A Louisiana man featured on the Sportsman Channel program "Syndicate Hunting" was sentenced Thursday in federal court in Anchorage to four years probation for illegally taking a brown bear, a kill videotaped for the show.
The brief hearing featured remarks from all involved that defendant Lance Walker was a law-abiding citizen who made a mistake.
"I apologize for the mistake I made," Walker told U.S. District Court Judge Ralph Beistline. "I've hunted and fished my entire life" without any run-ins with the law, he said.
Walker was federally charged along with several others after an 18-month investigation by Alaska law enforcement. The production company The Outdoor Syndicate LLC and editing studio Zap Lab Ltd. were fined for their involvement in the hunting violation.
Walker pleaded guilty to a single misdemeanor violation of the Lacey Act, a conservation law that prohibits the sale of illegally taken game. A second misdemeanor was dismissed at the sentencing.
The longtime outdoorsman shot and killed a grizzly bear while in the company of Clark Dixon in 2011 on the Noatak National Preserve, which consists of 6.8 million acres of protected land in Northwest Alaska. Dixon, the host from "Syndicate" who was charged in what prosecutors described as a poaching operation, pleaded guilty to two Lacey Act violation last month and is set to be sentenced in February.
The second misdemeanor Walker was charged with stemmed from his shipping of the grizzly to his home in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, according to court remarks. Walker flew north from his hometown to attend Thursday's hearing.
Prosecutors say once the culprits were caught, they all cooperated with law enforcement's investigation. Still, they argued Walker should have known better.
Walker "violated the law in numerous ways, taking without a guide, nonresident permit, and nonresident tag. Once the bear was taken, Clark Dixon used his own resident locking tag to cover Mr. Walker's lack of (a) tag while still in the field," Assistant U.S. Attorney Steven Skrocki wrote in the government's sentencing memorandum.
Walker's attorney David Nesbett said his client's biggest mistake was trusting Dixon, but Walker accepted responsibility nonetheless.
"He ended up here because of his relationship with Dixon. He shouldn't have trusted this guy. He should have known better," Nesbett said.
"This is his life … There is a small chance of (Walker) ever coming back," the defense attorney added.
In addition to the probation, Walker won't be able to hunt or fish, and was ordered to pay a $5,000 fine and $10,000 restitution to the reserve. He's already handed over a grizzly-bear rug and a tanned wolf hide to the government.
His conditions of release will not bar him from filming for production companies other than Syndicate, which is what he does for work, according to court remarks.