Although the Cook County News-Herald knows that the majority of sportsmen and women are law-abiding folks, there are a few that run afoul of the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR) Conservation Officers. Periodically, the DNR provides a report of some of the miscreants the Conservation Officers (CO) have encountered. The News-Herald shares these stories as a reminder to all to be safe and to follow the rules!
CO Darin Fagerman (Grand Marais) patrolled non-motorized areas to check anglers. He checked designated lakes and snowmobile trails. He also attended a district meeting.
CO Mary Manning (Hovland) checked anglers and snowmobilers. Manning also attended a district meeting and training. Calls were answered about wolves and coyotes.
CO Thomas Wahlstrom (Tofte) taught a snowmobile safety class in Grand Portage with area officers and an excellent volunteer instructor. Despite the rain, everybody enjoyed riding the snowmobiles and much fun was had by all. The officer attended a district meeting in Two Harbors. Wahlstrom checked snowmobilers where many were stopped and had their hoods up trying to deal with a common problem, overheating. Not many anglers were trying their luck in the rain. He also handled a situation where a deer was sick or injured at a resort.
CO Joe Stattelman (Detroit Lakes) contacted three young men after they intentionally ran over some raccoons with their truck. The guys were picking the animals up and intended to sell them to a fur buyer. Enforcement action was taken.
CO Jeff Johanson (Osakis) assisted CO Bertram with a case where an individual had attempted to remove all the identification on his portable fish house that was frozen into the ice and left buried under the snow. The individual was identified and cited, and the fish house was removed and confiscated.
CO Mitch Sladek (Big Lake) followed up on a possible escaped deer from a game farm. Sladek located the deer, which was an orphaned wild deer that a neighborhood adopted. CO Sladek wants everyone to leave the wild animals alone and let nature take its course.
CO Don Bozovsky (Hibbing) worked a case of an illegally possessed deer that was found by the Hibbing Police Department, as a result of an unrelated search warrant. A number of charges will be made against four individuals. The deer appeared to have been killed by a snowmobile; the search warrant had been for a stolen snowmobile. The officer worked a Lake Vermilion spring time snowmobile water skipping detail, where a number of snowmobile and ATV violations were encountered and included an ATV driver who was arrested for DWI. It was the driver’s second DWI in three months.
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