Should elephants be considered people? A Colorado court may decide

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COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. - An animal rights group is fighting for the release of five elephants that have lived at the same Colorado zoo for decades, claiming the elephants are "unlawfully confined" and able to challenge their own captivity.

The Colorado Supreme Court will hear arguments Thursday from the NonHuman Rights Project and the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo in Colorado Springs, Colorado, where Missy, Kimba, Lucky, LouLou, and Jambo have lived for decades at the zoo’s elephant exhibit.

The animal rights group claims the highly intelligent and social elephants should be legally able to challenge their captivity under a long-held process used by prisoners to dispute their detention. They want them released to an unspecified elephant sanctuary.

"They are suffering immensely and unnecessarily. Without judicial intervention, they are doomed to suffer day after day, year after year, for the rest of their lives," a lawyer for the group, Jake Davis, said in a May brief submitted to the Colorado Supreme Court.

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Kimba and Lucky (Cheyenne Mountain Zoo)

The zoo, meanwhile, argues that moving the elephants and potentially placing them with new animals would be cruel at their age, potentially causing them unnecessary stress. It says they are not used to being in larger herds and, based on its experience, they do not have the skills or desire to join them.

"Our elephant care team knows the needs of our elephants, and tailors specific health and exercise programs based on each elephant’s needs and preferences. Suggesting they’d be better off at a sanctuary is simply incorrect," the zoo said.

In a statement ahead of Thursday's hearing, the zoo claimed the NonHuman Rights Project isn't concerned about the elephants but is just trying to create a judicial precedent that would allow the captivity of any animal to be challenged.

"We hope Colorado isn’t the place that sets the slippery slope in motion of whether your beloved and well-cared-for dog or cat should have habeas corpus and would be required to ‘go free,’ at the whim of someone else’s opinion of them," it said.

What is the NonHuman Rights Project arguing?

Lucky (Cheyenne Mountain Zoo)

The main legal issue is whether or not the elephants are considered persons under the law, and therefore able to pursue a petition of habeas corpus challenging their detention. The NonHuman Rights project argues that legal personhood is not limited to humans.

The lawsuit is similar to an unsuccessful one the group filed challenging the confinement of an elephant named Happy at the Bronx Zoo in 2022. New York's Court of Appeals ruled that Happy, while intelligent and deserving of compassion, cannot be considered a person illegally confined with the ability to pursue a petition seeking release.

The New York ruling said giving such rights to an elephant "would have an enormous destabilizing impact on modern society" and change how humans interact with animals.