Posted on 02/27/2013 11:05:06 AM PST by jazusamo
Video and slideshow at link.
A federal appeals court panel has branded a Northwest anti-whaling group "pirates," ordering a halt to attacks on Japanese whalers in Antarctic waters.
The outspoken opinion, which reads at times more like "Moby Dick" than a court decision, hands a victory to Miller Nash, a Portland law firm that took the controversial step of representing Japan's whale hunters .
The 9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals opinion issued late Monday is also unusual for ordering the transfer of a lower-court judge from the case, finding that U.S. District Judge Richard A. Jones made "numerous, serious and obvious errors" in the ruling that generated the appeal.
The majority opinion of the three-judge panel continues an earlier injunction ordering Sea Shepherd Conservation Society activists to stay at least 500 yards away from Japanese whaling ships.
"You don't need a peg leg or an eye patch," wrote Chief Judge Alex Kozinski in the majority opinion. "When you ram ships; hurl glass containers of acid; drag metal-reinforced ropes in the water to damage propellers and rudders; launch smoke bombs and flares with hooks; and point high-powered lasers at other ships, you are, without a doubt, a pirate, no matter how high-minded you believe your purpose to be."
The opinion is a blow to Sea Shepherd, registered in Oregon and based in Friday Harbor, Wash., known for combating whaling on the high seas. It's a win in a continuing legal battle waged by the plaintiffs, which are led by the Institute of Cetacean Research , a Japanese foundation that cites a scientific-research exception to an international whaling ban.
But the opinion isn't shutting down Sea Shepherd, which continued clashes this week off Antarctica, claiming whalers rammed one of its vessels and deployed stun grenades and a water cannon.
Scott West, a Sea Shepherd spokesman, said that to comply with the appeals court's earlier injunction, the U.S. organization has separated itself from Sea Shepherd Australia, which is now operating the anti-whaling campaign.
"It's not us," West said. "We have separated ourselves from having anything to do with what's going on in Antarctica."
That argument doesn't wash with the Cetacean Institute, which filed suit in 2011 against Sea Shepherd and its president, Paul Watson, whom the judges' opinion describes as eccentric.
Gavin Carter, an institute spokesman in Washington, D.C., noted that Sea Shepherd split its branches after the panel of judges issued a preliminary injunction Dec. 17.
"I would imagine that the courts would be able to see through what they've done," Carter said. "The question now is whether the nations that are flagging the Sea Shepherd vessels, which are the Netherlands and Australia, are going to be willing to continue providing a flag for vessels that the U.S. courts have deemed to be engaging in acts of piracy."
The appeals court judges said their opinion should be taken not as an endorsement of whaling but as a signal that "violent vigilantism by U.S. nationals in international waters" is not condoned.
Judge Jones, a former prosecutor who is a half brother of musician Quincy Jones, has been presiding in Seattle in the case.
The Cetacean Institute appealed Jones' decisions to dismiss its piracy claims and to deny the foundation's request for an injunction against Sea Shepherd. Miller Nash lawyer John Neupert presented arguments in October, supported by his law partner, Chris Helmer.
In the latest opinion, Kozinski wrote that Jones erred in dismissing the piracy claims. "Damaging Cetacean's ships could cause them to sink or become stranded in glacier-filled Antarctic waters," he wrote, "jeopardizing the safety of the crew."
Kozinski wrote in the majority opinion that the case, should be transferred to another district judge, drawn at random, as the case continues in the courts.
But another panel member, Circuit Judge Milan Smith, dissented on that point, saying Jones would be able to put aside his previous views and follow the appeals court's requirements.
"The Sea Shepherds are pirates. Period," Smith wrote. "No district judge could fail to grasp the clarity and firmness of our opinion."
It takes a lot of work to be too much for the 9th to stomach.
I’d like to see the Sea Shepherd take on a Russian ship. Just once. That’s all it would take. I suspect we’d never hear about the Sea Shepherd again.
Even a blind squirrel finds a nut now and then.
...what the law should do is STF out of this mess. Either the Japanese whalers sink the Sea Shephard, or vice versa.
...this will not end until one side is sunk....&...frankly, I don't care which.
if i was a whaling ship captain and was tasked with the safety of the ship, crew, mission, and cargo... i would sink them as a severe threat
i might even have hired a crew to provide security for my ship.
they could even board such a ship, seize it, and imprison the crew with thoughts of hanging them
welcome to the high seas
lol!
En banc decisions by the 9th Circuit are a little more normal because they're heard by the entire court, which includes several very solid conservatives, including Chief Justice Kozinski, who was appointed by Ronald Reagan. Like Kozinski said, "For better or worse, we are the Court of Appeals for the Hollywood Circuit."
Agreed, they’d only do it once with a Russian ship.
The video in the article is of the activist ship Bob Barker getting sandwiched and rammed but sadly the ships opened up too soon:)
Perhaps, but there is one major difference. The pirate are breaking the law, the liars are not.
Judge Koczinski is a conservative. He came to speak at the Federalist Society at Berkeley when I was in law school there. I used to work with his wife, who had a picture in her office of the two of them, in their 20s, with Ronald Reagan.
How does the 9th District court have juridiction over internationl waters?
How does the 9th District court have juridiction over internationl waters?
It was NOT RAMMED it was brushed big difference
Pirates = outside the law...
I understand the Japanese brought suit against Paul Watson and his Sea Shepherd Society and their home base is Friday Harbor in the Seattle area.
Now it’s time to teach the Sea Shepherds what comes to Pitates on the high seas, a one way trip to Davy Jone’s Locker.
They are based in the 9ths district
” The opinion is a blow to Sea Shepherd, registered in Oregon and based in Friday Harbor, Wash.”
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