Argentina court case: rights of Lola the puma

Summary

In July 2022, a criminal court of the City of Buenos Aires declared a puma named Lola Limon to be a “subject of rights.” The decision comes after Lola (a six month old cub) was found in 2019 tethered in the front yard of a human residence. While it was confirmed that the puma was in good health and properly cared, private possession of wild animals is illegal in Argentina, so police seized the cougar and transferred her to the Buenos Aires Ecopark.

Three years after being transferred to Ecopark, the case was brought to court by a public prosecutor in the Office of the Attorney General of Buenos Aires Environmental Affairs Unit (UFEMA), Dr. Carlos Fel Rolero Santurián. He requested that Lola, a sentient being of the species puma concolor, be declared a “subject of rights” and that she be granted her “complete freedom, free of any measure or legal restriction, with definitive legal custody granted to the Interactive Ecopark of the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires.”

Court Ruling
Regarding the interpretation of Lola’s legal status, Judge Carla Cavaliere notes that “the Civil and Commercial Code of Argentina grants animals the character of movable goods, without distinguishing them from other objects of a different nature, therefore, in the legal field of Private Law it is not possible to find a satisfactory answer [to the legal status of animals].”

However, he also notes the Argentine Constitution provides that “All inhabitants enjoy the right to a healthy, balanced environment” and the authorities must protect this right “to the preservation of natural and cultural heritage and biological diversity,” and Article 27 of the Constitution of the City of Buenos Aires which establishes that the City must promote “the protection of urban wildlife and the respect for their life. In addition, he cites Argentine law 14.346 which grants animals the possibility to be classified as “victims” of acts of cruelty” and the Universal Declaration of Animal Rights approved by the United Nations in 1977.

In addition, he builds on jurisprudential precedent from the Federal Criminal Appeal Court, which held that “based on a dynamic, non-static legal interpretation, animals must be recognized as the subject of rights, therefore non human subjects (animals) are holders of rights,” and specifically the case of Sandra the orangutan, where Argentina’s Federal Chamber of Criminal Cassation ruled that Sandra is “a subject of rights.”

Under these conditions, the Judge ruled that it is appropriate to declare the nonhuman animal named “Lola” a subject of rights, contributing to a growing number of cases in Argentina that affirm animal rights.

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