By Allen M. Jones, NewWest.Net Guest Writer, 8-31-09
I like to hunt, and I like to fish, and I like to do them in good
conscience. This means, first and foremost, that I do my best to obey
the rule of law, toe the line in the interests of, among other things,
preserving the resource. As a hunter and fisherman, I want people to
think well of me. I bristle at stereotypes, I wince at photos of 300
pound rednecks on ATVs proudly holding up forkhorns they shot under a
jacklight. Aware of the public relations disaster that is too often the
image of hunters viz the city folk, I dig it when the bad guys get
their comeuppance.
I should be pleased, then, to see a few more ne’er-do-wells taken off the playing field in Montana.
Charges were recently filed in state district court against James Reed
(Rexberg, Idaho), Blake Trangmoe (Glendive) and John Lewton
(Whitehall). Lewton received the majority of the charges, including
felony unlawful sale of a game animal, felony unlawful possession of a
game animal, two misdemeanor counts of hunting without landowner
permission, and a misdemeanor count of outfitting without a license.
Indeed, I should be pleased to see these guys caught. But…
Lewton and his buddies were arrested in an undercover sting operation
during which an agent for Montana’s Fish, Wildlife & Parks shot and
killed a bighorn sheep that scored over 204 points, Boone and Crockett.
A new state record. According to recently released court documents, the
undercover agent approached Lewton saying he had a bighorn sheep tag
for Hunting District 680 (Montana’s Missouri River Breaks). Lewton
scouted from an airplane on the agent’s behalf, used walkie-talkies
during the hunt (both potentially illegal activities for which he
wasn’t charged), and then, with the agent in tow, crossed private
ground without permission prior to showing the agent the animal. The
accused watched while the agent shot the sheep.
According to court documents, the investigation began in 2005, and was
seeded in the fact that Lewton was “with a number of bighorn sheep tag
holders in Montana during the last 10 to 15 years when they were
hunting for bighorn sheep.” His continued proximity presumably helped
arouse suspicion that he was outfitting without a license. The agent,
identified in court documents only as J. G., first approached Lewton on
July 29, 2008. Lewton specifically told J. G. he could not charge for
helping him as Lewton was not an outfitter. He went on to say that he
would be scouting and flying the area for another hunter, and could do
the same for J. G. for $1,000. By my reading of the court documents,
these are the only monies Lewton received prior to the shooting of the
sheep.
Again according to court documents, during the hunt the men passed
through a small piece of private property conspicuously marked no
trespassing. Lewton asked the agent if he minded trespassing and the
agent responded that he did not.
The first day of the hunt, agent J. G., shot at the ram and
purposefully missed. The next day, September 19, with radio guidance
by Lewton and his two companions, J. G. shot at the ram and
purposefully missed again. They pursued the ram further. The ram was
then “chased with two others into a steep-sided coulee.” According to
documents, “It was clear that J. G. must shoot the ram, which was now
in close proximity to the hunters, or reveal his true identity.”
After the hunt (in October), Lewton bought the ram from the agent for $5,000.
The prosecution, by my read, hinges on two elements. The first and
apparently least in question, that Lewton (and the investigating
officer) crossed private ground to reach the animal. The second, that
Lewton accepted $1,000 for scouting and flying the territory. It’s
questionable, to my mind, if this last constitutes “outfitting,” but he
apparently did accept payment. The crossing of private ground prior to
taking an animal, however, is illegal, which in turn would seem to make
the taking of the animal itself illegal, leading to the other charges
(unlawful possession, etc.) Given that the agent J. G. agreed to cross
the private ground, he participated in the crime.
The court documents do not address the tag itself, mentioning only that
the undercover agent approached Lewton saying he had a tag for district
680. Given that the chances of legitimately drawing a tag are miniscule
(typically under 2 percent), it seems likely that the agent was either
given a tag outside the traditional channels (depriving a Montana
hunter of his own tag) or was using a fraudulent tag.
I don’t know Lewton and his cohorts, nor am I privy to all the
circumstances behind the sting. (Jim Kropp, Chief of Law Enforcement
for the FWP, when approached for comment, didn’t feel, and quite
appropriately so, that it would be in good conscience to discuss the
matter pre-trial.) It may be that Lewton has a history of wrongdoing
such that the FWP wanted to prosecute him by any means possible – the
equivalent of sending Al Capone up on tax evasion. But even if there
are extenuating circumstances, as a sportsman in Montana, I find myself
offended. As a hunter and conservationist, and according to the
information I have available, I must say that the greatest wrongdoing
here wasn’t committed by the folks who are being charged.
Every year, a Montana “governor’s sheep permit” is sold at auction
during a banquet held by the Foundation for North American Wild Sheep.
