New York lawsuit seeks ‘legal personhood’ for chimpanzees

NEW YORK, Dec 5:  A US animal rights group on Monday filed what it said is the first lawsuit seeking to establish the ‘legal personhood’ of chimpanzees. The non-profit  Nonhuman Rights Project asked a New York state court to declare a 26-year-old chimp named Tommy ‘a cognitively complex  autonomous legal person with the fundamental legal right not to be imprisoned.’ (agencies)