They say old habits die hard and one Wyoming man is doing his best to prove the sentiment of that statement true.
Each year the Wyoming Game and Fish Department publishes a law enforcement report which serves to inform the public regarding the details of the previous year’s most outlandish crimes. One story titled “Drunk Driver Arrested For Poaching” certainly lived up to the expectations of such a report, unraveling exactly like anyone would expect.
The story begins via a game warden’s account of coming across a man noted to be “unconscious/sleeping in the truck with a deer carcass in the bed along a highway east of Edgerton.” It was January 2022 when the warden encountered the vehicle along the side of the road and noticed both the ‘exhausted’ driver and the deceased mule deer buck accompanying him in the back.
Noticing the driver’s condition, the warden put a call in to the Natrona County Sheriff’s Office under suspicion of alcohol use while operating a motor vehicle. Upon arrival at the scene, a sheriff’s deputy placed the man under arrest on a DUI charge.
The story goes on to dig into the history of the accused drunk driver and reveals that the man had a long history of drinking and driving. The report stated that “the suspect had a history of DUI charges and as a result had a felony conviction,” and “was charged with another felony DUI, as well as with being a felon in possession of a firearm.”
Having booked the suspect on criminal charges, it was now up to wardens at the Game and Fish Department to tackle the issue of the dead buck. According to the report, wardens determined that the large buck was shot illegally out of season. They also found that in addition to previous DUI charges, the accused was also no stranger to wildlife violations.
It was found that the suspect had pending wildlife violations in four different counties across the state. In one incident in Johnson County, he was charged with killing five bull elk and two mule deer bucks in 2021 and 2022. Court rulings later found him guilty of the charges, costing him his hunting and fishing privileges for a total of 55 years, plus $8,000 worth of fines and $28,000 in restitution. He was also sentenced to one year in jail.
The unfortunate reality is that, despite all of the fines, restitution and suspensions, it did very little to deter him from offending again. Stories like these and others like it continue to raise the question of the efficacy of these laws, penalties and consequences.
With the suspect still under investigation for violations in three other Wyoming counties, along with his pending DUI charge, it appears that they will do very little to deter him from offending again in the future.
