Boise (670 KBOI News) – The State of Idaho will pay an animal rights group thousands of dollars in legal reimbursements, in a settlement of the so-called “ag-gag” lawsuit.
Attorney John Seber with the group Mercy for Animals, which publicized a 2012 undercover video which showed cattle being stomped, kicked and dragged at a Southern Idaho dairy farm, says it’s a good outcome.
“Judge Winmill, of the Federal District Court of Idaho, ruled back in 2015, that Idaho’s ag-gag law violated the First Amendment, and Equal Protection Clause,” said Seber. “The 9th Circuit recently upheld the ruling, and just this past week, the parties agreed on a settlement.”
The so-called ag-gag law was passed in 2014. It made taking videos of agricultural operations involving animals a crime, punishable by up to one year in jail, and a $5,000 fine.
Seber says the Idaho case has been the springboard from which two other state ag-gag laws have been overturned. Those were in Kansas and Utah.
The state will pay the Animal Legal Defense Fund about $260,000 in legal fees.
