A misaligned Michigan woman faced criminal charges after she removed four deer fawns from the wild with the intention of turning them into domestic pets.
The incident was brought to the attention of the Michigan Department of Natural Resources when the woman placed a call to the department informing them she had found a fawn without its mother. Naturally, the officer advised the woman to immediately place the animal back where she had found it, informing her that mother deer will often leave their fawns in safe locations, so as to not draw the attention of predators.
When wildlife officers finally tracker her down, she was without the fawn in question and it was later uncovered that she had actually given the animal to a family friend. No less than a week later, the woman took to the woods once again, this time removing a set of triplet fawns, which she also gave away to friends.
Last week, Michigan DNR officers released a number of images from the woman’s Facebook account, depicting the fawns roaming around the inside of her home along with a selfie she snapped with one of the fawns.
What followed was a rash of profane retaliations from the woman as friends and family on the social network began to express concern for the animals.
“Montcalm DNR is a piece of (expletive). … “Any animal I see from today until the day I finally (expletive) die I’m going to kill. Snapping necks (expletive). #orangeisthenewblack”
“Charged for having four deer … Haha Where’s the fourth stupid? Yall are a God damn joke. Don’t do your job in the first place then write people up. … Haha have fun with all the paperwork … And yall can take my hunting rights I don’t give a (expletive)! I don’t hunt anyways you dumb(expletive).”
The accused, Karen Hofstetter of Montcalm County was eventually charged with four misdemeanor tickets – one for each of the animals. The prosecutor handling the case, however, combined the charges into a single count resulting in only a $575 fine.
As for the four fawns, one was released back into an area from which it was removed, and was not seen again. The other three fawns were transported to a wildlife rehabilitation facility, where one of the animals died during transport.
The remaining two fawns will be rehabilitated and hopefully released back into the wild when they are mature.
H/T: MLive
