by Dave Butler
But now, they were two hours south, at the Kingsgate border crossing, and the coffee mugs were again empty.
“What will you be doing in Sandpoint?” asked the agent.
“We’re going to a meeting with a U.S. Fish and Wildlife agent,” said Willson.
She and Forsyth were in uniform, the green and brown of the Parks Canada Warden Service. Seeing Canadian officials heading into the United States in uniform was apparently a rarity for the border agent, so he dug deeper. “What’s the meeting about and how long will you be in the U.S.?” he asked.
Willson had nothing to hide, so she explained that they’d be discussing a wildlife-poaching case involving suspects from both sides of the border. “We’ll only be down there as long as the meeting takes, probably a couple of hours, and then we’ll head back through here again.”
“Where were the animals poached?” the agent asked, his curiosity apparently piqued.
“We really have to get to the meeting,” said Willson, looking down at her watch to make a point. “I can tell you we’re dealing with a guide-outfitter on our side of the border who’s not playing by the rules and an American hunter who’s taking full advantage of that.”
“Well, give ’em hell,” said the agent. “I’m an avid hunter and this kind of thing pisses me off.” With that, he handed the passports to Willson and waved them on.
The two wardens drove southward through northern Idaho on Highway 93, stopping just north of Bonners Ferry for cheap gas. They drove down a long hill and crossed the Kootenay River as it began its big circle back to the north. Now on the verge of summer, the grasses along the riverbank were green and lush, and the river was still aggressive and full, just past the peak of freshet. They picked up a pair of tall coffees from a Starbucks hidden in a Safeway at the south end of the small town. After the first sip, Willson knew that finding Kick Ass had changed her life forever, at least the part that involved coffee. And that was a big part. But she was disappointed to realize that she’d have to stop ribbing Forsyth about his caffeine snobbery. He had previously called Kicking Horse coffee the “nectar of the East Kootenay,” and now she no longer wanted to argue the point.
Before continuing south toward Sandpoint, the two switched places. Forsyth drove while Willson sat in the passenger seat with a thick file balanced on her knees, trying to ignore his inconsistent speeds. She felt her upper body moving back and forth while Forsyth used the gas pedal like bellows on a bagpipe.
“Jesus, Bill,” said Willson finally, “can’t you just pick one bloody speed and stick with it?”
“Don’t worry about me,” said Forsyth without looking at her. “I’ve had few accidents in my driving career.”
Willson turned back to the files on her lap, trying to read, knowing she would drive home.
“I guess the fact we’re heading south today, back on the case, means your little plan worked?” asked Forsyth a few miles later, one side of his mouth and one eyebrow raised in a question.
Willson smiled knowingly in response to Forsyth’s question, ignoring his implication that her plan was insignificant. “We lost almost a month on that debacle. But it’s funny how the bigwigs in Calgary and Ottawa decided that this investigation was a good idea when they got letters from politicians and senior bureaucrats in B.C. — and from some key environmental groups in the Kootenays — openly applauding them for trying to bring the poachers to justice. The fact that the letters were copied to and reprinted by major news outlets didn’t hurt, either.”
Forsyth chuckled. Willson had told him that, after being told to stand down from the investigation, she’d made a late-night call to a deputy environment minister in B.C., a fellow she’ d worked with early in his career. A letter from him, and one from the provincial environment minister, had arrived in her boss’s inbox a week later. And Jim Canon, a director of the Kootenays’ biggest and most influential environmental group, was responsible for the other persuasive letters.
“Are our bosses taking credit for it?” Forsyth asked.
“Of course they are,” she said. “If you can stomach hearing the politicians talk, the thing was their idea from the beginning. Little did I know, but it was them who pushed me to work on it. They’ve got their public relations people working full-time on it. According to the crap coming out of their Ottawa crap factories, they’ve been concerned about this issue for a while. Who knew?”
“Well, that’s what anti-nausea pills are for,” said Forsyth.
“Quite frankly, I don’t give a shit what they say — as long as I can keep this thing moving,” said Willson. “I had no intention of giving up, but it was an RCMP contact who gave me the idea of turning the tables on them by getting the letters sent. I owe him big time.”
“What about the Jasper ram?”
“It was a Parks Canada miracle,” said Willson. “As soon as the politicians decided this investigation was a good idea, the Jasper boys suddenly disclosed that the handgun used in Wilcox Pass was a .44 calibre.”
“Did it match any of the handguns I saw at Eastman’s house?” asked Forsyth. “Shit. I was there and could’ve easily grabbed them.”
“It could have matched, but the crime lab says there’s no way to know without them getting their hands on the gun that shot the bullet.”
“Son of a bitch,” said Forsyth, shaking his head in disgust. “And the Kootenay goat?”
“The same thing. That investigation is back on, too. The saddest part of this —” Willson tapped her fingers on the files in her lap to the beat of the song on the radio “— is that the jerks in Ottawa aren’t smart enough to realize what happened. And even if they suspect what we did to them, there’s not a damn thing they can do about it. There is one little asshole in particular, a pompous little prick from Calgary, whose face I would love to rub in this till he squeals. But I’ll just give him a big smile the next time I see him.”
