Re: (Fwd) Bald Eagle Killer Fined, Sentenced
Gary A. Griffith (brdnsum@dpnet.net)
Wed, 11 Mar 98 20:28:42 PST
Norm,
Much better results than the Cecil County Eagle murderer, who paid a thousand bucks in fines and got a suspended sentence. He probably still realized a ten fold profit on the carcass after attorneys fees and court costs. Wow, what a disincentive. Sipple will probably relocate to Maryland.
I'm a cynic.
Gary A. Griffith (BrdNSum@dpnet.net)
The Hummingbird Society (www.hummingbird.org)
Elkton, Maryland
(302) 369-3699 Society
(410) 392-4491 Home
----------
> I thought this might be of interest....
>
> ==================================================================
>
> For immediate release for further information, contact Rick
> Giovengo at 302-653-9152 March 10, 1998 or Diana Weaver at
> 413-253-8329
>
> Bald Eagle Killer Fined, Sentenced
>
> Saying that he "essentially assassinated the Nation's symbol," U.S.
> District Court Judge Mary Pat Trostle sentenced Douglas Sipple, 53, of
> Georgetown, Del., to six months of home detention, 400 hours of
> community service, five years probation and assessed more than $25,000
> in restitution and fines for poisoning a bald eagle with the pesticide
> Furadan in April 1997. Trostle handed the sentence down Thursday in
> Wilmington.
>
> The eagle was released in New Jersey and killed in Delaware, so
> $20,000 of the restitution Sipple was ordered to pay will be split
> between New Jersey Fish, Game and Wildlife and the Delaware Nongame
> Fund.
>
> Sipple pleaded guilty in October last year to violating the Endangered
> Species Act. Bald eagles are protected under the Act with a
> threatened designation, meaning that the species could become
> endangered and face possible extinction. Trostle said that Sipple was
> motivated by greed and had "created an atmosphere of fear" in the
> community by poisoning domestic pets and wildlife, not considering the
> effect of his actions and the emotional cost to the community.
>
> U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service special agents arrested Sipple at his
> farm during a raid with Delaware fish and wildlife agents on the farm
> and Sipple's father's home in July last year. State agents had been
> investigating Sipple for more than two years, after they began finding
> dead animals poisoned with Furadan. Among those dead were a turkey
> vulture and a red-tailed hawk.
>
> Sipple pleaded guilty in 1994 to a state charge of illegally
> pole-trapping hawks. He was fined for that offense.
>
> Assistant U.S. Attorney Edmund Falgowski of Wilmington successfully
> prosecuted this case.
>
> -FWS-