Dairy veterinarians appeal trafficking lawsuit dismissal
A group of Mexican veterinarians who recently lost a lawsuit they filed against an Idaho dairy under human trafficking laws says they’ll appeal the case to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
Attorneys for the veterinarians filed the notice of appeal in Boise’s U.S. District Court on Monday.
U.S. District Judge David Nye dismissed the lawsuit last month, writing that while managers at Funk Dairy Inc. in southern Idaho used intimidating language in talking to the workers once they arrived at the diary, the managers’ actions didn’t rise to the level of forcing the veterinarians to work.
The veterinarians – Cesar Martinez-Rodriguez, Dalia Padilla-Lopez, Mayra Munoz-Lara, Brenda Gastelum-Sierra, Leslie Ortiz-Garcia and Ricardo Neri-Camacho – claimed in the lawsuit that they were recruited to be animal scientists at the dairy in the small town of Murtaugh but instead were forced to work as laborers in poor conditions.
