Violations directly associated with wolf introduction

[wolfbait]

A.   Violations directly associated with wolf introduction.

1.   The theft (misappropriation, diversion) and misuse by USFWS
Administrators of at least $60 Million from the Pittman – Robertson excise
taxes in Fiscal Years 1995, and 1996.  These funds could only be used by
state fish and wildlife agencies for purposes expressly stated in the Act.
This was done by USFWS managers and was verified by a GAO audit report to
the US Congress in 1998 and my own examination of these records. 26USC, Sec
4161?  31USC, Sec.666?

2.   Supplementing federal Appropriations with illegal funds.  FWS
managers supplemented the USFWS Congressionally Appropriation in FY 1995 and
1996 with at least $60 Million taken from the Pittman – Robertson funding to
fund a wolf introduction program and to establish an USFWS office in
California, each of which Congress had specifically and previously refused
to fund and to pay salary bonuses to select USFWS employees that were not
entitled to such funds since they had no connection with the “administration
of the Wildlife Restoration excise taxes or their disposition.  26USC, Sec
4161?


3.   Introducing wolves from Canada into Yellowstone National Park after
the US Congress had refused to Appropriate funds for or to Authorize such
action. This act is clearly a serious violation of federal budget
regulations but would arguably be caught up in an irresolvable debate
between the President and the Congress as to whether or not the President is
bound by a refusal of Congressional funding to forego specific actions.
 
4.   Failure to file Wildlife Importation Forms (Form 3-177) upon
importing wolves from Canada into the United States for release soon
thereafter in Yellowstone National Park. 50CFR, Part 14; 16USC 3371-3378
NOTE – This “required” Form 3-177 describes the species and origin of the
wildlife along with the date imported so that you could check on all who
were present at the importation (like DOW?).  When I was told (in 1997 by an
Endangered Species biologist) that the Form 3-177 was not submitted at the
border when the wolves were imported by USFWS employees I doubted it, so I
called the Law Enforcement Office that would have had such records and asked
how many live wolves had been imported into the US from Canada in the first
half of 1995.  I was told “none”.  As a former US Special Agent at a
Port-of-Entry (New York in the 1970’s) I knew of the importance of this
document.  I was truly stunned at the time that no such record was made.  As
an indication of the variable and selective enforcement power of Endangered
Species “requirements” at this time a biologist in the Endangered Species
Program had accompanied a Smithsonian expedition to Asia and made out the
“required” Form 3-177 for the expedition on return to the US.  Nitpicking
about the species name used on the form and the failure of some inane
documents from some tiny Asian “republic” turned into federal charges
against the biologist that went on forever. His only “real” violation was
questioning Endangered Species “science” and “enforcement” practices in the
past.  Finally he was forced to agree to two misdemeanors and retire.  He
soon found out that the US Attorney had been induced to arrange things so
that it was treated by the state of Virginia as a low-level felony thereby
depriving him of the right to vote or own or possess a gun.  Given the
importance of wolf dealings today, the fact of questionability of origin and
“species” of the wolves is merely but one more “impossible to prove” aspect
of the whole affair.

5.   The failure of USFWS to describe the impacts, costs, and dangers to
be expected if and when wolves were introduced and protected as Listed
Endangered Species in the Lower 48 States.  

