A “bad actor” lawsuit filed against Coeur d’Alene-based Hecla Mining Co. by a coalition of tribes and environmental groups has been voluntarily dismissed as a result of the recent abrupt retirement of Hecla’s former CEO Phillips Baker Jr.

The suit had sought to block Hecla’s attempts to obtain exploration and mining permits for its silver and copper Libby Exploration Project, in the Cabinet Mountains of northwest Montana.

The suit had alleged that Baker was a “bad actor” because, prior to heading Hecla, he had once led Pegasus Gold, which filed for bankruptcy protection in 1998 and defaulted on cleanup projects at three Montana mines.

The plaintiffs claimed that, under the Montana Metal Mines Reclamation Act, such a default bars the state from issuing exploration and mining permits to any company led by Baker.

“With the dismissal of the ‘bad actor’ lawsuit, (Hecla) is focused on advancing permitting of the Libby Exploration Project,” the mining company says in a press release.

The project site is 23 miles south of Libby, in Lincoln County, Montana, about 50 miles north of Hecla’s Lucky Friday Mine, in Murray, Idaho.

Meantime, environmental law group Earthjustice, which represents many of the tribes and organizations in the original suit, vows to continue to oppose mining proposals in the Cabinets.

“Regardless of what mining company or mining executive arrives next on the scene to push through an ill-conceived mining scheme, we will be ready to protect the Cabinet Mountains Wilderness and our clean water,” Mary Costello of the Rock Creek Alliance says in a press release issued by Earthjustice.