RICHMOND — Two hunters pleaded responsible Thursday within the unlawful killing of the “Hollywood buck,” an impressive 29-point deer that for years roamed this metropolis’s ornate Accomplice burial floor.
Jason Walters of Richmond entered responsible pleas to twenty misdemeanors in Richmond Normal District Court docket associated to the unlawful looking of three deer, together with the buck identified in Richmond and past as a frequent customer to historic Hollywood Cemetery.
Walters was sentenced to 6 months in jail, with three months suspended, and ordered to pay $2,500 in fines and $11,000 in “substitute prices.” He additionally misplaced his looking privileges for twenty-four years.
“I feel he’s simply completely happy to place this behind him and transfer ahead and ensure the restitution is paid,” stated Walters’s lawyer, Gregory R. Sheldon.
Alan Proffitt, additionally of Richmond, pleaded responsible to 6 misdemeanors, all associated to the Hollywood buck, which was killed in December. Officers referred to him as an confederate. Proffitt was ordered to pay $1,250 in fines and serve 30 days of home arrest. His looking privileges have been revoked for six years.
The penalties characterize “one of many strongest enforcement outcomes in latest reminiscence” for wildlife crimes, the Virginia Division of Wildlife Assets stated in a written assertion saying the pleas.
“The appreciable penalties included will definitely be a deterrent to future wildlife crime and will give the group a degree of consolation that one of these crime is taken very significantly within the Commonwealth,” it stated. “Searching is a treasured custom in Virginia. Unethical and prison conduct tarnishes the popularity of the game and offers a nasty title to people who interact in it lawfully.”
The division’s regulation enforcement staff executed 10 search warrants because it investigated the case, with help from Chesterfield County and Richmond police, the cemetery and Richmond’s Division of Parks and Recreation. The division stated it would work with “the outside group” and others to “decide one of the best ways to memorialize this unimaginable animal.”
Residents close to the cemetery estimated that the Hollywood buck was about 8 years outdated. They known as him Prince, guessing he was the offspring of one other regal buck they’d dubbed King. Searching with firearms is unlawful within the metropolis of Richmond and within the cemeteries the place the Hollywood buck was identified to roam.
Walters posted images of himself with the lifeless Hollywood buck on the Star Metropolis Whitetails Fb web page. He stated he shot it in rural Prince Edward County, about 70 miles southwest of Richmond. However hunters and wildlife photographers acknowledged the deer’s distinctive 29-point rack.
Walters was arrested in January on costs that included trespassing, failing to examine and tag a deer and littering, in keeping with court docket data. The costs additionally associated to 2 different bucks that authorities stated Walters poached from part of Richmond that features neighborhoods, cemeteries and parkland.
This article by Laura Vozzella was first printed by The Washington Publish on 15 August 2024. Lead Picture: The Hollywood Cemetery buck, also called Prince, was killed in December. (Ben King).
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