1.Historical records of wolves attacking and killing soldiers, children,
homesteaders, and Natives (as mentioned in Stanley Young’s Wolves of North
America) were ignored.  
2.  International records of human attacks and livestock and wildlife losses
(as described later from available documents in Will Graves’ Wolves in
Russia) were ignored. Human attacks were denied and ignored and it was even
claimed that there were NO such attacks in North America.  
3. Human, wildlife, and livestock dangers from wolf-borne disease were
ignored while the steady discovery of health hazards to people, wildlife,
pets, and livestock from wolves has grown exponentially. Wolves carry and
spread over 30 infectious diseases, nearly all of which are hazardous to
humans.
4. Expected Big Game animal losses were totally distorted and made into
nothing while the results are catastrophic.
5. Livestock losses were underestimated and the fact that any taking or
harassment of wolves (except in only the most extreme and provable
circumstances where a human life was in extreme danger) in protection of
private property would be met with draconian – felony and extreme federal
enforcement – penalties was not mentioned.  
6. Promises in initial documents to not allow any number over X by state
have been disregarded and implied “return of management to states” in truth
has and will only mean Federally “approved” (and changeable) Plans that
“permit” State governments (only temporarily and under changeable goals and
processes) to implement “approved plans” as changing federal political winds
dictate.  
7. Control and management costs of expanding wolf populations to state and
federal budgets received no realistic treatment.  
8.Current costs to farmers and ranchers, to say nothing of current total
federal costs annually are not available and are downplayed when requested.
9. Costs incurred by state governments and local economies due to the loss
of hunting opportunity and all the revenue and wildlife management it
generated were nowhere anticipated or described realistically.
10. Anticipated loss of large-scale familial and cultural family hunting and
other outdoor traditions was neither mentioned nor quantified in the impacts
expected from the release and protection of wolves.
11. The loss of ranches, livestock production, and the significant
diminishment of rural economies were ignored and are still denied by those
responsible.  
This record should give a court the opportunity to tell the Federal
government that USFWS is totally incapable of describing the impact of its
programs due to its own self-serving stake in the outcome and thus (at
least) ask a court to designate or direct the Congress or the President to
designate a different process or entity to write such documents and
implement such programs from now on.  Such a finding may be a “violation” of
the duties and functions expected of an agency under this specific law or in
general under their charter.  If USFWS cannot perform such a basic
governmental requirement then the responsibility should be placed elsewhere.
If USFWS DELIBERATELY ignored multitudinous harms and dangers in order to
introduce the wolves anyway, they should be prosecuted and the program
reversed.  16USC, Sec. 1533?  50 CFR, Sec. 424?

6. The entire relationship, going back to the early 1990’s     between USFWS
and the Defenders of Wildlife (an organization that since its inception has
been a foe of USFWS programs as evidenced by lawsuits and opposition
publicly to Federal and State fish and wildlife management and use programs
as well as the ownership and use of wildlife by US citizens) is one that
bears close examination.  For instance:
-Did the Defenders of Wildlife actively participate in the capture,
transfer, and release of wolves into Yellowstone in 1995?  What role (both
personnel-wise and financially) did DOW play in that effort?
-Is it permissible for a governmental function like compiling and
compensating livestock owners for animals lost to wolves to be given to a
Non-Government Organization (NGO) like DOW with an agenda opposed to state
wildlife authority, ranching, hunting, and the Constitutional rights of
rural American citizens?
-On what basis can recording wolf damage be awarded by USFWS to an NGO that
is deeply involved in one side of a very partisan wolf program?
      -Although the 2nd female USFWS Director appointed DOW to be the sole
authority on “documented” wolf damage to livestock, and even though this
same Director left USFWS with the election of President Bush and then waited
3 years (2 ½ of them in a top job at the Wildlife Federation) before
assuming a top job with the Defenders of Wildlife: was there any quid pro
quo during her tenure as USFWS Director regarding USFWS decisions like the
quasi-governmental role awarded DOW and future employment?
      -What political activities, donations, and support regarding state and
local elections does DOW engage in?  Have any government funds been used to
influence political elections or to influence political votes? Did DOW lead
an effort to defeat Congressman Pombo? Is DOW leading a current effort to
defeat Congressman Pombo’s bid for re-election?
      -How close to the line of illegality are all or any of these
involvements, violations of election laws?  Of lobbying laws?  Of use of
federal funds?  Of simple government ethics regulations? – P.L. 100-478?

7.   Can items 1 through 6 be combined in whole or in part to indicate a
Conspiracy either among federal employees or between federal employees and
others, like DOW?

