The system is rigged...

[LFC911]

Great legal hunt on some land-locked public land in WY, what is discouraging it the landowner, WY F&G and the WY Outfitter & Guide actions at the end.

 

[Teaman1]

Makes me wish people would collectively ignore Wyoming for a year or two. No preference points, licenses, nothing.
I know this will never happen and would make the pay hunters happy.
Outfitter welfare and actions like this being ignored are just ridiculous.

 

[Fireflyfishing]

I would prosecute to full extent of the law.

I like ranchers and have plenty of friends that are ranchers. I don’t care for ranchers that don’t follow the law in the best interest of their ranch. I don’t like when they lie about property boundaries which they do. I’m also not a fan of the idea “it’s landlocked, thus I basically own the land.” Tack on stealing….grrr. This vid frustrates me.

 

[LFC911]

It will be curious to see where the jury trial goes...my guess is the DA will take a plea deal and it will never go to trial.

 

[RockAndSage]

Not wanting to spend half an hour watching through the video - what's the short version?

 

[LFC911]

Not wanting to spend half an hour watching through the video - what's the short version?

3 hunters fly into land-locked public ground and tag 3 banger bulls in 2 days. Day 3 they're hauling out meat and one of the landowners gets caught stealing one of the hunters head. Hunters catch and confront him. No remorse, hunters report it. F&G determine they were done hunting, so it wasn't harassment but he did get charged with theft under $1k. There will be a jury trial in the summer. Landowner also sells hunts. WY guide association pressures F&G to review helicopter rules and want the pilot to be a licensed guide. F&G is going to review "loophole" in helicopter rules. I think that's how it went.

 

[Conrad101st]

I laugh when I hear the word loophole.
You either comply or you don’t.
Intent doesn’t mean squat if they don’t write laws correctly.

I had a professor getting pissed bc grad students (I was one) were maxing out the earned income credit payments in the mid 1990s and bragging about it. We just happened to earn right at the very best income level as graduate assistants to max the credit.

He said that was meant for poor people and I said yes and we are poor grad students. If congress didn’t want us to get it as students, they should have written it more carefully.

 

[Conrad101st]

I can think of them saying something akin that you can’t land helicopters on forest lands.

So the hunters jump out from a 3 foot hover, then sling load gear and meat out later and stabo out to a public road to exit.

 

[jesco88]

As a Wyoming native. This isn't shit. Everyone is surprised when people don't follow the law, but in a lot of areas of Wyoming the law is hours away and doesn't give a shit about stuff like this. So the people that live there decide to do their own thing. Just goes to show you that just because what you're doing is legal, doesn't mean its the smartest thing to do. You should really check things out ahead of time and try to give people a heads up. I don't think you should have to do that, but it certainly would go a long way.

 

[RockAndSage]

3 hunters fly into land-locked public ground and tag 3 banger bulls in 2 days. Day 3 they're hauling out meat and one of the landowners gets caught stealing one of the hunters head. Hunters catch and confront him. No remorse, hunters report it. F&G determine they were done hunting, so it wasn't harassment but he did get charged with theft under $1k. There will be a jury trial in the summer. Landowner also sells hunts. WY guide association pressures F&G to review helicopter rules and want the pilot to be a licensed guide. F&G is going to review "loophole" in helicopter rules. I think that's how it went.

Wow, that is a whole lot of BS in one incident. Thanks for the summary.

 

[Beendare]

Theft under $1000 is a joke. That should have been grand theft. A Quilty LO tag is $20000 in NM. A hunt for quality bull is $8k-$15k. How is that only $1,000? Ridiculous.

I hope they sock it to that Rancher to set a precedent. In this case the wardens went out of their way to protect the Rancher. Terrible.

 

[wardl_3]

Pretty disgusting on the landowner’s part. Glad the hunters had an awesome hunt as a whole!!

 

[BRTreedogs]

How is it not a game violation?

If I went into someone’s camp and took a head they would say it’s because I want to poach another non legal sex animal and put that person’s head with the meat.

But a big land owner takes it and it’s a ok because he has the warden over for dinner a few times per year?

 

[Bubblehide]

I think F&W opened a loophole when the determined and declared the hunters were no longer hunting, therefore F&W law does not apply.

 

[HairyScandinavian]

I think F&W opened a loophole when the determined and declared the hunters were no longer hunting, therefore F&W law does not apply.

One of the threads about a year ago a guy was packing out a meat and took a shortcut to the road across a small stretch of private. If I recall correctly he was charged with game/hunting related trespassing and he tried making the argument that he was only packing and not hunting but it didn't fly. I'll see if I can find the thread. Not sure what state it was though.

 

[resident vs nonresident]

They did a great job with that video. Really worth 30 mins. Amazing that’s it’s the same landowner who did exact same thing to another hunter year or two earlier? What a joke.
Only thing they could have improved on is their shooting which was poor. Even at the end then they have 2 heads stacked up you can see where antler was shot through

 

[RockAndSage]

One of the threads about a year ago a guy was packing out a meat and took a shortcut to the road across a small stretch of private. If I recall correctly he was charged with game/hunting related trespassing and he tried making the argument that he was only packing and not hunting but it didn't fly. I'll see if I can find the thread. Not sure what state it was though.

Pretty sure it was Idaho.

 

[DroptineNW]

Some petty ranchers damn

 

[Bearded Bowhunter]

LO will probably plea out if at all possible for less of a legal trail for the internet sleuths who will all be trying to fly into this same piece next year after watching this video and figuring out where this piece is.

I also have to think with Andrew as an Outdoor Life editor, this story will get quite a bit of attention and Wyo G&F might not love the attention on the explanations they gave or the actual potential precedents from this case.

 

[resident vs nonresident]

I do wonder what the cost of such heli ride is? May be cheaper than LO Tag
May need to research this .
I’d be flying in with multiple Cellular Trail Cams to set up on meat/antlers just in case