Behind the Badge
A Quirk of Fate
District Game Warden Erik Schmidt
The Report All Poachers program is a joint effort between the North Dakota Wildlife Federation, North Dakota Game and Fish Department and North Dakota State Radio Communications.
The program allows the public to contact State Radio to report suspected game and fish violations.
When a violation is called in, State Radio will put the caller in touch with a game warden. If the information leads to a conviction, a monetary reward may be paid to the caller.
Over the years I’ve taken many RAP calls. Sometimes these calls result in a quick case being made and other times it takes time.
The following is a case that took a little more time…eight years to be exact.
In the summer of 2007, I was a newly hired game warden who had just finished field training and was on my own. That June I received a RAP call concerning a group of out-of-state fishermen who were allegedly taking more than their fair share of walleye from one of my south central lakes.
The reporting party informed me he had learned the fishermen were making multiple trips to the lake and taking a limit of walleye each time.
Using the detailed descriptions of the trucks he gave me, my neighboring game warden Mark Pollert and I found them the next day at one of the lakes. We spoke with one member of the group who was at his truck and learned the men were leaving in a couple days.
The man told us he didn’t have any walleye and allowed us to look in the chest freezer he had in the topper covered bed of his pickup.
After leaving, Mark and I put together a plan to check the group again later in the week. The plan fell through when the group decided to leave early and we missed them. I remember thinking ‘Oh well, can’t catch them all.’
Eight years later, in the summer of 2015, I pulled into one of my small-town gas stations for a quick snack when a familiar distinct truck pulled up.
It was my fisherman and his group from eight years earlier. They had just arrived in town and were going in to purchase their fishing licenses.
As I spoke with him about the hot fish bite, it was evident he did not recognize me from the last time we had spoken.
We talked fishing and he told me they planned on fishing the whole week. While I was talking with them, I noticed the small chest freezer in the back of the topper covered pickup bed.
On the last day of their trip, I checked the eight men after they returned from their day of fishing.
The fishermen told me they had been eating most of what they caught throughout the week and didn’t have much left for fish. I was shown that days catch of walleyes along with a few more in the freezer.
When I asked if the men had any other fish, I was told they didn’t have anything else. Then I asked if they had anything in the chest freezer in the truck. After a moment’s hesitation, I was told there were a few walleyes in there.
A ‘few walleye’ turned out to be an eight-man possession limit of 80 walleyes. Those 80 walleyes together with what the group had already shown me put the men over their possession limit.
After everything was said and done all eight men pled guilty to their charges. Each of them paid a fine and lost their fishing privileges for one year for their miscount.
Once the case was settled, I called the original reporting party.
I still had his name and number after all those years. He was a little surprised to hear back from me so many years later but he was glad I was able to make the case.
When I asked if he wanted a monetary reward from the RAP program, he politely declined my offer and again said he was just happy I had caught them.
Sometimes game wardens can respond to a RAP call and make the case right away. And sometimes, it just takes a little patience and few years.
If you have a game and fish violation you would like to report call Report All Poachers at 701-328-9921.