8.  If USFWS empowers DOW to compensate livestock owners for provable loss
of their property (livestock) how can it (USFWS) refuse to similarly
compensate dog owners or other animal owners for the provable loss of their
property to wolves?  Similarly how can the federal government that
introduced, protected, and spread the wolves not be liable for human attacks
by wolves?  What of the loss of huntable animal populations to federal
wolves, since if MY dogs kill game animals I am fined and punished to
prevent any such future loss of game animals (i.e. public property under
state jurisdiction managed for all the residents of the state)?  Is this not
a violation of the “Equal Treatment” before the law prominently stated in
the XIV Amendment, “nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty,
or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its
jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”  Even if you make the
argument, “why that only applies to the States, not the federal government”,
then each state allowing this disparate treatment (livestock owners v. dog
owners, big game hunters, humans attacked by introduced wolves, etc.) under
federal law is violating the 14th Amendment and should be sued to force them
to “protect” the “life” and “property” of its residents “equally”.  There
seems to be no doubt about the awful dilemma created by the USFWS and
gutless states here.  Were I to move into your neighborhood and let my
Dobermans run loose and kill your dog and your calves and wild fawns in
parks while keeping families sealed up in their homes and causing you to not
let you kids walk home from the school bus stop: would I not be liable and
would not the state have a responsibility to protect you and your property?
The fact that federal policies and laws create such a situation in our
communities with no federal accountability and that state governments are
nowhere in evidence is disgraceful and I would argue illegal with only the
most rudimentary reading of the US and most State Constitutions.

[wolfbait]

B. Violations resulting from and associated with a cover-up of past
criminal activity associated with the wolf introduction or in furtherance of
current and future cooperation to ensure the continued expansion of areas
supporting wolf populations.

1. Fifteen plus or minus years (mid 1980’s to late 1990’s) failure of
USFWS to audit state fish and wildlife agencies’ compliance with excise tax
expenditures and other requirements to continue receiving such Wildlife
Restoration funding.  This specific requirement in the legislation
authorizing the entire excise tax program was let slide as USFWS strived to
become more “green” (I.e. more non-“management” and use oriented) in its own
programs and to allow state agencies to likewise use the excise taxes for
similar, but prohibited uses like non-sport fish projects and replacing
non-native game species with native non-game species.  During this
dereliction of USFWS duties one state sold wildlife lands to a prison (a
violation), another, paid state park employees salaries (a violation), and
another bought a vehicle fleet and put it in the statewide motor pool for
all state employees to use (a violation).  Were it not for late-at-night
State whistleblowers, these would have gone undetected and bred more such
violations. This made it harder and harder for state fish and wildlife
agencies to stand up to USFWS over anything as each state had more and more
skeletons hidden in their closets.  Remember to add to this the increasing
grant dollars from federal sources (Endangered Species, Research, “adaptive
management” etc.) and the growing conviction that “hunting (license money
particularly) was on the way out” and you have state fish and wildlife
employees more and more beholden to federal bureaucrats than to state
residents or even state governments for that matter.  As proof that the
state fish and wildlife cowards were right that “hunting is on the way out”,
as wolves have eradicated Idaho (a former premiere destination for
non-resident big game hunters) elk and deer such that current (as this is
written) non-resident hunting license applications that are normally quickly
sold out are only 3,235 applicants for 14,023 available permits.  The
failure to audit state agencies by USFWS was an intentional action to
further neutralize state agencies that might think of objecting to USFWS
plans not only for wolves but for land acquisition, introduction and
protection of other predators like grizzly bears and jaguars and a whole
host of planned private property takings and game species’ eradications of
(“Invasive”) species like brown trout, pheasants, Hungarian Partridge,
Rainbow trout, Pacific striped bass, Great Lakes salmon, etc.  The reason
for these intended eradications is the bizarre offense that these animals
(though highly prized by sportsmen and others) arrived in North America
AFTER Christopher Columbus. Today South Dakotans and Iowans have had to
fight their state wildlife agency to control the cougars spreading into
their states.  Today the Iowa wildlife agency burns pheasant nesting and
wintering habitat in the spring on state hunting areas to ostensibly
establish “Native Prairie” while actually eliminating the few remaining
pheasants (just like is currently happening at Bowdoin National Refuge here
in Montana as I speak).

2. State audit discrepancy cover-up of State irregularities in excise tax
expenditures and the illegal “hiring” of the US Department of the Interior
Inspector General as a contractor by USFWS an agency under the purview of
that Inspector General. After the theft of the +/-$60M USFWS had to quickly
restore the 5-year State audit cycle but they no longer had qualified
employees (who had formerly conducted the audits from the 1940’s to the mid
1970’s when they started becoming less and less frequent).  A contract audit
agency was hired to audit each state fish and wildlife agency in the next
five years.  There were 2 real difficulties.  First, the states had not been
properly audited for a long time and they were (like USFWS) a budget
hodgepodge of funds, restrictions, earmarked funds, separate offices and
conflicting missions.  Additionally, some state agencies are in larger
Departments of Natural Resources where fund “sharing” and abuses of the
excise taxes are harder to detect.  Second, the auditors were not familiar
with fish and wildlife organizations and programs (as were growing numbers
of USFWS employees).  Thus misuse of excise taxes for illegal “green agenda”
purposes were not only concealed but readily denied by state managers that
saw this as their career future “when hunting disappears” and federal funds
became even more important.  After 2 years, the auditors were somewhat
behind schedule (not surprisingly) but they had already confirmed over
$130Million in misused excise tax dollars from shady land transfers to
political profiteering and timber sales revenues that were deposited in
state coffers rather than in fish and wildlife accounts as required by law.
So USFWS fired the auditors when they showed no inclination to “smooth” over
their findings.  USFWS then “hired” the US Department of the Interior
INSPECTOR GENERAL (IG), who is appointed by the Justice Department and
confirmed by the Senate TO OVERSEE the USFWS among others, to conduct the
state audits.  The IG didn’t even audit USFWS and was more a political
figurehead than anything.  That IG moved on to being currently
Vice-President Biden’s IG or “Czar” overseeing the “Stimulus Funding”.
Anyway, the current IG is still given +$3m per year to “audit” state
agencies.  By the way, the $130 Million misuse was (settled? explained?
erased?) and no other major problems have been unearthed.
Question, is it legal for a federal agency to (“hire”, “contract with”,
“pay”, “employ”) an Inspector General with oversight responsibilities for
that agency?  This is like some bank or trucking company hiring the County
Sheriff to do X, Y, and Z. Could such a thing ever be legal, tolerable, or
ethical, aside from the corruption that such an arrangement would inevitably
breed?
What happened to the $130 Million misused by state agencies?  When added to
the stolen, and never replaced, $60Million and funds probably spent in
Canada catching wolves and we are up to at least $200+ Million lost to
American hunters, anglers, and outdoorsmen. At what point does all this (to
paraphrase the late Senator Everett Dirksen) “become real money”?
The laws violated here are numerous and the mind boggles at what has evolved
between USFWS, the IG, and state fish and wildlife agencies in the interim.
– 26USC4161 +?

3.  Stolen excise tax dollars were never replaced. You might wonder why the
+/-$60M documented as stolen from the excise taxes was never replaced?  Well
aside from the national political interest in containing the scandal, THE
STATE FISH AND WILDLIFE AGENCIES NEVER REQUESTED THAT IT BE REPLACED! How
could that be?  Well I have already mentioned the steady slide of state fish
and wildlife agencies from being state agencies in service of their state,
its residents, and its government to quasi-subcontractors for all manner of
federal programs and federal bureaucracies.  The thought of antagonizing
federal bureaucrats (especially USFWS bureaucrats from whom more and more of
their future financial support was anticipated to come from) was probably
like Italian troops in North Africa in 1942 making up their minds about what
to do about the Allied horde that was descending on them – they surrendered
quietly.
         The money was never requested to be replaced because the state fish
and wildlife Directors and their Washington, DC lobby group decided to
remain noncommittal after USFWS signed an agreement with them to annually
transfer $3M or more of the excise taxes to the states’ lobby group in
Washington to “fund multi-state projects of their choosing”.  This formerly
jealously-guarded USFWS prerogative was surrendered quietly and privately.
The lobby group doubled its staff and everyone (except the hunters, anglers,
and outdoorsmen) was happy.  Even the hunting and fishing groups and the
hunting and fishing business groups were happy since they could now feed
together on the excise taxes because of their “close” relations with the
state agencies and their lobbyists.
         Questions: Can a lobby group receive federal funding?  Can a lobby
group (just like the DOW precedent) determine the disposition of federal
funds?  Are there any state laws that require that a state fish and wildlife
Director inform his managers and state government that funds due the state
were stolen and should be replaced?  Is it a dereliction of duty for state
fish and wildlife employees, or Congressmen, or the President when they
become aware of an illicit loss of hunting and fishing funds collected for
and destined for state hunting and fishing programs to not ask for or
provide for their replacement?  Should such state employees have demanded
the punishment of those that stole the funds?  Can such a financial
arrangement on the heels of the GAO Audit be construed as a conspiracy, or a
quid pro quo, or simply “hush” money?
Like the man digging through the manure in the barn, “there must be a pony
(a law violation or two) in here somewhere”.

4. Using tax money to bribe a witness aware of government theft of
funds to keep quiet. The cash settlement paid to me when I retired was paid
in three, one-year, installments.  The agreement I signed with USFWS (after
10 months at home and testifying twice before a Congressional Committee,
etc.) stated that if I mentioned or wrote about anything or any circumstance
surrounding or having to do with my retirement or the USFWS activities
during the time leading up to my retirement I would forfeit any money due me
and would have to return all money paid me under this settlement.  In other
words, a government employee involved in government (public?) business was
to be paid WITH public taxpayer money BY government managers to keep quiet
about anything he knew or was aware of concerning his publicly paid-for
activities.  There was no “classified” aspect to this, only government
managers using government funds to have an employee keep quiet about
government activities.  Interested media or hunting and fishing groups were
to be told NOTHING, except the federal explanations given to state managers
at a federal Conservation Training Facility in West Virginia (it was all a
“bookkeeping error”, I kid you not).
         This stopped any further publicity and allowed everyone involved
with the wolf introduction from the Director (now at DOW) and the former
Democrat staff person (now a high USFWS official) and the US Senator’s
daughter (now also in a top USFWS management position) on down to move on
honorably and profitably.  Can such use of public funds ever be justifiable?
Is that a bribe?  I say that knowing that I accepted it due to the duress my
wife and I were under for almost 2 years and that was threatening to destroy
our lives.  Accepting that restriction was probably the dirtiest part, for
me, of all the circumstances that marked my departure from USFWS.  – 18USC,
Sec.201?

So there you have at least 12 actual or likely law violations associated
with the introduction, protection, and spread of wolves in the Lower 48
states.  I accuse federal bureaucrats, state bureaucrats, non-governmental
organizations, Washington lobbyists, and even myself.  It was a sordid
affair and it has only grown worse.  The “losers” thus far are ranchers,
hunters, dog owners, rural residents (especially parents, children, and the
elderly), local and state governments, and American Constitutional
government.  The “winners”, although many have gone onto higher salaries and
more power, have yet to be determined.  When those of us that have been
“losers” to date turn this government excess train around we will be the
“winners” because we will know where apathy led us and we will never let
this happen again.

Jim Beers
12 May 2010