Benjamin N. Chason, Wildlife Trafficking, Ohio 2014

COLUMBUS, Ohio – Benjamin N. Chason, 61, of Climax, Ga. was sentenced in U.S. District Court for three charges related to violating the Lacey Act.

Chason was ordered to pay $1.6 million in fines and restitution, the largest sum of money ordered of an individual to pay for a wildlife crime in the United States. Of the $1.6 million, $600,000 is to be paid into the Ohio Department of Natural Resources Wildlife Habitat Fund, $200,000 to the Federal Endangered Species and Wildlife Diversity Fund, $400,000 to Columbus and Franklin County Metro Parks and $100,000 to the Ohio DNR Division of Wildlife Turn in a Poacher (TIP) program.

According to court documents, Chason and co-conspirator Donald W. Wainwright, Sr. trafficked in live white-tailed deer. Wainwright Sr. owned hunting preserves in Logan County, Ohio, and Live Oak, Florida; both preserves were named Valley View Whitetails. Chason was part-owner of Valley View Whitetails in Ohio and also owned an extensive high-fenced property containing white-tailed deer in Climax, Ga.

Wainwright Sr. illegally shipped deer to Florida from Ohio and attempted to ship deer to Georgia from Ohio. The deer herds involved with these shipments were not certified to be free from chronic wasting disease, tuberculosis and brucellosis. Federal law requires interstate shipments of deer to be certified to be disease-free; because the deer in the present case were not certified as disease-free, deer herds (both captive and wild) in Florida were potentially exposed to these diseases. Tuberculosis and brucellosis can also be transmitted from deer to cows and humans.

The attempted shipment to Georgia was intercepted on I-71 South, about 50 miles from the Ohio River, when Ohio Division of Wildlife officers noticed deer noses and antlers inside a cargo trailer and pulled over a truck driven by Wainwright Sr.’s employees. Wainwright Sr. and Chason placed federal identification tags from a certified deer that had previously died into the ear of an uncertified deer they were selling. They then sold breeding services and semen from the deer to breeders around the United States. The defendants also sold illegal white-tailed deer hunts at Valley View Whitetails of Ohio.

Chason pleaded guilty on May 1, 2014. Besides being ordered to pay restitution, Chason was sentenced to three years of probation and four months of home confinement.

Benjamin N. Chason, Defendant, exact criminal charges, Violating the Lacey Act, three counts, COLUMBUS, Ohio, May 1, 2014, $1.6 million in fines and restitution, three years of probation and four months of home confinement.

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