Judge tosses legal effort by New Mexico rancher who killed wolf

Mar. 27—Conservation groups proclaimed victory this week when a federal judge tossed a rancher's claim that he shouldn't be kicked off federal land in New Mexico after killing a wolf.

Craig Thiessen's case goes back six years to his killing of an endangered Mexican wolf in Gila National Forest. His argument that he should continue to be allowed to graze his cattle on 48,000 acres near Reserve, N.M., was rejected this week by U.S. Magistrate Judge Gregory Fouratt in Las Cruces.

Thiessen pleaded guilty in 2018 to killing the wolf and faced a year of probation and a $2,300 fine. Later that year, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service revoked his limited liability corporation's permit to graze cattle on the public land. A court document says he had 286 cows and 143 calves on the property.

Thiessen has continued court action aimed at retaining the opportunity to keep cattle there. The Fish and Wildlife Service has sued him to remove them.

Hayden Ballard, an attorney who has represented Thiessen, couldn't be reached Friday for comment.

Representatives of four conservation groups said in a news release that Thiessen squandered his privilege to use the public land.

One of them, Tucson, Ariz.-based Greta Anderson of the Western Watersheds Project, accused him Friday afternoon of animal cruelty in killing the wolf. Numerous accounts say the young wolf's leg had been caught in a trap and it was then struck with a shovel.

Anderson said Friday it's good the courts and federal government have shown that when a person kills an endangered species, "there's a price to be paid, because it's a theft from all of us."

But Anderson said Thiessen's cattle continue to graze on the land in question.