Penalties for game law violations

[Tom7227]

In another post there is a bit of discussion about what the penalty should be for some people caught with a gross over-limit of crappie. The tone of the comments are that the book should be tossed at them. The report is that the 2 men were 172 fish over limit and the fine was $4,400.

The amount of fines that are to be charged for game law violations, and the amount of restitution that can be ordered, are set in Minnesota Rules and the Uniform Fine Schedule. Links to those are:

http://www.mncourts.gov/documents/8/Public/Other/DNR-15.pdf

https://www.revisor.leg.state.mn.us/rules/?id=6133.0080

I suspect most will be stunned at how minimal the fines are. Note that none of the violations get reported to the Department of Public Safety which means that they don't show up on criminal records checks.

On Page 30 of the MnCourts document it indicates that the fine for overlimit is a total of $137 for the first fish and $107 for each additional fish. The second document indicates that the restitution for taking a crappie is supposed to be $5 per fish with an additional $10 charge for each inch a fish measures over 11 inches.

I can tell you from many years of experience that most judges don't come anywhere close to imposing the allowed fines. Very few urban judges place much emphasis on these types of violations, and also see them very rarely.

[rockman]

Just to clarify it for myself,and maybe to correct my post on that other thread if need be,does the court set the schedule for penalties, or is it a legislative function to do so?It has been too many years since I went to school, and studied this stuff.I do agree, it is almost ridiculous how low the fines really are for such violations.

[Tom7227]

The legislature sets the level of the crime - petty misdemeanor, misdemeanor, gross misdemeanor or felony. In the instance I've pointed out a committee of the judges sets the 'fine schedule' for these and hundreds of other violations. e.g. most minor traffic violations. The DNR establishes the amount of restitution that is fair through a somewhat complex process.

I would be surprised if restitution was ordered in most cases. You could look it up on-line if you knew the names of the bad guys in the other post.

[Hammer Handle]

It depends on how the case was presented by the accused.

Maybe it was a retired family with no money and were relying on the fish for food. Still illegal...definately!

But, over $4,000 in fines would be HUGE for them! I think they learned their lesson.

[rockman]

Thanks for the clarification.Too many years have gone by, and some things have been forgotten. That was exactly my point in stating that jail time for first offenders is not going to happen.If restitution is a surprise for you in some, or most of these cases,jail time would be a huge, huge stretch,especially for first offenses.

[james_walleye]

MN game law penalties are way to leniant, bottom line. If the threat of a severe penalty was there i believe more people would think twice about breaking game laws.

[Tom7227]

 Originally Posted By: james_walleye

MN game law penalties are way to leniant, bottom line. If the threat of a severe penalty was there i believe more people would think twice about breaking game laws.

I'm not so sure about that.

First of all you have to realize that for most people who break the law the connection between crime and punishment simplly doesn't exist. In fact most have the attention span of a gnat and the IQ of a mature parking meter.

Secondly, these crimes are seldom prosecuted. The office I worked in for the last 10 years did 17,000+ cases a year (St. Paul) and I can only remember 3-5 game violation cases in the entire 10 years. If you don't see it often you don't understand the impact and so it doesn't seem important - to the prosecutors, defense attornies, or judges.

I don't disagree that the punishments seem lenient, but not when put into the perspective of misdemeanor level cases.

[FrontenacPike]

In my opinion and being in the field that I'm in, I think that

Mn is too lenient on all crimes. Case in point, sex offenders walking after sitting a 90 day sentence just to turn around and ruin another kids life.

I've heard of instances when CO's make an arrest and they have confiscated everything used in order to break the law...truck, boat, fishing gear and shirt on their back. If that was the case, more often I guarantee we wouldn't have so many ridicules game infractions.

[candiru]

I agree that MN is way too lenient on sentencing for all crimes. For Game and fish and some other violators maybe we should look at puttimng these people to work doing some community service in the form of going out and cleaning, maintaining, or improving our lands and waters. There would still be fines/equipment compensation. There is a segment of our population where the money part doesn't mean enough. Could you imagine what it would be like to spend some beautiful June weekends picking up trash and mowing grass (no riding mower) at some public boat landings.

[fishinalot]

This was a post back in October in the Outdoor Discussion Forum.

My point has not changed any on this topic!

I don't know why the DNR and our state puts up with this [PoorWordUsage]!!

I was reading in the outdoor news Oct 19th edition... 4-men (non-residents)were busted near Longville with 240 perch over the limit!! They claim they are getting hefty fines?? only $2000 each and maybe losing there fishing licenses for only 3 years?

Same article..... Other (non-residents) were busted with 106 sunfish over the limit and only getting fined $1600?($10 per sunfish)

Our state is not punishing these "Pigs" that come into our state and take our resources!

Most are loaded with $$$$ and have no problem paying these fines, come back and do it again and again and again.

Whats wrong with fining these "Pigs" a $1000 per fish, sieze there Hummers, ban them from ever fishing or hunting in MN again, put them on a bus with a one way pass and hopefully never see them again!

The DNR needs more money? easy solution.. fining these "Pigs" $1000 per fish, only puts on more CO's, stocks our lakes and gets the word out!

We need our law makers to enforse stiffer penalties on these law breaking residents or non-residents!!

[fishuhalik]

I don't think that's necessarily the answer either. Remember, the penalty really does have to fit the crime. If you brought this up to the courts, you would get laughted at. And really, I think there is alot the needs to be fixed in our court system before penalties for keeping to many fish get addressed. As was brought up earlier, if a child molestor can get off w/ 90 days, that needs to be fixed before a fella can get a stiffer fine for keeping too many fish.

[fishinalot]

The difference is the Child Molester is a Sick Bast@%*@d that should be shot, not given 90 days!

The poacher knows better and needs to pay $$$$ for it.