“Perfect!” said Forsyth. Then he sobered. “But now, to make it all worthwhile, we have to find a way to throw the friggin’ book at Eastman and this mysterious American.”
Willson nodded in agreement and then decided it was time to raise the elephant in the truck. “It’s unfortunate that you can’t stay on beyond your ten months, Bill.” She wasn’t going to tell Forsyth that he’d done a good job, and she wasn’t going to admit that she hadn’t tried to keep him on, or that he was an annoyance she could do without. So she kept it neutral.
“It’s all right,” said Forsyth. “I’ve got an interview the week after next for a conservation officer position in Manitoba.”
“Good luck with that, then,” Willson said, her head down in the file.
They drove into Sandpoint, a town of 8,200 people on the shore of Lake Pend Oreille, about forty-five minutes later. Neither of them had been there before, so they did a circle of the downtown core before finding Connie’s Café, the agreed-upon locale for the meeting with their U.S. counterpart. The café was lit by a large neon sign, a beacon of red on a cloudy day.
As they walked in the front door, Willson turned to Forsyth. “This is another opportunity to learn, Bill. I want you to stay quiet and listen. Got it?”
Forsyth nodded, but did not look happy with the direction.
With assistance from an aproned waitress straight from the 1960s, her hair in a net and a pencil behind her ear, they found Tracy Brown from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Based on Willson’s Internet search, the Spokane office was the closest to the East Kootenays, and after a phone call, she was told that Brown was the top-ranking special agent there. Brown’s dark hair was pulled back in a severe bun, but her smile lit the room when she saw the two Canadian wardens. The patches on the shoulders of her tan uniform shirt depicted a rising trout trying to ingest a startled duck above the words “Department of the Interior.” Over her uniform, Brown wore a dark-green bulletproof vest. No nonsense, thought Willson.
&nbs
p; After ordering lunch, Willson got down to business. “Thanks for this, Tracy,” she said, looking across the table at Brown. “I’ve shared our case files with you and we’ve talked on the phone, so you know what I’ve got. You also know I’m close to laying charges against Bernie Eastman, who holds the guide territory around which this entire investigation is circling.”
The primary case file was on the table in front of Willson. She patted it as she reviewed the list of potential charges against Eastman and the American under the Canada National Parks Act and B.C.’s Wildlife Act and the evidence they had for each. She told Brown that she was pinning her hopes primarily on the Parks Act, which allowed her to charge the two men with illegal hunting and illegal trafficking for the Banff elk and the Kootenay mountain goat. They talked about the Jasper ram and how she didn’t have sufficient evidence to charge the two men with that crime, other than hearsay from Clark and Canon’s recollection of seeing Eastman and Clark there the day before she believed it was shot.
“I’ve got to get my hands on the revolver used for the ram so I can match it with the slug in the carcass,” said Willson, “and that’s only going to come with another search warrant.”
Brown shook her head, agreeing that the Jasper wardens had been selfish and shortsighted. “I’m pleased to help, Jenny,” she said. “Looks like you’ve done a good job on Eastman and you seem to be building a solid case on your American suspect. Except, you know, for the fact that you don’t have his name yet. You’re sure the guy you’re looking for is from down here?”
“I am,” said Willson, with a blush of embarrassment in her cheeks. “Not only did our witness tell me that the client is an American, but our anonymous caller said the same thing. But neither will give me his name.” She smiled. “At least, not yet. So far, I know he’s rich, he has a big ego, he loves trophy hunting, and he doesn’t give a shit about wildlife laws on either side of the border.”
Brown chuckled. “Sorry, but that doesn’t narrow it down much.”
“I know,” said Willson, now leaning on the table with both forearms. “Ideally, I’d like to lay charges against Eastman early next week, but none of the charges I hope to lay on the American would allow us to extradite him to Canada, even if I did know who he was. So, one of the reasons I wanted to meet with you, before I go any further, is to see what you can do to help me out. Maybe you’ve got some brilliant ideas for me.…” She let her words trail off.
At that moment, the waitress brought their lunches, the plates stacked up both arms. She splashed extra coffee in their cups and in the saucers underneath. The trio dug in to huge hamburgers, massive piles of french fries, and glistening scoops of coleslaw, talking between mouthfuls.
“Do you know anything about the Lacey Act?” asked Brown after washing down the last of her fries with a sip of black coffee.
Willson openly expressed her ignorance. “I’ve heard of it, but I don’t know anything about it.”
“Thanks to forward-thinking politicians back in 1900,” said Brown, “it continues to be our premier weapon in the fight against illegal wildlife trafficking. It might be what we’re looking for here.” Brown described how it allowed them to lay a charge if a person imported or transported wildlife into the United States that had been taken in violation of a foreign wildlife protection law or regulation.
“It seems to me,” she went on, “that because your two suspects killed animals illegally in your parks — and if our guy brought the trophies down here afterward — we could charge him under the Lacey Act.”
“What are your penalties if he’s convicted?”
“If we can prove a felony rather than a misdemeanour, then we’re talking a maximum fine of $250,000 and up to five years in jail,” said Brown.
