Wildlife officers...busted
Elk
Should have put them all in prison !! I wonder what other illegal hunting they have done over the years and didn't get caught ? Kind of hard to work there and not know what the boundaries are.
" “Poachers come from all walks of life but everyone is subject to the same rules and regulations. Colorado Parks and Wildlife will prosecute anyone to the full extent in cases like this one,” area wildlife manager JT Romatzke said in a news release. "
Subject to the same rules, but not the same fines. $86 for CRIMINAL trespass????
I'm not sure they actually qualify as 'wildlife officers' like a game warden would, its says they worked at the fish hatchery...I hope they at least lost their jobs, that trespass fine is a joke
I know the guy who shot the bull. Good guy, just has "antler fever". I wondered why he wouldn't enter it into the books or let me write an article since it is one of the biggest archery bulls ever in CO, grossed over 400 with some really unique features. Got a slap on the wrist.
He also kills some great muleys with a bow every year. He scouts for them all year round. Hmmm..
Wow, slap on the wrist is right. With that little fine they will not learn much except to not put a picture on the internet.
what happened to the Samson law?
This is a sad day for those of us who try to demonstrate integrity in our hunting. They got off to easily, and definitely deserved stiffer fines.
Antlers are one of the best and worst parts of hunting.
The other guys got off easy. The shooter not so much.
"He was ordered to pay more than $200 in fines and another $5,000 in a donation to the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation. Before the plea agreement, Bingham was facing more than $12,000 in fines and several charges."
Often the case with game violations. A lot of judges don't know how to handle them, I've heard of one judge pulling books to help them sentence.
When has anyone ever had their a** handed to them over a game violation?
^^Ok so a little over 5k in fines. That bull is worth far far more than that let alone the criminal act. I bet 90% of us would chalk up that 5k to hunt a bull like that b/c we all know the actual cost would be 3-5x that! The worst of it is what his past could be, this just happened to be the time he was caught. Most poachers like this are chronic, not a one time dealing. Hopefully his privileges have been revoked for quite some time.
They aren't wildlife officers.
They are, however, low life scum.
$86 trespass fine... cheaper than landowner access fees, WTF!
not much of a penalty for any of them.......................
$5K TAX DEDUCTIBLE donation.
they got the hillary treatment.
It would of been nice if Hillary got at least that
Slap on the wrist....pretty sad
Does he lose the antlers?
Slap on the wrist!
See it all the time. The only time you see someone like this get hammered is those few states that have severe penalty's specific set up for poaching trophy animals.
We have the Georgia outdoor news magazine here. It has a Hall of Shame section every month. It details cases were people get caught breaking the law. 99 times out of a 100 they get slapped on the wrist.
Those guys must not have had "intent" to illegally kill that bull.
I'm sure as a condition of the plea deal he had to turn over the antlers, although it sounds like from the article the CPW had already seized them.
My guess is they got light deals because of cooperation with the prosecutor. The 86 dollars was probably court costs with the agreement to testify in the case.
If you cannot hunt ethically - your privilege to hunt needs to be taken. Doesn't matter who you are, how may racks hang on your walls, how much time you put in. Stealing....is stealing. Period. If it ain't - someone show me where that line is. Our catch and release society breeds nothing if not scum like these guys.
Colorado has severe penalties for poaching trophies. This would/should fall under the "Samson Law". For some reason they waived it. First time I've heard of that.
Did the accused's spouce meet with the prosecutor on prosecutor's airplane at the airport tarmac?
Purdue, that's funny stuff...sad, sick, and too true, but funny.
Seems light. Poaching needs to be taken seriously but as far as I'm concerned, the totally legal changes we are making with regards to opportunity distribution are a much bigger threat.
Considering the penaties handed down, will be interesting to see were that huge rack ends up in a few years. Good chance in the shooters house?
I quit reading after "They pleaded guilty to criminal trespass and were fined $86 each." The way this CRIME was handled pisses me off more than the actual CRIME.
Not to change the subject but didn't the head of Colorado DNR get caught illegally hunting on private property a few years ago? Did anything ever come of that?
I live in an area that gets closed in the summers for fires. When I turned 16 and got my drivers license I took my girlfriend out one night and parked right off the highway with the trunk of the car backed under a yellow tape across a small forest road that was closed due to the fire danger. A high way patrol officer pulled in and ran me through the ringer I didn't have a back ground and I was raised to have respect. Alas I was charged with criminal trespass and I had to write a lengthy essay to the judge, do community service, and pay a fine greater than 86 dollars. I was 16. I did not work for the federal goverment. I was polite. And what phony way to make a 16 year old into a criminal. These guys, really?
How about AZ CO Shawn Wagner ...Shot a bull at a water hole and didn't find it but him and his fellow CO's said it was a dead elk walking. Wagner had to leave for Phoenix in the AM so he gave his tag to his fellow officer so he could tag it the next day. Next day his buddy finds the bull hurting and alive standing under a tree and shoots at it several times, finally kills it and then puts Wagner's tag on it.... Google that one. Wagner ends up being awarded $100,000.... What a crock !!
