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Judge blocks resumption of horse processing
A federal judge has temporarily blocked the opening of horse processing plants in Iowa and New Mexico.
Owners of the plants said they were planning to begin operations next week.
In issuing a restraining order, U.S. district judge Christine Armijo sided with the Humane Society of the United States and other groups who contend the USDA failed to conduct the proper environmental studies before issuing permits to the plants.
Armijo’s ruling means that Valley Meat Co. of Roswell, New Mexico, and Responsible Transportation of Sigourney, Iowa, are barred from starting business for at least 30 days.
According to a report on the Las Cruces (NM) Sun-News web site, Armijo based a large part of her ruling on a directive for inspection procedures by a branch of the USDA. She said the directive amounted to government policy, and was so significant that it should have triggered a review through the National Environmental Policy Act.
This was necessary to protect public safety, the judge said.
Lawyers for the USDA said the internal directive was merely a guideline for the agency as it prepared to resume horse-plant inspections after the hiatus in horse slaughter. They said the document that Armijo put so much emphasis on had no bearing on the law that allows horse slaughter in America.
A. Blair Dunn, the attorney for Valley Meat and a Missouri company also trying to start a horse-slaughter plant, said Armijo’s ruling was “out of left field.”
No lawyer’s brief made an issue of the directive on inspections, but Armijo seized on it, Dunn said.
Tags: horse slaughter, Horses, Iowa
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