The permit holder is given statewide access to Montana’s bighorns. The
funds generated by these auctions are earmarked for species
conservation and management. This tag, given the quality of Montana’s
trophy sheep hunting, regularly goes for more than $200,000. These are
monies that benefit the animals, not to mention the thousands of
Montana hunters who annually apply by lottery for their own sheep tag,
rolling the dice for a chance at one of these huge rams. The governor’s
permit for this coming fall sold for $245,000. If this year’s permit
holder kills a ram that exceeds 190 points he will no doubt consider
himself lucky indeed. And a 200 point ram? Among avid sheephunters,
this is the equivalent of a four minute mile. It’s like winning a big
election, it’s like playing the slots in Vegas and seeing the machine
come up sevens. The sirens go off, the balloons come down.
To remove the emotional element (I won’t talk about the hordes of local
hunters who would have given a pinky toe for even a chance at this
animal), and just by crass calculation, this sting operation cost the
state of Montana, and by extension our population of bighorn sheep,
tens and perhaps hundreds of thousands of dollars. Given the money that
goes into these auctioned permits, the sheep in any given area are
typically scouted well before hand. The largest rams are usually known
by nickname. Photos of the rams often circulate at FNAWS (Foundation
for Northern American Wild Sheep), helping drive up the price of the
governor’s tag at auction. If it was known that a new state record was
in a given area, the tag would certainly be worth an additional . . .
what, twenty-five thousand dollars? Fifty thousand? Perhaps more.
Not to diminish the crimes of Lewton and his buddies (if guilty, they
should certainly be prosecuted), but by intentionally removing a
significant amount of money from the state’s conservation coffers, I
would argue that Montana’s FWP has stepped outside its own charter, has
contradicted its own raison d’etre. They are an agency who “provides
for the stewardship of the fish, wildlife, parks, and recreational
resources of Montana.” By taking the largest ram from a population that
has added millions of dollars to regional conservation based only on
its reputation for large rams, it doesn’t seem unreasonable to assume
they have damaged the state’s ability to manage its population of
bighorn sheep. It’s hard to see how this falls under the aegis of
“stewardship.” Any crimes committed or potentially committed by the guy
from Whitehall would have to be serious indeed to warrant this kind of
draconian enforcement.
Furthermore, I’ve always been vaguely uncomfortable with certain
aspects of Montana’s undercover sting operations. On one side, there
are those stings wherein game wardens place a dummy (often animatronic)
game animal next to a road and then watch to see who pulls over and
shoots it. It’s the equivalent of a speed trap, and nicely sifts the
bad minnows from our pond. But too often the agents participate in the
crime itself, as they did in this case. Soliciting potential criminals,
creating a scenario such that the suspect is actively encouraged to
commit a crime (allowing peer influence and cajoling to come into play,
which surely rigs the board a bit), and then the undercover agent
himself pulls the trigger, playing out the scenario to a believable
(if, to my mind, immoral) end. I would use the word entrapment, but I’m
not sure the courts would agree. Instead, I’ll just make the point that
the issue is one of moral authority, and the lack of it. This might
sound like a small point, but I consider it significant indeed. You
have caught a criminal, but at what cost?
Consider: Implicit within this sheep scenario is the notion that the
field agent is, himself, beyond the law. If I work for the Fish,
Wildlife & Parks, I can apparently commit any fish and game crime I
want so long as I’m doing it in order to position someone else for
prosecution. I’ll commit a greater crime (taking an illegal ram) and
then charge you for a lesser crime. No one should be above the law. No
one should be beyond a certain kind of accountability.
But the most troublesome aspect of this scenario isn’t the financial
loss, nor is it necessarily the specific wrongdoing committed by agent
J. G., it’s the fact that a law enforcement agency ostensibly acting on
my behalf has, to my mind, betrayed my trust. Members of law
enforcement (whether FBI, state patrolmen, city cops, sheriffs, or game
wardens), insofar as they are representatives of the people, insofar as
they are acting not in their own interests but in ours (they are our
agents), have an obligation toward a higher standard of behavior.
Indeed, it’s a sacred duty. I need to know that the people who are
acting with the authority of my republic are worthy of that authority.
When a field agent illegally and without repercussion kills a noble
animal of demonstrable value to the state, what does this say about
him? What does it say about his agency?
Consider this opinion piece a call for an investigation. Either
Montana’s Fish, Wildlife & Parks needs to do some serious soul
searching and rearranging of its law enforcement methods or the state
Attorney General needs to do it for them. As a sportsman, as a Montana
landowner and tax payer, as the public for whom these people work, I
need to have my faith in Montana’s FWP restored.
Allen M. Jones is the author of, among other books, A Quiet Place of Violence: Hunting and Ethics in the Missouri River Breaks.
This piece originally appeared at NewWest.Net, a magazine for and about the Rocky Mountain West that specializes in covering growth, politics, the outdoors and the culture of the region.
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