I was warned by other hunters about a rash o vehicle break ins where we hunted, not a week later I was in a hurry after work to hunt , so I set up about 100yrds from truck and I could see it from stand , this was in NJ back in the 80's . So not an hour in I see this DNR officer pull up next to my truck , he gets out and scopes the truck over , then after a quick look around he starts pulling on all the doors , and getting more frustrated , I was on the ground and running to him with arrow draw , I yelled freeze, he paused and turned slowly , to say He got a call about a abandoned vehicle, . Bullsxxx I said , no one can see my truck from road and no one drove by, called him a thief and told him to leave and never come back or I'll turn his butt in to a real cop. He said ok and held his head down and left . You cant trust people , Not sure if I reported him or not , but I sure spead the word in the area who was trying to rob me .
Well now that the precedent has been set, I know that it is less expensive and a higher quality experience to hunt at the Roan Plateau. Low pressure quality hunt for $86, or $5200 if successful. I've been looking everywhere for a $5200 guaranteed success hunt where i only pay $86 if i don't harvest an elk- FINALLY i know where to go now!
"We will use our expertise,,, bring poachers to justice.” great work but hardly justice once turned over to the court system.
"...private land and closed to all hunting" I guess unless you have $86 dollars to give to the system. The land owner doesn't even get the money! Is this for real? Unbelievable. Makes me wonder if the judge can do math. It takes about 2 minutes to google some of the rates for an outfitted hunt to know that this will only encourage more such behavior.
Razorhead, the newspaper headlines and published stories referred to them as "wildlife workers" and various iterations. I didn't see where any of their "friends" defended them anywhere.
I posted that I know Thad. Sometimes good people do bad things for various reasons. In his case it is an antler obsession. I can say that he took a lot of time and spent his own money to travel to a LE unit in CO and mentor my partner and me before our OIL elk hunt, was adamant about the private land boundaries and how to hunt so as not to get in trouble by pushing the boundaries. He showed us access points into the public flagpoles and gave us GPS waypoints to ensure we didnt trespass in tricky areas.
We killed two monster bulls largely due to his mentoring.
He didn't know us before this, was a friend of a friend and volunteered to help. I then returned the favor by mentoring Brian and Thad on moose hunting when Brian drew a unit I knew the following season.
The penalty they received doesn't fit the crime. But if you truly were in the business for 30 years (I was too, but not for that long) you know that sometimes good citizens in the rest of their lives get caught up in wildlife greed. I still see it now enforcing fishing codes. Wrote a $400 ticket recently to a couple who are internationally honored university physics and mathematics professors because they couldn't stop fishing and keeping fish on a good day.
Jaquomo you are a "Fish Cop"!! Ha, never would have known!!
Amazing how many opinions are generated from people who know no facts. Mebbe you should all move to ferguson where facts dont matter and you can walk around self righteous and pissed off all the time.
They take care of each other- just like the good old boys & Girl club in Washington-disgusting. If I forgot to leave the balls on my bull after a legal kill with my NR $600.00 plus tag and $2000.00 into the local economy...... they will try to hang me! Not so sure about Colorado anymore.
Charlie, yes I am a Fish Cop among other things... What's funny is that people don't realize what sort of detail I can see through a 60x spotting scope. And the excuses they give are all very creative!
In my advanced age I tend to give more people the benefit of a doubt and a warning than I did earlier in life. I only issue fines if they are jerks or the offense is really egregious. My fishing buddy who just retired from CPW as a WCO says the same thing.
I am retired LE as well. I did my job every day based upon knowing the difference between letter of law and intent. What these guys did - or should have, made it easy to prosecute. Like I said, catch and release has diluted our value system to the point wondering why people do what they do is a waste of time. Money talks and the good old boy's taking care of one another has never gone away. For me - it has always come down to doing the right thing even when no one was around. I will always have that - and - I truly believe 90% of my fellow hunters do as well. I'll take that any day over what's hanging on my wall. These guys will never have that.
Dwitt, its called integrity and you sir have it.
If I were the landowner I would be filing a lawsuit against the guilty parties. Other than that it looks like a fair case, certainly the public humiliation is a part of the punishment, in my opinion it would be the worst.
Not sure the landowner can do anything other than trespassing. In most states the State owns the wildlife, not private landowners.
There is some sad irony in making a point that the “antler fevered” violator refused to have an article written about him and therefore must’ve done something wrong…
Plenty of big critters taken every year that most folks don't know about...
Hehaka, no irony there. He DID do something wrong. I assumed it was because he was humble, and knowing him I didn't suspect it had anything suspect involved. The bull was notable because it would have been one of the largest archery bulls ever taken in CO, and on "public land" OTC to boot.
I'm a bowhunting writer. Writing about notable animals is sometimes what we do.
Man. From to Facebook to tv and back the world is going to crap. Ferguson even popped up on here.
I think it's time to get lost in the hills and find ourselves.
