The hog barns belonging to Circle Four Farms in southern Utah were dark and the employees had left one night in March of 2017. The group of animal rights activists, all members of Direct Action Everywhere, including co-founder Wayne Hsiung, waited for nightfall before illegally entering the property. Clad in matching t-shirts, head lamps and videotaping the entire event using virtual reality technology, the group, known for so-called “open rescues,”entered a barn in what they call “Operation Deathstar.”

With lookouts communicating with them using radios, Hsiung was videoed speaking about the conditions in the barn, which appeared to be a farrowing barn where piglets are born. The group, who knew they were trespassing, seemed to flee the barns when alerted to a vehicle, hiding in the shadows, camera still rolling, returning shortly to rescue two piglets Hsiung had identified.

The group reentered the barn, stole two piglets, and made their way back to a waiting vehicle where they tried to give them milk before seeking veterinary care. The activist group released the video several months after stealing the piglets, much to the apparent delight of activists pushing the “right to rescue.”

This set into motion an investigation involving local, state and federal law enforcement and involved raids on animal sanctuaries to locate the pigs, with one of the raided sanctuaries located in Colorado. The piglets were not located and Hsiung and the remainder of the group faced felony burglary and theft charges, both are convictions that would have carried prison sentences. Hsiung has nearly 20 arrests that resulted in felony charges, including one in 2017 for trespassing at a Boulder Whole Foods store. An attorney, Hsiung knows well the boundaries to test. Compassion may not be a crime, as Hsiung has told jurors in a number of his court appearances, but trespassing and theft are.

In mid-October, a Utah jury in a community where agriculture, and more specifically Circle Four Farms, is a major employer, found Hsiung and his co-defendant, camera operator Paul Darwin Picklesimer, not guilty of trespassing or theft. Not guilty.

The piglets were valued in court testimony recently at $42.50 each, which does not represent a major loss for the Smithfield Foods-owned farm. The most recent court decision, though, represents a monumental loss both for private property rights and agriculture.

Hsiung admitted that he trespassed and stole the pigs. He admitted it on film, in court, and in an editorial in The New York Times titled “I Did Not Steal Two Piglets. I Saved Them. A Jury Agreed.” However, he was able to successfully argue to a jury in Utah that it didn’t matter because the piglets were rescued.

In his editorial, Hsiung said a juror told him after eight hours of deliberation and the verdict, that many jurors believed the group’s actions were illegal, but the jurors believed the group was there to document the conditions and only rescue an animal if they identified one in need. The juror also allegedly told Hsiung jurors believed the animals had no value to Smithfield, preventing them from being objects of a theft. Finally, Hsiung claimed the juror told him they were sympathetic to the animals.

The verdict is ludicrous and sets a precedent that is more than dangerous.

Just days after SCOTUS heard arguments whether or not California’s Prop 12 is unconstitutional, this verdict is certain to embolden activists and extremist groups. A number of ag-producing states have “ag gag” laws on their books that prohibit or restrict unauthorized recording at farms, a favorite tactic of extremist groups. Utah previously had such a law to protect livestock producers from activists who trespass or pose as employees to record footage of alleged mistreatment of animals. One of the attorneys who worked to strike that law in Utah is University of Denver law professor Justin Marceau. The author of “Beyond Cages: Animal Law and Criminal Punishment,” Marceau was credited by the New York Times for leading the legal effort to overturn that law in 2017. Marceau, coincidentally, has a seat at the table and the ear of the Colorado Commissioner of Agriculture on the Bureau of Animal Protection Taskforce.

He told the Times, “prosecutors would have you believe this case is about burglary, but in reality, it’s a case about whether people can rescue animals in dire conditions…”

It is about burglary. And trespassing. You can call it whatever you wish but it is what it is. In the eyes of animal extremists working to eliminate animal agriculture, every animal on every farm, ranch, feedyard and processing facility in the world is in “dire conditions” for one reason or another because they personally don’t agree with using animals for food. Verdicts like this allow extremists to make personal decisions about food for people who very likely don’t agree with them, and it’s shameful.

Rachel Gabel writes about agriculture and rural issues. She is assistant editor of The Fence Post Magazine, the region’s preeminent agriculture publication. Gabel is a daughter of the state’s oil and gas industry and a member of one of the state’s 12,000 cattle-raising families, and she has authored children’s books used in hundreds of classrooms to teach students about agriculture.