Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar previously possessed over 80 hippos, and they now have a unique distinction in US law: they are the first non-human creatures to be legally classified as persons. 

These hippos have a lawyer, and a very good one, since the US District Court for the Southern District of Ohio recognised the late Escobar’s renowned “Cocaine Hippos” as legal individuals for the first time in the United States.

The October 15 judgement came on the same day that the Animal Legal Defense Fund filed an application on behalf of the hippo plaintiffs in Colombia to prevent the country’s authorities from slaughtering the animals.

The ALDF made the announcement in a news release on Wednesday. 

The hippos are descended from four that Escobar illegally brought.

They were released following his death in 1993.

Since then, the hippos’ population has grown to more than 80, and they are said to be wreaking havoc on the local ecology.

However, other experts believe they are “restoring ecological services” that have been lost for thousands of years owing to “human-driven extinctions.”

According to Newsweek, in July, Colombian attorney Luis Domingo Gómez Maldonado filed a lawsuit on behalf of the animals to prevent them from being slaughtered, claiming that sterilisation was a preferable alternative. 

Although Colombian law grants non-human species legal standing to sue to safeguard their interests, the Colombian judicial system cannot compel someone in the United States to submit papers supporting their case.

However, a US law permits interested individuals in Colombia to seek access to records and evidence in a U.S. federal court, so the ALDF petitioned for the hippos’ rights to force two Ohio wildlife specialists who research nonsurgical sterilisation to testify on their side.

For the first time in US history, the District Court granted the application, recognising animals as legal people.

(With inputs from agencies)