As a man learned the hard way, passing out drunk with a poached Wyoming mule deer in your truck isn’t a good idea.
It’s a particularly bad idea if you already have a string of prior DUI and poaching violations under your belt.
The man’s fortunes took a turn from already terrible to pretty much done for when a Wyoming Game and Fish game warden came across him “unconscious/sleeping in the truck with a deer carcass in the bed along a highway east of Edgerton.”
That’s according to the agency’s recently released 2022 law enforcement report, which doesn’t name the suspect.
Felony DUI
The report includes summaries of some of the agency’s unusual cases from last year.
According to the entry titled “Drunk Driver Arrested For Poaching,” an east Casper game warden came across the truck parked along the highway in January 2022. The warden noticed “a large buck mule deer in the bed of the truck.”
After seeing that the driver was unconscious in the cab, the warden called the Natrona County’s Sheriff’s Office. A deputy arrived and arrested the driver on a DUI charge.
Things got worse from there, according to the report.
“The suspect had a history of DUI charges and as a result had a felony conviction,” the report says. “He was charged with another felony DUI, as well as with being a felon in possession of a firearm.”
… And How About That Deer?
Then it was the game warden’s turn.
The warden determined that the suspect had “shot and killed the mule deer buck out of season,” according to the report.
Further digging revealed that the suspect had pending wildlife violations in four Wyoming counties. In just one, Johnson County, he was charged with killing five bull elk in two mule deer bucks in 2021 and 2022.
The Johnson County court found him guilty, resulted in the man losing his hunting and fishing privileges for 55 years and slapped with $8,000 in fines and $28,000 in restitution. He was also sentenced to a year in jail.
The suspects alleged wildlife violations in the other three counties remain under investigation, according to Game and Fish.
Mark Heinz can be reached at mark@cowboystatedaily.com.
