Montana man charged for killing grizzlies that ate his chickens

Dan Calvert Wallen is charged with three counts of unlawful taking of a threatened species, a federal offense. Law enforcement was first contacted about the case on May 27 when a neighbor of Wallen’s called Flathead County Dispatch saying he had shot and killed a grizzly that his neighbor (Wallen) had wounded. A state wildlife biologist responded to the call at Wallen’s residence, where the dead bear was lying in the driveway. According to the affidavit filed in the case, Wallen said the bear was killing chickens and he used a .22 caliber rifle to try and scare it away.  The wildlife biologist who first responded to the call on May 27, noted that there was a phone message from Wallens wife, left on May 27 at 7:08 p.m. Wallen’s wife had reported that they were having trouble with bears killing their chickens. On May 28, the wildlife biologist went to the Wallen home to set a trap for bears and he found a second dead grizzly in tall grass near the one that was reported shot and killed. When he was interviewed by a game warden, Wallen reportedly said that his family and friends were playing in the yard when the grizzlies arrived and he “was afraid of the bears around his family.” Wallen reportedly told the game warden that two bears approached his chicken coop and he chased them away in his pickup truck, but they soon returned and he got his rifle. In a second interview, Wallen reportedly told a game warden and a U.S. Fish and Wildlife agent that the incident began on May 27 when he discovered dead chickens in his yard. He reported that only seven of approximately 35 chickens were alive...more

You can't drop possums anymore, you can't even defend your own chickens. What's this world coming to?  Not only that, you can't "harass" an endangered species, so chasing them away in your pickup is also a federal offense.  Hope he wasn't speeding, or the locals will get him too.