Smuggling is a serious problem. Smugglers illegally transport drugs, guns, and tragically, even people. However, you don’t often hear about a traffic stop putting an end to a deer trafficking operation.
Police apprehended Texas men after a traffic stop revealed seven ‘improperly identified’ deer and a smuggling scheme
The Texas Parks & Wildlife Department (TPWD) has a lot on its plate. After all, Texas is mind-blowingly huge, stretching across vast stretches of the US-Mexico border and the Gulf. Still, the TPWD has to be alert for smuggling operations taking advantage of the Lone Star State’s wildlife.
Fortunately, a recent traffic stop halted a smuggling operation in its tracks. Authorities in Montogomery County stopped a vehicle while it was traveling from East Texas. Surprisingly, a game warden found seven white-tailed deer in the vehicle. The deer were “ghost deer,” meaning the animals were “not properly identified” by the breeder. What’s more, the two men reportedly planned on releasing the animals in Duval and Brazoria Counties in South Texas.
As silly as it sounds, Texas takes deer smuggling really, really seriously. According to Texas Parks & Wildlife, authorities track breeder deer to control the spread of disease and promote healthy populations. Consequently, authorities convicted the two men of 57 breeder violations. Surprisingly, the nearly 60 violations amounted to $12,060 in fines.
TPWD Law Enforcement Director Ronald VanderRoest says violations like these “creates the potential for negative impacts to the health of both captive and free-ranging deer populations, the deer breeder industry, landowners, hunters and Texas’ outdoor and rural based economies, where white-tailed deer hunting has a $9.6 billion annual economic contribution.”
Now, the vehicle at the traffic stop in question had to be pretty large. Even a juvenile white-tailed deer can weigh over 100 lbs and take up more space than a large dog. Consequently, seven deer would require quite a bit of space to transport.
