10 CapitalPress.com
October 6, 2017
Washington
Ranchers plead guilty to gun charges
Couple and their
two grown sons
could face as much
as a year in prison
By DAN WHEAT
Capital Press
SPOKANE — A former
master of the Washington
State Grange and his wife,
who is a former Douglas
County commissioner, and
their two sons have pleaded
guilty to federal charges re-
lated to illegally buying and
selling firearms.
Terry Hunt was Grange
master for many years and
his wife, Mary, was a Repub-
lican county commissioner
from 1998 to 2010. Both are
72. They operate a wheat and
cattle ranch with their sons,
Rusty, 52, and Derek, 47, at
Sims Corner, east of Mans-
field in northern Douglas
County.
All four pleaded guilty
to three counts each of aid-
ing and abetting a false entry
by a firearms dealer in U.S.
District Court in Spokane on
Sept. 6 and are scheduled for
sentencing Dec. 7.
Each could receive up to
one year in prison and a fine
of $100,000 on each count.
In exchange for the pleas,
U.S. attorneys will drop a
16-count grand jury indict-
ment against the Hunts is-
sued last December.
The indictment alleged
conspiracy, dealing firearms
without a license and nu-
merous counts of making
false statements in buying
Terry and Mary Hunt
firearms from June 2011
through December 2015.
Five-year prison terms and
$250,000 fines were pos-
sible on the conspiracy
charge.
Mary Hunt declined com-
ment about the case to the
Capital Press and said the
family continues to operate
its ranch.
According to the plea
agreement, filed Sept. 6, the
prosecution and defendants
stipulate to the following
facts:
The U.S. Bureau of Al-
cohol, Tobacco, Firearms
and Explosives began inves-
tigating the Hunts in 2009,
relative to the family’s sales
of guns at the Big Reno Gun
Show in Reno, Nev.
The Hunts operated a
vendor booth called “Hunt
Family Farms” at the show
three times a year.
Investigators discovered
the Hunts falsely filled out
federal firearms forms and
sold approximately 465 fire-
arms for $273,954 between
June 2012 and November
2015.
The Hunts filled out
forms when buying the guns
in Washington indicating
that the guns were for them-
selves. However, the guns
were sold in Reno.
On April 18, 2012, Spe-
cial Agent Heidi Wallace
with the U.S. Bureau of Al-
cohol, Tobacco, Firearms
and Explosives issued a
Cease and Desist Warning
Letter to Terry Hunt.
Hunt indicated it was the
buyer’s problem, not his.
Wallace told Hunt she would
help him obtain a federal
firearms license.
In 2013, Hunt recruited a
straw purchaser to buy guns
and continued illegal actions.
On Aug. 14, 2015, two
undercover ATF agents
bought guns from Mary Hunt
at the Big Reno show.
Hunt said the guns were
transported to the show in
the back of her Yukon SUV
and that she would sell them
without tax, transfer fees or
paperwork.
Hunt never checked the
agents’ identification or el-
igibility to possess firearms
when she sold them two fire-
arms. The undercover buy
was audio and video record-
ed.
On Nov. 13, 2015, ATF
served warrants at the Hunts’
ranch and recovered spread-
sheets of firearms purchases
and sales.
The plea agreement calls
upon the court to sentence
the defendants to five years
probation with no jail time
and fines of $5,000 to be
paid at no less than $1,000
per year.
The Hunts are to abandon
all rights to more than 100
firearms seized from their
home during the execution
of a search warrant in De-
cember 2015.
If the court rejects the
agreement, the Hunts may
withdraw their guilty pleas
and the U.S. may prosecute
them for any and all crimes.
Groups say wolf kill notice
allows time to take legal action
By MATTHEW WEAVER
Capital Press
Conservation groups that
sued the Washington Depart-
ment of Fish and Wildlife say
they’ve reached an agreement
with the agency to get enough
advance notice about wolf kill
orders to seek legal action to
stop them.
A department official says
the agency hasn’t lost the abil-
ity to take action.
