Judge sentences Pa. man to 7 days in lynx death
Jan. 12, 2011
BANGOR — A federal judge on Wednesday wondered aloud if trappers and hunters were getting the message that the Canada lynx is an endangered species and it’s a federal crime to kill it, move or possess its carcass or own its pelt.
“I don’t know how long my patience will last with these kinds of cases,” U.S. Magistrate Judge Margaret Kravchuk said after sentencing a fourth man in U.S. District Court in four years to jail time for a violation of the Endangered Species Act that involved a lynx. “At some point, I may have to impose longer sentences. Seven days of incarceration hasn’t stopped this.”
Kravchuk sentenced William McCoy, 41, of Fayetteville, Pa., to seven days in federal prison for trying to cover up the fact that a Canada lynx, an endangered species, was caught in one of his traps two years ago. McCoy was sentenced immediately after he pleaded guilty to violating the act.
By pleading guilty, McCoy admitted that in December 2008 he removed a lynx’s body from his trap set in the town of Stacyville and carried it about 50 yards away so wardens would not know he had unintentionally trapped the animal.
A charge that he killed a gray jay, a protected migratory bird, in a separate trap that had been set illegally was dropped in a plea agreement with federal prosecutors.
“I’ve based my whole life on [trapping],” McCoy told the judge just before she imposed the sentence. “I’m a good person. I do what states tell me to do, and I trap in a lot of states.”
McCoy, who has no criminal history, told Kravchuk that he did not trap the lynx intentionally but panicked when he found the dead animal in one of his traps and attempted to discard its body…