Why protections are being sought for coyotes in Mexican wolf territory – By Susan Montoya Bryan (Associated Press) / Dec 8, 2022
Environmentalists want the U.S. government to list coyotes as endangered in parts of Arizona and New Mexico where the rarest subspecies of gray wolf in North America is found.
A coalition of groups argue in a petition submitted Thursday to U.S. Interior Secretary Deb Haaland and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service that small statured Mexican gray wolves are often mistaken for coyotes and that protecting coyotes would in turn cut down on wolf deaths.
Environmentalists say illegal killings are the leading cause of death for the endangered animals.
The petition pointed to cases in which Mexican wolves have been killed by people who said they believed they were killing a coyote. This misidentification invokes a federal policy that effectively protects a person from prosecution because it requires the government to prove that a defendant knew they were killing an endangered species when they pulled the trigger.
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