FAIRPLAY, Colo.—A software executive has been sentenced to 10 days in jail for authorizing the slaughter of 32 of his neighbor’s bison that wandered onto his Colorado ranch.
Jeff Hawn of Austin, Texas, pleaded guilty in November to criminal mischief and animal cruelty. He was sentenced Wednesday and ordered to report to jail by Feb. 2.
Prosecutors say Hawn gave 14 hunters permission to hunt the bison on his Park County land. The carcasses were found in March.
As part of a plea agreement, Hawn paid $83,000 to the bison’s owner, $70,000 to charities and $4,000 to the sheriff’s department. Hawn also performed 96 hours of community service as part of his sentence.
The criminal mischief charge, a felony, will be wiped from his record if he stays out of trouble during two years of probation.
Hawn is CEO of Seattle-based Attachmate Corp.
His lawyer, Pamela Mackey, didn’t immediately return a telephone message.
Monte Downare, who owned the bison, said the jail sentence was “well deserved.”
Like most Western, Colorado has laws making property owners responsible for building and maintaining fences if they want to keep livestock off their land. Livestock owners don’t have to keep their animals fenced in, although many do to protect their animals from increasing traffic and population.
“Even though they have a four-strand fence, it has to be maintained to make it a good fence,” Downare said. “I don’t think that they could get that through their head that that’s what the law is.”
Hawn had sued Downare on March 10, claiming the bison damaged his fences and turned his land into a “feedlot.” Bison can be more than 6 feet tall and weigh more than a ton.
On March 19, Monte Downare’s wife, Tracy, reported to the sheriff that someone was shooting the family’s bison.
Investigators found 32 dead bison on Hawn’s ranch and surrounding properties and detained 14 hunters. According to an arrest affidavit, Hawn had written a letter Feb. 18 giving permission to the hunters to shoot the bison.
In the lawsuit, Hawn claimed the bison had knocked his satellite television dishes off-line and left dung, tracks and hair on “pristine pasture on rolling hills.” He included a photograph of three bison walking past his deck as evidence.
The suit was dismissed in December.
