No aboriginal right to traffic eagle parts, B.C. judge rules

Andy Clark/Reuters files

A pair of eagles fly over their feeding grounds at the Fraser River near Harrison Mills, British Columbia.

VANCOUVER— A man who told a judge he had an aboriginal right to trade eagle parts that he kept stashed at a North Vancouver workshop has lost his argument in court.

Judge Jim Jardine of the Surrey, B.C. provincial court rejected James Carl Joseph’s claim that he had an aboriginal right to possess and trade eagle feathers and parts. In making his ruling, Jardine said Joseph had presented no evidence that the right existed as central to the culture of his Tlowitsis First Nations.

More: