If true, Troy Gentry, half of the country group Montgomery Gentry, is a disgusting person:

The indictment alleges that in October 2004 [country star Troy] Gentry paid Greenly $4,650 for Cubby, a tame, trophy-caliber, captive-reared black bear that was the largest bear used by Greenly in his wildlife photography business. After the purchase, the indictment says, Gentry killed Cubby with a bow and arrow while the bear was contained in a pen on Greenly’s property. The indictment does not specify how large the pen was.

Why would he do that? To show off:

The bear’s demise was videotaped, but court documents said the tape was edited later to show that Cubby had been killed in a “fair chase” hunting situation.

So, Gentry buys a domesticated bear that is essentially a pet and has been trained to be comfortable around people. Then kills it and makes it look like it was done in the wild. I suppose to make him look like a sportsman or some such. The newspaper account notes:

On Tuesday, Gentry pleaded not guilty to a charge that he violated the federal Lacey Act by falsely tagging the bear.

…

“Apparently it was perfectly legal to kill that bear since he was the owner,” Meshbesher said. “The government claims that once it was killed, there was mislabeled tagging because apparently the (property) owner indicated that it wasn’t killed on his game farm. It is a highly technical charge. The whole point is, they have to prove that Troy knew it was wrong and willfully went ahead and did it anyhow, and that relates to the tagging, not the killing.”

As a sort-of libertarian, here’s the deal: What Gentry did was cruel, evil and stupid. But I doubt it was illegal. My understanding is that for the Lacey Act to apply, said animal must be transported across state lines. So, they are obviously going after him on a highly technical charge to prove a point. The prosecution is stupid as well. But at least it’s stupid for good as opposed to Gentry being stupid for evil.

Gentry denies the claim:

“Troy is an avid environmentalist and hunter who supports and follows all game laws,” Meshbesher said. “Before he killed the bear, he was told by the bear guide that it was proper and legal to kill the bear, which was not a tamed bear and was never in a pen or cage.”

It’s possible he was lied to but then how does he explain buying the bear?

Posted in uncategorized on August 18th, 2006 by SayUncle | RSS 2.0 |