Judge allows Shoshone tribe into eagle permit case

A federal judge is allowing the Eastern Shoshone Tribe to challenge the Northern Arapaho Tribe's plan to kill bald eagles on the reservation they share in central Wyoming. U.S. District Judge Alan B. Johnson on Friday agreed to allow the Eastern Shoshone Tribe to participate in the lawsuit the Northern Arapaho Tribe filed last year against the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The federal agency in March issued the Northern Arapaho Tribe the nation's first permit allowing the killing of bald eagles for religious purposes. The Northern Arapaho have called the federal permit a sham because it specified they must kill eagles outside the Wind River Indian Reservation and state law prohibits killing eagles off the reservation.