https://www.kamloopsthisweek.c...-california-bighorn/


Link has photo of the three ram skulls and horns.



Woman fined $2,000 for poaching California bighorn

By Cam Fortems - January 11, 2017


A First Nations woman has pleaded guilty to shooting a California bighorn sheep — one of three she hunted — and leaving most of its meat behind.

Marlene Kato was sentenced yesterday in provincial court under the Wildlife Act for failing to remove edible portions of a carcass. The law is in place to ensure hunters kill for more than a trophy rack or horns.

Crown prosecutor Joel Gold said on Nov. 9, 2014, conservation officers found two of the three dead rams within 10 metres of a logging road in an area north of Kamloops Lake while the third was about 500 metres away on a slope.

They had been killed the previous day. While meat was removed from two of the animals, most of the meat from the third ram was left on the hillside.

Kato, a member of the Ashcroft Indian Band who works at Overlander Residential Care, was originally charged with three counts of failing to remove edible portions of a carcass, but two of the counts were dropped in return for her pleading guilty to the single charge. She was accompanied by her husband and daughter at the time of the hunt.

Judge Chris Cleaveley sentenced Kato to a $2,000 fine. All but $100 of that amount will go to the B.C. Habitat Conservation Trust Fund. As part of the deal, she forfeited her right to trophy parts — the cape and the skull and horns.

Outside court, conservation officer Kevin Van Damme said the shooting of the three rams is a concern to local First Nations because sustenance hunting should be done for food, rather than profit. Parts harvested from bighorn sheep can fetch as much as $20,000 on the open market.

The law allows aboriginal hunting for food.

“We commonly see that with aboriginal people with moose and deer and elk. We don’t see a lot of sustenance hunting for sheep,” Van Damme said, noting it does occur.


Kato did bring the head and horns to ministry officials for identification and reporting. They were seized.

Van Damme said Tk’emlups and Skeetchestn Indian bands both manage bighorn sheep populations and typically require their members to obtain a permit before hunting for sheep.

“In speaking with chief and council . . . there was no support for this hunt.”

Non-aboriginal hunters can apply in a lottery for the right to harvest bighorn sheep. The odds of winning a tag are in the order of 1-1,000.

“You can apply for a lifetime and not get a draw,” Van Damme said.

Hunting bighorn sheep at that time of year and area is also not considered sport because the animals are not wary of people and will wander beside busy roads and highways.

California bighorn sheep are considered an at-risk species in B.C.

The headline is a bit misleading but good to the government taking action on this.

A $2000 fine for poaching 3 sheep. That is a joke.

quote:

Originally posted by snowman:
A $2000 fine for poaching 3 sheep. That is a joke.

A not very funny one.

typical Indian bullshit, but they love the land and revere the animals . Should have been 30K a piece !

That'll cut into her cheap beer budget!

No where near stiff enough a penalty. Their disregard for wildlife is to get back at the white man.....and twilli can confirm that I bet. I've been in MT every year since 2005....pretty obvious that most of what they do is driven by same.

quote:

Originally posted by sheephunterab:
The headline is a bit misleading but good to the government taking action on this.

Question is, how high in the court system will this go and will she win in the end ? Canadian courts are not known to be wildlife friendly, when it comes to Natives. Of course, in the end, we'll be paying the lawyer bills.

Grizz

I hoping because she doesn't have the support of the band that it ends here. Kind of a precedent setting case really.