Pablo Escobar‘s “cocaine hippos” have been established as people by law.
Hippos formerly owned by Columbian drug kingpin Pablo Escobar produced offspring that the government is now recognizing as people or “interested person,” who will also have legal rights in the United States, CBS News reports.
The “cocaine hippos” are the offspring of other hippos Escobar illegally imported to his Columbian ranch in the 80s. Their number started off at 35 but now they’ve reached somewhere between 65 and 80.
The news comes after the Columbian government tried to decide what to do with the hippos; some of the options were killing or sterilizing them. The news outlet reports that the hippos have been reproducing very quickly, and they are now a detriment to biodiversity. While they may have human rights in the U.S., the same won’t be said for the hippos in Columbia.
“The ruling has no impact in Colombia because they only have an impact within their own territories. It will be the Colombian authorities who decide what to do with the hippos and not the American ones,” said Camilo Burbano Cifuentes, a criminal law professor at the Universidad Externado de Colombia.
