you are driving home one night in march when you see a women stopped on the side of the road, you stop to offer help and find out that she has hit a deer, you go back a couple of hundred yards and find the deer with the aid of your headlights, it has been run over/hit in the hind quarter area, it is trying to get up and flee but is so broken up nothing is working very well, at one point the deer is dragging itself with nothing but its front legs. myself i would put the deer out of its misery, just wondering what everbody else approach to this would be, by the way i have done this, i have also freed deer from fences, and rescued injured fawns during haying times, sometimes things happen beyond our control, but when you can do something about it what do you do? BTW i think what i do is the right thing

I opted for the knife to put the deer down, nice and quiet. I know some people will say a deer will kick your a$$ if you try to get close enough with a knife but I have done it and it works, caution must be used though. I also voted for try to get a date with the women, in any circumstance thisis a goodidea.....unless the wife is riding in vehicle with you.

I opted for the authorities and game warden, although I don't know how long I would be able to watch it suffer without trying to do something.

Well, the law in Illinois requires you to report the incident, and the deer belongs to the person who hit it. In a perfect world, you could cell phone the game warden and he would dash up to the scene in minutes to dispatch it.
More than likely, it will take much more time for anyone to arrive. You have to also consider that in some counties, multiple incidents like this occur on almost a nightly basis. So, getting anyone other than a bored police deputy out there that evening might be a problem as well. However, I would make a reasonable effort to contact a game warden and get them out there. And by the time he arrives, the deer is out of its misery and my tire iron is back behind my truck seat. And the next day, the lady and I are grilling backstrap and sipping red wine....

Well, then you just broke the law in Illinois. You can not put down a deer injured by a vehicle.

Now, even though it is "Illegal", and you could be fined, isn't it the right thing to do?

Technically, I think that it would be illegal for even a police officer to dispath the deer without explicit approval from a wildlife official, but it happens....and for the exact reason you described.

To be quite frank, this happens constantly. My local newspaper now includes a special section just to report deer accidents. As this becomes more and more of a problem, i would assume that wildlife officials may be assuming a much less stringent policy on this. So, I think we have again ventured into the gray area that I am sure others will soon be arguing does not exist.

I would put the deer down by the quickest and safest means available and the call both the highway patrol and the game warden. If that meant shooting the animal after legal hunting hours then so be it and I would take the punishment (if any) that the authorities saw fit to dish out. I know that those of you on the radical fringe will call me a poacher, but whatever. I was raised to do what is right and if you believe that letting an animal whose fate is sealed lie suffering on the side of the road is right so that you do not break the law...well then your opinion of me is not really going to factor into how I determine my self-worth. It is probably a moot point anyway as I don't make a habit of carrying a gun unless I am hunting. Just my take.

Merry Christmas to all and hunt safe and good luck.

Yep! That's the way it's here in FL! If the cop were to pull and shoot his gun while on duty, he will have a 6 page report on it.

All the officer does is call the conservation police dispatcher and inform them. But, my point was, and is, that sometime doing the "right" thing, leaving the animal to suffer, is not the right thing to do.

What does she look like?