Not your football team, you SOB's
Two southern Ohio men have been convicted of the illegal taking of white-tailed deer and ordered to pay $12,988 in restitution in the first such white-tailed deer case processed under a new law, the Ohio Division of Wildlife said.
Cory A. Posey, 19, of South Salem, pleaded guilty to charges of taking a deer with a rifle, deterring an officer, taking a deer after hours and taking more than one buck in a license year.
Appearing before Chillicothe Municipal Judge Thomas E. Bunch, Posey was sentenced in Ross County to $100 in fines, additional court costs and $6,494 in restitution.
Posey also was ordered to serve 200 hours of community service, five years of community control and his hunting privileges were suspended for five years.
Kyle E. Kruger, 20, of Washington Court House, pleaded guilty to charges of spotlighting, deterring an officer and aiding an individual in the unlawful taking of a wild animal. He also was ordered to pay $100 in fines, additional court costs and $6,494 in restitution, and is to serve 200 hours of community service, will be subject to five years of community control and his hunting privileges were suspended for five years.
The two men were arrested in the early hours of Nov. 1 by state wildlife officers investigating reports of deer poaching in the rural county, according to Tom Donnelly, law enforcement supervisor for Ohio Wildlife District 4 at Athens.
A state wildlife law enforcement team fanned out after dark to check on reports of spotlighting by vehicles. Ken Cutright, a District 4 wildlife investigator, and Bob Nelson, state wildlife officer in Ross County, made the arrests after confronting two individuals in a remote farm field.
The men initially claimed they had been hunting coyotes.
The arresting agents were assisted by Kandy Klosterman, state wildlife investigator in Wildlife District 1, Columbus; Dave Lane, a District 1 field supervisor, and Bill Bullard, state wildlife officer in Licking County, Roy Rucker, wildlife officer in Fayette County, and Chris Rice, wildlife officer in Union County.
Cutright said the buck the men killed was a trophy-class animal that gross-scored 1867/8 inches. "It was a dandy deer."
The buck's antlers had very heavy main beams and at least 12 major tines or points.
In addition to fines, restitution, license suspension and community service, the deer, firearms and all other equipment used in the illegal activities were ordered forfeited.
All venison was forfeited and will be donated to a local food pantry.
The new law went into effect March, 2008, and allows the Ohio Division of Wildlife to seek an increased recovery value on all illegally harvested wildlife.
It updated outdated restitution values, which did not fairly reflect the current worth of various species.
That is especially so with very large whitetail antlers, which may command thousands of dollars on the trophy market.
The recovery value for individual white-tailed deer is derived from the formula listed in the Ohio Revised Code.
The dollar amount is determined by measuring the antlers and using the formula, and adding a base wildlife value.
The formula for deer applies to all bucks which have an antler value with a gross score exceeding 125 Boone and Crockett (B&C) inches. The buck in the Posey-Kruger case was valued at $12,988.
Way to go Ohio
