An animal rights group is taking unprecedented legal action to demand that chimpanzees be granted "legal personhood" based on their cognitive abilities.

Nonprofit Nonhuman Rights Project filed a second lawsuit on Tuesday and plans to file a third later this week asking the courts to recognize four chimps as autonomous and free them from "illegal detention," The Associated Press reported.

The lawsuits filed in New York are requesting the courts declare that the chimps are not things to be possessed and caged by people.

"In this case, we are claiming that chimpanzees are autonomous," Massachusetts lawyer and project founder Steven Wise said. "That is, being able to self-determine, be self-aware, and be able to choose how to live their own lives."

Wise plans to take the lawsuits to the Appellate Division and the state Court of Appeals. He doesn't expect the initial responses to the lawsuits to be favorable since the judges will have no legal precedent for their decisions, but he feels ready for the challenge.

"We've been preparing for lawsuits for many years," Wise sad. "These are the first in a long series of suits that will chip away at the legal thinghood of such non-human animals as chimpanzees."

The national group, which has a board of directors that includes chimpanzee research pioneer Jane Goodall, wants to change the common law status of some species other than humans.

The next move could be to file similar lawsuits on behalf of gorillas, orangutans, whales, dolphins and elephants, which are considered autonomous, Wise said.

Nonhuman Rights Project filed a lawsuit Monday on behalf of Tommy, an adult male chimp owned by Patrick Lavery and kept in a cage in a shed in a used trailer lot. The chimp is kept in a small cage in a chilly shed with only a television set for company, according to the lawsuit.

On Tuesday, the group filed a lawsuit in Niagara Falls on behalf of Kiko, a chimp living in a cage in a brick building of the nonprofit Primate Sanctuary. The third lawsuit, scheduled for Thursday, will be filed on behalf of two chimpanzees being used in locomotion research at Stony Brook University on Long Island.

"Once we prove that chimpanzees are autonomous, that should be sufficient for them to gain legal personhood and at least have their fundamental interests protected by human rights," Wise said.

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