fish passage to and from inland waters. The court agreed with Native American tribes' claim that the state has a treaty-based duty to preserve fish ru...

A district court held that the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality violated ESA §9 by failing to properly manage freshwater inflows into the San Antonio and Guadalupe bays during the 2008-2009 winter, thereby causing an unlawful take of the world’s only self-sustaining, wild Whooping Crane ...