Ockham's Razor
With the busy season coming I thought I'd tell a little story about something I forgot from CLEET and the subject of "Wildlife Tunnel Vision" and how it happened to me last season. From the training we have had, we all know intense focus on one particular thing can be dangerous if not deadly. I had only thought about this as it relates to fighting, driving, shooting, or other intense situations. We're also strongly encouraged to look for and enforce primarily wildlife violations and avoid others unless life threatening circumstances exist. This past year, just before Christmas, I was locked in on a wildlife law and was practically blinded to what I'd found because I was trying to focus on making it a wildlife case. It happened to me after an adrenaline-pumping chase and the handcuffing were all over with.
The fifth district has been lucky in getting to know and work with some of the OUP pilots. The pilots needed to log some night time training hours. Now, with experience comes knowledge, and I've learned that I tend to catch most of my spot lighters between sunset and sunrise. So we put up a helicopter and began to fly over the South Canadian river. Once we got near highway 177 activity picked up. Within an area of 5 miles we could see three separate vehicles head lighting. One was working a handheld spotlight, another was a four wheeler and the third was a truck parked under lighting up a tree with two deercarcasses hanging from its branches. It was only about 9:00 p.m. Snow had begun to fall and the pilot said it could cause our engine to flameout. Since I didn't want to ride a one ton lawn dart to earth, this operation was over. We were only able to coordinate ground unit into making contact with one of the observed lights, but now at least I had located a hot area to work.
It was the end of a rainy week and I was back in that hot area. District four was out in force that night so, I migrated their direction. I was separated from the District four guys by the South Canadian River but could talk over the department's radio channel. As I was driving into the area I was approaching a T intersection. Before I came to a stop, two white males wearing camo in an old Dodge pickup with a broken taillight crossed the intersection in front of me. I turned the opposite direction and got over a hill and blacked out all my lights. I pulled a quick turn-around to get behind the vehicle. As I topped the hill I could see their vehicle had pulled into the gate of a wheat field. It stayed there a few minutes, backed out and headed back my way. I found a place to get out of the way and let the vehicle pass while staying undetected. When it passed I got behind them again. We continued along a muddy county road for about 10 miles passing several good fields along the way. We were now in the area where I'd seen all the activity from the helicopter, and I knew these must be the ones that got away. I was trailing only 40 yards behind when the suspect found another field he thought he needed to turn into. I thought he would spend several minutes at this one just like the last. However, he made a quick turn around and to both our surprise ...I was busted! I turned on my 'red and blues' as he approached. Even though he passed within two feet of my door he must not have seen the lights because he didn't stop. I turned around in the gate and it was on. And, IT WAS ON, for all of about 20 seconds. It was at that point I realized that he was willing to do well over 90 miles an hour on a muddy two lane road to avoid talking to me. I did not want to talk that bad. I got on the radio and let the guys know I had a truck headlighting but he got away and to keep their eye's open for the old truck with two white males in camo. I was down but not out. I knew there had to be more activity in the area. I made a big loop and ended up about one mile south of the intersection where I first saw the truck.
I was blacked out on a hill with a view and I was parked about 50 yards off the county road. I'd been sitting for an hour with my windows down and could hear a vehicle slowly coming my way. I watched as the headlights went past, and then I saw it ...only one taillight. Wholly Crap! I eased out behind the vehicle, lights out. Two hundred yards down the road it pulled into another gate. As I closed the distance, the truck backed out of the gate and continued down the road. I lit up the truck coming to a stop near two trailer houses. Only the driver was visible. It was at this time I learned that my county radio did not have the right frequency for the county I had ended up in. I tried to do a felony stop but the driver refused to lie on the muddy road. Then I had the driver approach the rear of his vehicle and after a short discussion on the meaning of certain commands he was sitting cuffed in the county road where I could see him while covering and clearing the old pickup. He was alone. He had no license, and he was very upset. As we moved into the headlights of my truck he saw my uniform and exploded. He started screaming you can't arrest me, you're just a security guard, take these cuffs off. I was placed under citizen's arrest (by my handcuffed suspect) for parking in the road with no lights on. At first I thought he was just being stupid, but after a while it was apparent he did not recognize the Game Warden's uniform.
He eventually calmed down and gave me a false name and DOB. The subject was smart enough to give me a friend's name, but not smart enough to realize that the friend had a warrant out on him. I had Daryl Howser (Seminole) relay to the county where I was and a deputy was soon in route to assist me. This is when "Wildlife Tunnel Vision" made me miss what we in the business call clues.
There was a wide variety of items in the old truck. First and of greatest interest was an old 9mm pistol the driver had resting between his feet. The pistol was empty and without a magazine. There were two video cameras, one with a bloody fingerprint. I just knew these two idiots had videoed the spotlighting, but this could not be verified because the battery was dead. There were some tom Christmas wrapping papers, two backpacks full of high priced camping equipment (obviously for deer camp). Two flashlights (for spotlighting of course), gloves (for cleaning the deer they were going to shoot), a pry bar, and various other tools. In my conditioned mind this all screamed poaching. But no bullets, no rifle, no deer, and the subject didn't recognize a Warden. I began to fear my case was crumbling. I dropped off my catch with the Deputy for his warrant/false ID, towed the truck and was headed home.
As I drove back down the road I had just come from I notice a pile of blankets laying in the gateway where the old truck had pulled into just 45 minutes earlier. I pulled over and hit the pile with my spotlight. Now I knew I had busted the case wide open. The driver must have dropped his partner off here to pick up the monster buck they had shot, and it must be lying under this blanket. Wrong. Under the blanket were items that were again in almost no way related to wildlife crime. There were CD's, Playstation games, a rifle scope, a computer tower, a completely outfitted youth bow, another video camera, DVD's and some stereo equipment. Daryl again called the county for me and they retrieved the items of evidence. Later we made our way to a house just down the road where we found the back door broken open (pry bar). The house had been burglarized. There was an empty computer desk, an empty gun case, an empty stereo cabinet, and a Christmas tree with no presents under it.
Now everything began to tie together. I had been trying so hard to make a solid wildlife case that I missed a very obvious home-invasion team in action. When I thought they were obviously headlighting a field they were actually dropping off a thief to remove property from a home and stage it near the road in a field where it could be easily retrieved later. The driver would return every so often to pick up the loot. Apparently on my first attempt to stop the team they ran because they had a load of stolen property. I guess they felt safe a short 10 miles away and continued on their spree. The pistol in the truck was actually from the house. The case is still pending and I guess the get-away driver's partner was left in the field and must have had a long walk back to where ever he came from.
Even though we're focused on enforcing wildlife violations, we need be to ready for something else that could land in our laps. Because, blood isn't always deer blood, and people with guns in the woods aren't always hunters. And lights in a field aren't always spotlighters and, punks in camo aren't always poachers.
CLEET 101
Ockham's Razor - "All other things being equal, the simplest solution is the best."