In a round-about way, the Cuban iguana's status under the US Endangered Species Act made its way into US jurisprudence. In the fall of 2003, attorney Tom Wilner needed to persuade the justices of the US Supreme Court to take the case of a dozen Kuwaiti detainees being held in isolation in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, without charges, without a hearing and without access to a lawyer.[33] According to Peter Honigsberg, a professor of law at the University of San Francisco, Wilner unsuccessfully made two arguments before the Court to hear his case; in his third argument he changed tactics by mentioning US law and the Cuban iguana.[33][34] Wilner argued, "Anyone, including a federal official, who violates the Endangered Species Act by harming an iguana at Guantanamo, can be fined and prosecuted. Yet the government argues that US law does not apply to protect the human prisoners there".[35] According to Honigsberg, the Supreme Court agreed to hear the case because of this argument.[33]