Action timeline

1999 – A court decision shut down the Hawaii-based longline fishery for swordfish. This decision to close millions of miles of Pacific Ocean to longline fishing prompted the fishery’s fleet of three dozen vessels to relocate to Southern California.

2000 – The Center and the Turtle Island Restoration Network filed a lawsuit to keep the National Marine Fisheries Service from authorizing a California drift-gillnet fishery until it met requirements to reduce the number of leatherbacks drowning in gillnets. Following this lawsuit, the agency agreed to prohibit drift-gillnets in central and northern California in El Niño years when leatherbacks are present.

June 2002 – The Center filed a successful lawsuit to stop an experimental longline swordfish fishery that would have been allowed to kill leatherback sea turtles in the same area where the fishing practice was previously banned in Hawaii.

December 2002 – The Center filed a lawsuit against the Fisheries Service for its failure to close portions of the California drift-gillnet fishery during an El Niño year, when warmer water temperatures brought leatherbacks into contact with the fishery.

2004 – Following a successful lawsuit by the Center and the Turtle Island Restoration Network, longline fishing for swordfish was prohibited along the West Coast.

2006 – The Center fought off a proposal to reopen important leatherback foraging areas off the California coast to drift-gillnet fishing.

June 2007 – When pressed by the Center, the Fisheries Service denied a permit that would have allowed drift-gillnet vessels to operate in a protected area off the California and Oregon coasts. In the same month, the Center blocked a proposal by the Fisheries Service to allow longline fishing for swordfish off the California coast in leatherback habitat.

September 2007 – The Center, Turtle Island Restoration Network, and Oceana filed a citizen petition seeking to have critical habitat designated for the leatherback along the coasts of California and Oregon.