## Facts

- The Animal Protection Institute (API), a nonprofit animal-advocacy organization, sued Gene Merriam in his official capacity as Commissioner of the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR).
- API alleged that the DNR’s practices in issuing and administering trapping and snaring permits were resulting in unlawful “takes” of federally listed endangered species.
- API sought declaratory and injunctive relief that would prohibit trapping or require changes to Minnesota’s trapping regulations and permitting practices to avoid takes of listed species.
- A trappers’ association representing commercial and recreational trappers moved to intervene as a defendant under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 24, asserting that the requested relief threatened its members’ ability to trap under existing state rules.
- API opposed intervention, arguing that the DNR would adequately represent trappers’ interests and that adding another party could complicate the litigation.
- The reported decision addressed only whether the trappers’ association could intervene; it did not resolve the merits of API’s Endangered Species Act claims.

## Issues

1. Whether the trappers’ association was entitled to intervene as of right under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 24(a)(2) based on a legally protectable interest in trapping that could be impaired by the requested relief and not adequately represented by the DNR.
2. If intervention as of right was not available, whether the court should allow permissive intervention under Rule 24(b) because the association’s defenses shared common questions of law or fact with the main action and would not cause undue delay or prejudice.

## Decision

- The court granted the trappers’ association’s motion to intervene.
- The motion was timely in light of the stage of the case and the absence of prejudice to the existing parties.
- The association showed a sufficient interest because its members engaged in trapping and snaring activities that could be limited, suspended, or restructured by the injunction API sought.
- The court found that the litigation could, as a practical matter, impair the association’s ability to protect its members’ interests because API’s requested relief targeted the regulatory framework governing trapping and snaring.
- The court concluded that the DNR might not adequately represent the association’s interests, given that the DNR must account for broader public responsibilities and competing policy considerations that may diverge from trappers’ more focused interests in maintaining trapping opportunities under current rules.
- The court also recognized that permissive intervention was appropriate as an alternative basis because the association’s participation involved overlapping legal and factual questions and did not pose an undue risk of delay.

## Legal Principles

- Rule 24(a)(2) requires a timely motion, an interest relating to the property or transaction at issue, a showing that the action may practically impair the movant’s ability to protect that interest, and a showing that existing parties may not adequately represent the interest.
- A regulated association may have a protectable interest when requested injunctive relief would directly restrict or materially change the regulatory conditions under which its members carry out lawful activities.
- “Impairment” under Rule 24(a)(2) is satisfied when the requested relief could practically limit, suspend, or alter the movant’s activities or the rules governing them, even if the effect would occur through future regulatory changes ordered by the court.
- The burden to show inadequate representation is minimal; when the existing defendant is a government official or agency charged with representing the public interest, that representation may differ from a private group’s more specific interests.
- Under Rule 24(b), a court may allow intervention when the applicant’s claim or defense shares a common question of law or fact with the main action, so long as intervention will not unduly delay or prejudice the original parties.

## Conclusion

In *Animal Protection Institute v. Merriam*, the District of Minnesota allowed a trappers’ association to intervene in an Endangered Species Act lawsuit challenging Minnesota’s trapping and snaring permitting practices, holding that the association’s members faced potential restrictions from the requested injunction and that the state agency’s broader public obligations could mean the trappers’ interests would not be fully represented without intervention.


Animal Protection Institute v. Merriam, 242 F.R.D. 524 (2006)