St. Maries Idaho man convicted of multiple wildlife and other violations.

[westbranch]

I also had the same reaction when I read this. I lived in St Maries for a couple of years in the eighties. Twenty-three years of "investigating" complaints? More like twenty-three years of ignoring them. I won't be singing the praises of local law enforcement if it took them that long to shut him down. Hauling a poached goat across state lines undoubtedly got the feds involved and they lit a fire under local LE that couldn't be ignored any longer.

One morning I introduced a new chapter to my ninth grade St Maries HS students, "Today we start the unit on ecology." Danny jumps to his feet at the back of the room: "I ain't putting up with that! My dad says them damn ecologists are communists!" Hmmm. Okay, what's a communist? After a moment Danny responds, "An ecologist." His dad died in a logging accident earlier in the year so there was no point debating further. I sent Danny to the office and let the principle try to reason with him. Didn't work. That kid really had a lot of promise as a wrestler but after his dad died he easily slid between the cracks in that community. Very sad.

Again, it wasn't hard to find where this poacher lives. A real estate ad with 39 photos revealed a three story rustic style home full of shoulder mounts and a large shop (containing classic Mercedes) with stocked trout pond out front (one photo of him dumping a bucket of fish into the lake). Coward is apparently doing well for himself. The stiff fine was appropriate. His broken up jail sentence allows for some "unintentional" sloppiness in enforcing it. I hope someone keeps an eye on local LE to make sure he does his time.

It seems like you should be able to understand how difficult it would be to build up a case when you are familiar with the locals views. The CO for that area is covering 948 sq miles, others nearby are covering similar areas. I was at a F&G meeting this past year and there was a brief overview of the enforcement division. I don't recall the exact numbers but there are only a handful of investigators covering the state and they travel to assist on different violations. On top of hunting and fishing COs need to cover other outdoor recreation enforcement. I met the CO covering the St Maries area at a educational event last spring for elementary students. My understanding is that they end up supporting local LE more than local LE supports them. I have 5 different CO cell #s saved in my phone for the areas I frequent and send them coordinates and pics of shady activity when I find it. I can't imagine how much time they spend sorting through the tips they get.

It seems common that people in rural areas that are otherwise supportive of LE are anti CO/Game Wardens. This was also my experience while growing up and living in different areas of rural MN before moving to Idaho so it wasn't too surprising. Not too hard to find memes about game wardens or "fish cops" on hunting social media.

In a recent BHA podcast Hal Herring interviewed Tony Latham a retired game warden from Idaho that did a lot of undercover work. Huge numbers of elk, moose and deer killed by some of these poachers. Also talked about overhearing some hunters discuss murdering him while he was in the backcountry. I don't remember the exact quote, but one of the guys was a local teacher and he confronted him about what he said. A good listen:

BHA Podcast & Blast, Ep. 117: Undercover Game Warden Tony Latham

Backcountry Hunters & Anglers is the voice for our wild public lands, waters and wildlife.

www.backcountryhunters.org

 

[44hunter45]

I never imaged this would turn into a LEO bashing thread. If it keeps going that way, I'll drop some F bombs at the obvious suspects and ask the admins to lock it down myself.

My wife is a local educator who deals with kids who have lost their parents. It tears her soul. Using a bereaved and at-risk kid to make a point is just plain chickenshit no matter where you live.

Some of you seem to think that IDFG Conservation Officers are less than qualified. That is utter bullshit. It has no place here.

Clean this up or go to a different thread.

 

[westbranch]

They keep New Mexicans from getting disappeared by the locals.

Damn straight. It is not worth trying to explain to NRs how big this is in GMUs 5 & 6. Half the hunters have tribal rights and the rest have 5'x8' Gasden flags mounted on their F350 trucks.

Other than the Claude Dallas murder of two CO's in Owyhee County decades ago, the only other IDFG CO being shot at THAT I KNOW ABOUT happened in GMU 5.
Others may know better than I.

St. Maries is the County Seat of Benewah County, It straddles the GMU 5/6 boundary. East of St. Maries, in Unit 6 is Shoshone County, whose County Attorney prosecuted this case.
Judge Wayman is from CDA, but sits on the ID Region 1 District bench.

I was scouting spring bears in GMU 6 in 2021 and was "contacted" by a SxS full of local boys letting me know I was not welcome.

For the unaware- there are actually those who keep proposing that IDFG designate anyone who does not live in a GMU to be a "Non-Resident Hunter"

Apologies to @westbranch - I did not see you had posted this news release a few days ago.

ID Poaching Case

Just saw this: https://idfg.idaho.gov/press/st-maries-man-sentenced-months-jail-thousands-fines-and-decade-long-hunting-ban-poaching Based on some searching it looks like this guy was involved in a moose poaching case back to 1992 and illegal trapping in 2015. Looks like this guy was heavily...

www.hunttalk.com

I am kind of surprised I haven't had something like this happen as I end up covering quite a bit of ground from spring to fall. Most people I talk to while out in the woods are friendlier than I would expect them to be. Not that they share info, but we usually talk about our general plans and how we will try to mess up each others hunts. The biggest A-Holes I have ran into during archery elk season had ND and MN plates. And they still weren't too bad.


Some more recent local news:

Manslaughter suspect's home goes up in flames

The home of a Calder man burned to the ground Monday morning as he sat in the Shoshone County Jail for criminal charges including vehicular manslaughter.

shoshonenewspress.com

 

[BucksnDucks]

Twenty.three.years. of complaints? And just now jailed? Just what do game officers do in Idaho?

