Big poaching arrest in Lac qui Parle County

[Tom7227]

http://www.wctrib.com/news/region/365988...ounty-deer-case

[smalliehunter]

Wow, what a bunch of D-bags.

[PurpleFloyd]

I would support auditing him. No wonder there are no deer left.

[Tom7227]

He is only charged with gross misdemeanors. 365 days in jail is the max.

[FISHINGURU]

They will get off with a slap on the wrist, pretty much a waste of a "5 year investigation".

[outdoors247]

I wish they would enact tougher laws for these types of offenses. His hunting privileges were already revoked in MN by the IWVC. The only thing this guy will understand is jail time, and a lot of it.

[picksbigwagon]

I am not familiar with these "investigations" but 5 years seems like an awfully long time to figure out a case against these poachers

[sticknstring]

They took his truck, 37 guns, and I'm sure there will be some fines & jail time as well. I'd hardly call that a "slap on the wrist." It's pretty tough to get more than that w/ animal cases. Great job to the citizens who called the TIP lines and to the CO officers who investigated.

[O.T.C.]

If they could make arrests like this in many more counties where the same thing maybe even worse is going on it will help some. Don't think for a second while we all are sound asleep that these kinds of dudes are sleeping as well, they are out there fueling their adrenaline rush etc. It's much more widespread than most will admit or care to know. We need to help the CO's in cleaning these things up. At least some LQP county people should have slightly better deer hunting upcoming. How many did this guy already sell off ? How many were wounded and got away only to die, it's worse then just seeing those antlers and head mounts not to mention possible bullets ending up who knows where, mercy.

[lawdog]

Tom is right 365 days jail and $3000 fine is the most for a GM. Here however there will also be restitution for the illegally taken animals and also seizures/forfeitures of the vehicles and firearms. There is also a loss of hunting license privilege (not that it will stop the guy but if he's seen hunting they will know he's illegal), it will extend the time his privileges are gone.

Plus all his prize trophies are GONE!

[DonBo]

Tom is right 365 days jail and $3000 fine is the most for a GM.

Can't this be for each GM he's charged with? If he's charged with three, won't that be 3 years, $9000? Let's hope.

[O.T.C.]

Glad this clown didn't live in moose country or those racks would be in the pile also. I don't like the possible fact he's been filling his freezer to boot and his sidekicks. Possible, cuz maybe these animals were wanton waste eventually also, bet he spared the tenderloins and backstraps or maybe not. Come on now news agencies, blow this clown up on TV, and his "buddies" don't just leave it to the Outdoor News. I wonder if they can decipher through the volume of lies that will or were told by this guy and his sidekicks, to have that level of disrespect for fellow hunters and the animals is truly sickening.

[Tom7227]

Law is that sentences run concurrently - all at the same time, unless the judge orders that they be consecutive. That is a hard thing to do.

the loss of the guns is significant, maybe an average of $4-500 each. But as for the restitution he probably won't pay it and it will be difficult to force the issue. He probably doesn't have a lot of money, likely no job or works only for cash. If the truck was worth anything he probably has a big loan on it.

As far as how long the investigation took - think about it. Hard to follow him. If they had to work it undercover it takes a lot of time to get the suspect comfortable enough to gt anything useful. I guess I wonder how much money he made selling off some of the trophy mounts. I've heard that in the old days guys were walking around with money belts and would pay big bucks at the Deer Classic.

[O.T.C.]

I hope they can bust a few more of these guys. Hope they nail the Bemidji area poaching ring at some point, have heard even back in College in the early 90's about several headless bucks found and still seem to hear those same reports up that way today. That's not just random stuff really, most poaching a solo deer here or there I would think would want the whole animal. Time to wish the CO's good luck and hope some people come forward who are tired of this stuff. This guy mentioned in the article I'm trying to figure out if his brother is possibly in our town. That last name isn't mega common. Can't they put a jail cell at the Deer Classic and let them serve a few days of their sentence there ?

[O.T.C.]

Dude had 37 guns ? Pretty good accumulation for his age. Hope they check those, think any are a bit hot ? We had quite the rash of break-ins in our area, not saying it's connected but guns and money were the items the thieves wanted. I tend to think guys like this tend to break the fishing laws and state laws, they tend to not wake up one day thinking I'm gonna start poaching now, I won't break any other laws just poach antlered animals so I have zero compassion for these guy. Nail them for everything possible cuz they've gotten away with plenty in their life already and with a dead 8 and rifle/spotlight in the truck when pulled over there was no plan to stop apparently. Hope the people of LQP county are outraged, if that's where the deer were even poached from, his crew has been killing and wounding some of the nicer deer in your county for quite some time, arrested Oct. 21st, he was banging them so the fine people of LQP had less of a chance, how many more would've went down before gun season opened ? Wish they'd display these racks for closer up viewing so people with t-cam pictures of the bucks might know why the buck vanished and realize he was hammering in our area for sure. There was another poaching story in yesterday's outdoor news, hope they can strengthen those laws a touch.

[O.T.C.]

That a boy Dennis Anderson ! And Ken Soring who was our area CO present at our gun safety training in 1982 ! Hope no 1 has too much compassion for this guy, the meat was a non issue, didn't need it, I'd say the 37 guns could've been sold for cash/food. Think this guy ice fishing stops at his limit ? Summer ? Etc. Thankfully his fun is done.

[frogtosser]

This guy doesn't buy hunting licenses so that penalty is pointless. He needs to be run out of the state.

[candiru]

The head mounts add up to a lot of money as well.