Animal rights groups bolstered by AG opinion on pigeon shoots

Sandra Chereb

Thursday, April 6, 2000 | 12:08 p.m.

RENO, Nev. - Animal rights groups say a recent opinion from the California Attorney General's Office gives them added ammunition for abolishing live pigeon shoots in California.

"This is a landmark victory for those of us working to eliminate cruelty to animals, and for the thousands of pigeons who would have been gunned down at future shoots in California," Sonia Waisman of the Sacramento, Calif.,-based United Animal Nations, said Wednesday.

The six-page opinion determined that pigeon shoots subject the birds to needless suffering, unnecessary cruelty and abuse.

"We conclude that it is a violation of the state's animal cruelty laws to conduct a pigeon shoot at which domestic pigeons are released from cages and shot for purposes of sport and amusement," the March 31 opinion said.

The attorney general's opinion was sought by California Assemblywoman Sheila James Kuehl, D-Santa Monica, at the request of United Animal Nations and The Fund for Animals, headquartered in New York.

The request was made after the groups were unable to stop a four-day, pigeon shoot in May 1998 that took place on private land in Sierra County, Calif., about 15 miles north of Reno just over the Nevada-California line.

Attendance was by invitation only and no spectators were allowed.

Animal control officers said they couldn't halt the event because it was not illegal under California law.

"We can't stop the shoot because we don't like it," Dan Olsen, animal control supervisor in Truckee, Calif., said at the time. Animal control officers were present to make sure wounded birds were killed quickly and not left to suffer.

Heidi Prescott, national director of The Fund for Animals, said all but three states - Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Texas - have banned pigeon shoots under animal cruelty laws.

"We hope that the California decision will set a precedent for these organized acts of animal cruelty to be shut down nationwide," she said.

Pam Runquist, also of United Animal Nations, said the opinion will be distributed to animal control officers and organizations around the state to use as reference should they become aware of pigeon shoots in the future.

"The problem with pigeon shoots, lots of times don't know they're going on," she said.