Cheating in fishing tournaments has made headlines in recent years, and for some participants it may be worth the risk when thousands of dollars in cash prizes and a new bass boat are awarded to the winners. But cheating at a local pig hunting contest to take home a few hundred dollars, buckles and bragging rights? According to allegations from Louisiana game wardens, that’s what they think happened earlier this year.
Wednesday, Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries officials announced that they had been arrested six subjects for alleged fraud in two separate hog hunting contests that took place in Caldwell and Bienville parishes. They say the Louisiana men caught pigs in Texas, drove the live pigs across state lines and then entered them in the two competitions, which they won. Both competitions have rules that require the pigs to be caught within specific time frames and within the state of Louisiana.
“During the investigation,” the press release reads, “agents obtained evidence indicating that the six subjects captured hogs in Texas for use in the Dingler Wild Hog Roundup in Bienville Parish on February 9 and 10 and the Swamp Time Hog Hunt in Caldwell . Parish from March 14 to 16.”
The six people named in the news release are: Trace Davis, 30, of Longville; Hunter Webb, 27, of Pitkin; Colby Bushnell, 26, of Dry Creek; Davy Hampton, 35, of Pitkin, Nathan Granger, 34, of Vinton; and Don Pollard Jr., 40, of Pitkin. All six men were charged with hunting fraud and criminal conspiracy. In addition, all defendants except Granger were charged with interstate commerce violations. Davis was also charged with obstruction of justice and Webb was also cited for hunting with a suspended license.
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Officials say Granger turned himself in at the Bienville Parish Jail on June 4. They say the other five men turned themselves in at the Bienville and Caldwell Parish Jails on June 7.
Davis says Living outside in a Facebook post that he didn’t cheat. Both he and Bushnell say they will have to contact their attorneys for comment. Davis’ attorney, Cameron Murray, was unable to comment at the time of publication.
Officials at LDWF did not immediately respond to a request for comment, so it is unclear what prompted their investigation, or what evidence they have showing the six men committed fraud. Randy Dingler, who organized the Dingler Wild Hog Roundup, and Dalton Moses, who organized the Swamp Time Hog Hunt, both confirmed Living outside that the men mentioned in the LDWF news release were part of teams that took first place in the two competitions.
“There’s always someone who wants to cheat,” said Dingler, who has organized the event for a decade. “But luckily we had Wildlife and Fisheries, and they stepped in and did what they did. I would never have known.”
Both competitions have similar rules. These are teams of four or five people with one or two helpers (teams of four people with only one helper in the Swamp Time Hog Hunt). The teams are each assigned a random number by the organizer just before the hunt begins, and they have a limited amount of time to capture the five largest pigs they can find. Traps and fences are not allowed and all wild boar must be caught with dogs. Each competitor must have a permit to transport pigs, as the live pigs are transported in a trailer to the competition site, where they are weighed by the organizer.
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The two competitions also require participants to take a photo with each of the pigs they catch and send that photo to the organizer. The photo should have the team’s number on it, confirming that the team caught the pig after getting their number. It is not immediately clear how the suspects falsified or avoided this demand. Moses says he has been instructed by LDWF not to share details about how the deception may have occurred as the agency’s investigation is ongoing.
“This winning team had the biggest boar, if I’m not mistaken,” says Dingler. “And they also took first place. They had the heaviest weight of five pigs.”
The first-place team in the Dingler Wild Hog Roundup won custom belt buckles. The same team also won the heaviest pot of boar worth $180 dollars (or $36 per person), along with additional custom buckles and 20 bags of feed donated by one of the race sponsors.
The Swamp Time Hog Hunt had bigger payouts. Moses says the first-place team in that event was the Piney Woods Pimps, including Davis, Webb, Hampton and Pollard Jr. They had the heaviest stringer of five pigs and took home a cash prize of $1,558.
Moses says the Piney Woods Pimps also won the side pots for largest boar, which paid $1,100, and largest sow, which paid $800. This means that each of the four participants took home approximately $814.50, along with trophies and bragging rights.
On March 16, the last day of the Swamp Time Hog Hunt, Davis made a message on Facebook Moses for organizing the competition.
“Everyone who hunted did an excellent job,” Davis wrote. “With a little luck and God’s grace, we managed to raise the money from fourteen teams.”
Moses emphasizes that the men are innocent until proven guilty, but he calls the allegations that have surfaced unfortunate. And if proven true, they will put a damper on a community event that was meant to be a family gathering and celebration of hunting traditions. Yesterday Moses commented a Facebook message and said he had already heard from one of the test subjects, who offered to give back his winnings. He said he hasn’t heard from the others yet.
“We don’t do polygraphs and all that stuff, but it’s probably something we’ll do in the future,” he says. Living outside. “In the past we’ve made this work with an honor system, but I think they’ve proven that you can’t do that anymore.”
syndication@recurrent.io (Dac Collins)