American Wild Horse Preservation Campaign v. Jewell

669 F. App'x 516

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit
• Decided: October 14, 2016
• Docket: 15-8033
• Status: Unpublished

Opinion

ORDER AND JUDGMENT

Mary Beck Briscoe, Circuit Judge

In July 2014, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), acting through a contractor, removed approximately 1,263 wild horses from sections of public and private lands in an area in southwestern Wyoming known as the “Checkerboard.” Shortly thereafter, petitioners American Wild Horse Preservation Campaign, The Cloud Foundation, Return to Freedom, Carol Walker, and Kimerlee Curyl filed this action against Sally Jewell, the Secretary of the Department of the Interior, and Neil Kornze, the acting director of the BLM, seeking review of BLM’s decision to remove wild horses from public land sections of the Checkerboard. Petitioners alleged, in pertinent part, that the removal violated the Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act (Act), 16 U.S.C. §§ 1331-1340, and the Federal Land Policy and Management Act of 1976 (FLPMA), 43 U.S.C. §§ 1701-1787. The district court rejected these claims. Petitioners now appeal.

Exercising jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1291, we conclude, for reasons to be more fully explained in a forthcoming opinion, that the case is not moot, and that, as alleged by petitioners, the BLM violated both the Act and the FLPMA in carrying out the 2014 removal of wild horses from the Checkerboard. Accordingly, we REVERSE the judgment of the district court.