“That might slow the bastard down.” Then Willson explained to Brown that B.C.’s Wildlife Act offered a fine up to $250,000 and a maximum of two years in jail, while getting a conviction for an indictable offence under the Canadian National Parks Act could lead to a fine ranging from $30,000 to $2 million, and a maximum time in jail of five years. Brown whistled when she heard the maximum fine, showing she understood why Willson wanted to get convictions under the Parks legislation.
“What do we have to prove to get a felony conviction under your act?” asked Willson.
With her elbow on the table, Brown raised her left hand in a fist, and using her fingers one at a time, listed the requirements. “First, we need to identify him. Then, we must prove that he shot the animals in violation of one of your laws. Looks like we’ve got that nailed. If it’s clear that the American client paid for Eastman’s services as a guide-outfitter when he took the animals — and you said your witness stated that he paid $20,000 in total for each hunt — then we’ve also proved that each animal has a market value greater than $350. And if we can prove, through your witness statements, that the client knew he was illegally hunting in the parks, even better.”
“There’s no doubt about any of that,” said Willson.
With four fingers raised in the air, and with Willson and Forsyth both taking notes as she spoke, Brown continued. “Based on that, we then have to prove that Eastman’s client brought the trophies into the U.S. That’s the key link between the violations in Canada and making any Lacey charges stick down here.” Her hand was now open like she was waving, all fingers upright.
Willson frowned and sighed. “That’s where we’ve got a problem,” she said.
“How so?”
“The American only needed his hunting licence and cancelled tags to legally get the animals out of the country,” Willson explained. “That is, if Eastman reported any of his hunts at all. Because I don’t have the American’s name yet, I don’t know if he did or didn’t do that. And I can’t check with the border crossings in B.C. and Alberta to see if there’s any record of him bringing the elk rack or the goat head down here. Believe it or not, they might’ve brought the goat to a B.C. government office for a compulsory inspection. But without a name, I just don’t know.”
“What about the sheep?” asked Brown.
“I don’t know what happened with that,” said Willson. “Because Eastman’s territory is in the Purcell Mountains, where there are no bighorn sheep, I’m guessing he didn’t bring it to a B.C. office to get a small numbered aluminum plug inserted in the horn for tracking, like he’s required to do. It would have been impossible for him to explain where it came from.”
“But your suspect must’ve crossed somewhere,” Brown said, “with or without the animals.”
“He must have,” agreed Willson. “But again, without a name, I don’t know where … and I don’t know when.”
“Well, son of a bitch,” said Brown. “He must have got the trophies across the border somehow. How the hell did he do it?” She stared off into a dark corner of the restaurant. “Without proof of that, there’s no way we can get a Lacey conviction,” she said with a grimace. “And there’s no way we’d get a judge to give us a warrant to search down here — the connection just isn’t there yet.”
“Shit. I was hoping you weren’t going to say that,” said Willson. “We thought about this a lot and we figure the American could have brought the elk and the goat across legally. It’s possible, but in my opinion unlikely. But he must’ve had help from someone else to get the sheep head across. From what we’ve heard about the guy, whoever he is, about his love of hunting big game, his huge ego, and his desire to show off his trophies, there’s no way he’d leave any of those trophies in Canada.”
Forsyth jumped in. “Yeah,” he said. “I checked to see if Eastman brought them across for his client, but there’s no record of him crossing the border from B.C. or Alberta for the last twelve months.” Willson gave him a dirty look, so, chastened, he returned to making notes.
“Do you have any sense of whether the American knows you’re looking for him?” asked Brown.
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��I don’t,” said Willson. “Eastman certainly knows we’re looking for something because of the searches we did at his and Clark’s residences. But whether or not he told his client what happened, we don’t know.”
“If you lay those charges on Eastman next week, we have to assume the American will know what’s going on for sure,” said Brown. She sat back in the booth and stared at the ceiling. “If we want to bring the hammer down on both of these guys,” she said, “we need to trace the American from shooting an animal in a park in Canada to bringing it across the border into the United States, with a clear and unbroken chain of evidence.” She nodded her head, as though she’d convinced herself that this was the only way forward. “Do you know if he has any more trips planned up your way?”
“I don’t,” said Willson. “But I’ve been thinking about that. Once I lay charges against Eastman, I assume he’ll tell his client. Then we probably won’t see him in Canada again. If I don’t catch the American in the act on our side of the border, I’ve got no way to ever get him in a Canadian court. Based on what you said, I might not get him in a U.S. court, either. And if Eastman is convicted, I’m sure he’ll lose his guide territory … and probably his right to hunt in B.C. for a long time. And there goes the client’s trophy pipeline.”
Forsyth again spoke up, despite Willson’s glare. “The only way Eastman wouldn’t say anything to his client is if he’s scared of him, or if he wants to get him back up here for another animal,” he said. “That’s another twenty grand in his pocket for what might be his last hunt. Only Eastman knows how much risk he’s willing to accept.”
“Is there any way to get him to flip on his client?” asked Brown.
“I doubt it,” said Willson. “He doesn’t appear to be that kind of guy. But I do have a potential informant in Charlie Clark, his assistant guide. If there’s another hunt planned, he might know about it.”