In a press release, the
Center for Biological Diver-
sity and Cascadia Wildlands
said the department will pro-
vide the groups 48 hours no-
tice, including one business
day, before killing problem
wolves.
According to the press re-
lease, the agreement allows
“time for pursuit of a tempo-
rary restraining order to stop
any killing.”
Donny Martorello, wolf
policy lead for WDFW, said
attorneys for the agency and
for the conservation groups
essentially reached an agree-
ment on scheduling for poten-
tial preliminary injunctions if
needed. They did not reach
agreements on any merits of
the case, he said.
Under the scheduling
agreement, the groups are not
seeking a preliminary injunc-
tion at this point, Martorello
said.
If a wolfpack reaches the
point where the department
considers killing problem
wolves under its management
plan, WDFW already gives
advance notice to the pub-
lic, depending on the method
used.
“If the plaintiffs then
choose to take any kind of ac-
tion to stop the agency, then
that would be up to them,” he
said.
“There hasn’t been any
loss of department authority
or ability to take action.”
Martorello said the depart-
ment will continue to work
with ranchers to use nonlethal
deterrents to reduce conflict
and look at criteria in its pro-
tocols for when the agency
might consider killing prob-
lem wolves.
“We’re going to continue
to do all the things we have
done in the past,” he said.
Martorello said wolf con-
servation is a “very highly
controversial” topic nation-
wide, with a history of litiga-
tion.
“We are disappointed that
these two out-of-state groups
have chosen to file a lawsuit,
but the department is com-
mitted to continue working
with our citizens, stakehold-
ers, wolf advocates, hunters
and livestock producers as we
have in the past,” he said. “We
will deal with the litigation
and lawsuit, and keep moving
forward.”
According to the conser-
vation groups’ press release,
the parties also agreed to
cooperate to expedite the
pending lawsuit to allow for
a full hearing before Thur-
ston County Superior Court
Judge Chris Lanese before
the 2018 grazing season be-
gins.
Skagit County home to lone wolf
By DON JENKINS
Capital Press
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Courtesy of U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
Tests confirm this wolf, photographed in May, is Western Washing-
ton’s first known gray wolf in decades, according to the U.S. Fish
and Wildlife Service.
of having wolves widely dis-
persed. Wolves have recolo-
nized northeast Washington,
but will remain a state-pro-
tected species until they are
established in the North and
South Cascades, too.
The male wolf was pho-
tographed in May by a man
who reported the animal was
attacking his chickens. Three
weeks later, federal and state
biologists captured the wolf
and fitted him with a GPS col-
lar to transmit his location.
Froschauer said the wolf
has remained in Western
Washington.
The wolf has been roam-
ing north and west of Mar-
blemount, a small community
about 50 miles east of Mount
Vernon and Interstate 5.
So far, wildlife managers
have not seen a mate or re-
ceived any new reports from
residents, she said.
Wolves are federally pro-
tected in Western and Central
Washington. They are not a
federally protected species in
Eastern Washington.
According to a 2011 re-
port by the state wildlife de-
partment, the last confirmed
report of a wolf in Skagit
County was 1927.
Wolf tracks were seen in
Clallam County in Western
Washington in 1946, accord-
ing to the report.
In 2015, a female wolf was
hit and killed by a vehicle on
Interstate 90 within 30 miles
of Seattle.
Wolves have been moving
into Washington over the past
decade. Most of the wolves
are in northeast Washington
near Idaho. Wildlife manag-
ers say they expect wolves to
continue spreading west.
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Genetic testing has con-
firmed that a lone animal
roaming in eastern Skagit
County is Western Washing-
ton’s first known gray wolf in
decades, according to the U.S.
Fish and Wildlife Service.
The USFWS laboratory
in Ashland, Ore., verified the
animal wasn’t a hybrid, but
was unable to link the wolf
to the DNA taken from other
wolves, USFWS spokeswom-
an Ann Froschauer said Mon-
day.
“We have no specifics on
the where the animal came
from,” she said.
A wolf west of the Cas-
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