more.....Officials: Big buck is record

April 6, 1999



































































BY ERIC SHARP
Free Press Outdoors Writer




HOUGHTON LAKE -- Mitch Rompola's whitetail deer, which has raised controversy and fueled debate for months, definitely is a world record, says a Commemorative Bucks of Michigan official who has measured the deer.


Three measurers from Commemorative Bucks of Michigan gave the deer a score of 216 5/8 -- two inches smaller than Rompola announced previously, but still a record.


Scores and records are based on antler size. Numerous measurements are taken of the rack, and deductions are made for imperfections.


"There's absolutely no doubt in my mind that it's 100 percent authentic. I saw the antlers attached to the skull plate, and there's no question that it's exactly what he said it is -- a real deer," said Gary Berger of Houghton Lake, who is also a measurer for Boone & Crockett, the national trophy measuring club.


Berger said the deer, which Rompola killed with a bow and arrow Nov. 13 in Grand Traverse County, was panel scored on March 25 by Berger, Lee Holbrook of Boyne Falls, who is also a measurer for Pope & Young, the national organization that records archery-killed deer, and Al Brown of Kalkaska, a measurer for Commemorative Bucks of Michigan.


"It scored 216 5/8 net and grossed 220 6/8. It's an almost perfect 12-point. There were no abnormal points, and there were only 4 1/8 in deductions (for lack of symmetry)," Berger said. "The scoring was videotaped, and it took us 2 hours, 20 minutes.... We went over everything several times to make sure we were as close as possible to perfect."


Berger said that he, Holbrook and Brown all signed the score sheet and left it with Rompola, "but what he's going to do with it now I don't know. I'm going to send a notification to Boone & Crockett (as required by club rules), but whether Mitch is ever going to enter it in their books or anywhere, I have no idea."


The score from the Michigan measurers means that the deer still measures three inches bigger than the 213 5/8 world record buck that Milo Hanson killed in Biggar, Saskatchewan, in 1993.


Rompola killed the deer in an area not known for producing trophy bucks. His secretiveness and contradictory statements then raised controversy and suspicion.


At one point, Rompola announced that the deer had been scored secretly by four measurers, but he refused to identify them and said they did not sign the score sheets. He also refused to show the rack publicly.


Rompola said the first measurement produced a net score of 218 5/8 and a gross score of 223 5/8. Berger said he did not know whether the slightly lower score his group came up with was the product of further shrinkage of the rack since the first scoring or a more careful measurement.


"I think it was scored by four people earlier, but there were no official score sheets. But all three of us signed our sheets, and although there might be a little more shrinkage, I think that our measurement is going to stand up," Berger said.


Every three years, Boone & Crockett holds a panel scoring in which expert measurers carefully score the 10 biggest racks taken since the last panel scoring.


Until the next panel scoring in 2001, Hanson's deer will remain the official world record, but Berger said he didn't know whether Rompola would submit the deer for scoring then.


"I know that 99.9 percent of the other hunters in the world would enter it, but with Mitch, you can't tell. He is extremely suspicious. I told him that he has a lot of people out there who support him and believe in him, but he said that all he ever hears is the bad stuff from people who don't," Berger said.