Conservation Law Enforcement Corner – July 2024

The Conservation LE Corner is designed to highlight the efforts of Georgia DNR Law Enforcement Division (LED) officers who, among their many duties, protect Georgia’s wildlife, sportsmen and natural resources from game-law violators.

Ware County: Around lunchtime on Oct. 15, 2022, Cpl. Sam Williams received a phone call from Sgt. Jason Shipes instructing him to meet Sgt. Shipes and Game Warden Erin McClellan on Jordan Ford Road in Ware County. Sgt. Shipes stated that someone had just checked in a bear at the Fargo check station and that it was possibly killed over bait. He said the subject was leading them back to the hunting location.

Once everyone arrived to Jordan Ford Road, the officers followed the subject to a hunting club. He led officers to a location inside the club where an elevated box stand was located along a roadway. The hunter initially stated that he had been hog hunting at this location and a bear appeared, and he shot it instead of a hog.

“I observed corn scattered down the roadway at that location,” Cpl. Williams wrote in the incident report. “GW McClellan inspected the box stand located there and discovered that the wooden steps on the ladder were rotten, and when the doorway was opened, undisturbed spiderwebs were observed inside the stand.”

The hunter, a 72-year-old from Orlando, then admitted to Sgt. Shipes that the actual stand was farther down the roadway, and that there was bear bait at that location similar to a recipe for “bear crack” that Sgt. Shipes had observed written down on a note possessed by the hunter.

At the second location, the officers observed a tripod stand located approximately 15 to 20 yards from bear bait dumped on the ground that consisted of corn, oats and additional flavorings and sticky substances. Approximately 25 to 30 yards from the stand was a small plastic drum attached to a tree that also contained a mixture of corn and oats. Blood was located near the bait, and the hunter stated that this was the location where he had been bear hunting.

GW McClellan also found a 30-06 shell casing underneath the stand that matched the other 30-06 cartridges the hunter had in his rifle.

“I asked how long he had lived in Florida, and he stated since 1975,” Cpl. Williams said. “As I ran his information, I noticed that he had been charged in 2015 as a non-resident hunting with a resident hunting license. ”

As the officer looked closer at the hunter’s current license, he saw that he was again using a Georgia resident hunting license while still a resident of Orlando, Fla. Cpl. Williams determined that at one time the hunter obtained a Georgia Identification Card, giving the appearance that he was a Georgia resident, and he fraudulently obtained a Senior Lifetime Sportsman License. After receiving a citation in 2015 just months after he obtained the fraudulent license, the hunter’s history in Georgia’s license system showed that he purchased the appropriate out-of-state licenses until the fall of 2021.

Officers received consent to look at photographs of his bear kill, and they discovered a photograph of a 7-point buck the hunter said he killed with a crossbow earlier that week. Officers also found a photo of a spike buck killed the day before the 7-pointer.

“Although the wound in the photograph appeared to be from a rifle, (the hunter) was adamant that he had taken the deer with his crossbow,” Cpl. Williams said.

The hunter said the meat from the buck was in a cooler at the hunting camp, but when officers arrived at the camp, the cooler and the rack were not there. After initially blaming the missing meat on other hunters at the camp, the man finally admitted to calling someone as they were headed to the camp. That man was contacted and brought the cooler of meat and antlers back to the camp.

For the photographic evidence of hunting bear on Oct. 8, the hunter received written warnings for Non-resident Hunting With a Resident License and Hunting Big Game Over Bait. For the spike buck killed Oct. 10 and 7-pointer killed Oct. 11, he received citations for Non-resident Hunting With a Resident License and written warnings for failure to record the harvests.

For the bear that was killed on Oct. 14, he received citations for Non-resident Hunting With a Resident License and Hunting Big Game Over Bait.