David
NM

What exactly does everyone think 23 years of complaints mean? This could be anything from one complaint twenty-three years ago with a handful of vague reports since.

 

[OntarioHunter]

I never imaged this would turn into a LEO bashing thread. If it keeps going that way, I'll drop some F bombs at the obvious suspects and ask the admins to lock it down myself.

My wife is a local educator who deals with kids who have lost their parents. It tears her soul. Using a bereaved and at-risk kid to make a point is just plain chickenshit no matter where you live.

Some of you seem to think that IDFG Conservation Officers are less than qualified. That is utter bullshit. It has no place here.

Clean this up or go to a different thread.

You apparently missed the context. Danny was intent on making a disturbance in my class. Students go to the office for that. I asked him what was his concept of ecology which was a legitimate question. Not mocking him. And I certainly didn't want to debate his late father's values. He didn't have the foggiest idea, but refused to be a part of the class anyway. So I simply sent him to the office. I thought I made it clear enough in my post that I had nothing but compassion for this former wrestler that I coached. Nice job twisting the context. And unless you have lived in that neck of the woods, I doubt you can understand the context. I am surprised a teacher in St Maries would be making death threats to a game warden. When I taught there teachers and other "educated" local professionals were, generally speaking, almost an isolated island socially. I bridged the gap somewhat because besides being "educated" I was from another logging community in nearby NW Montana, a disabled veteran, accomplished outdoorsman, coach, and former policeman. Still, it was a difficult place to live. Two local cops literally boasted to me they were neo-Nazis. And I made it politely yet clear enough to them that I was NOT cut from that cloth.

 

[44hunter45]

You apparently missed the context. Danny was intent on making a disturbance in my class. Students go to the office for that. I asked him what was his concept of ecology which was a legitimate question. Not mocking him. And I certainly didn't want to debate his late father's values. He didn't have the foggiest idea, but refused to be a part of the class anyway. So I simply sent him to the office. I thought I made it clear enough in my post that I had nothing but compassion for this former wrestler that I coached. Nice job twisting the context. And unless you have lived in that neck of the woods, I doubt you can understand the context. I am surprised a teacher in St Maries would be making death threats to a game warden. When I taught there teachers and other "educated" local professionals were, generally speaking, almost an isolated island socially. I bridged the gap somewhat because besides being "educated" I was from another logging community in nearby NW Montana, a disabled veteran, accomplished outdoorsman, coach, and former policeman. Still, it was a difficult place to live. Two local cops literally boasted to me they were neo-Natzis. And I made it politely yet clear enough to them that I was NOT cut from that cloth.

Where is it you think I live that I don't get this? Did you read any of the cultural context presented in the thread?

Who said you mocked a student? I said it is chickenshit to use one to make a point. But here you are still trying to defend yourself.

Where did anyone say that a teacher from St. Maries had threatened a CO. No one.

Context does matter.

Is a neo-Natzi something you have in Ontario? Did you mean neo-NAZI? You being "educated" and all, I didn't want to assume your meaning.

 

[Hunting Wife]

 

[OntarioHunter]

Where is it you think I live that I don't get this? Did you read any of the cultural context presented in the thread?

Who said you mocked a student? I said it is chickenshit to use one to make a point. But here you are still trying to defend yourself.

Where did anyone say that a teacher from St. Maries had threatened a CO. No one.

Context does matter.

Is a neo-Natzi something you have in Ontario? Did you mean neo-NAZI? You being "educated" and all, I didn't want to assume your meaning.

The typo was corrected while you were typing your post. Silly.

The point being that the concept of ecology being equated with violent overthrow of America was expressed by a student misinformed by his parent. Not surprising in that community, at that time anyway. The boy's father had been deceased almost a year by then. I was sensitive enough to not debate the definition of ecology with Danny. The principle simply kept him in the office for the rest of the week till the unit was finished. No big deal. Important to do what we could to keep Danny in school. Things were a mess for him at home.

Read the other above posts and you'll see the reference to an Idaho teacher making death threats to a game warden.

 

[BackofBeyond]

People will find this hyperbolic. If you know, you know. The 5 northernmost counties are so unique, it's almost unfathomable. The Three S's existed up there, long before wolves and bears made their respective comebacks.

And in Shoshone county there’s plenty of abandoned air shafts… we don’t even have to do the middle S if we really don’t want to.

 

[44hunter45]

Read the other above posts and you'll see the reference to an Idaho teacher making death threats to a game warden.

You must mean the Hal Herring & Tony Latham podcast? I guess you missed the part where that story was about a shop teacher in Lemhi County. Not St. Maries.
I'm betting you didn't listen to it. You just shoot from the hip.

Like you said - Context matters.

I'm done beating this horse now. I have recovered my emotional intelligence.

 

[OntarioHunter]

You must mean the Hal Herring & Tony Latham podcast? I guess you missed the part where that story was about a shop teacher in Lemhi County. Not St. Maries.
I'm betting you didn't listen to it. You just shoot from the hip.

Like you said - Context matters.

I'm done beating this horse now. I have recovered my emotional intelligence.

You're right. I didn't watch the video. Sound board is out on my computer. A shop teacher from Salmon or Leadore, eh. The context of the post gave the impression he was a St Maries teacher. My mistake.

 

[flatcoat]

Watching the 'Foundation For Wildlife Management' guy scrub Coward form all of their social media over the years has been pretty hilarious.

 

[44hunter45]

Watching the 'Foundation For Wildlife Management' guy scrub Coward form all of their social media over the years has been pretty hilarious.

Even funnier is the USB drive with all that stuff I would be handing over to my CO if I were that guy.

 

[Mallardsx2]

Is this the same guy?