TONAWANDA, N.Y. (1010 WINS/WCBS 880) — Two hunters pleaded guilty for illegally hunting deer last month after they were caught in what the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation called an “elaborate poaching scheme,” which included the offenders catfishing wildlife photographers on Facebook to locate prey.
Jayson Zorada, of Oneonta, and Kevin Butler, of Afton, pleaded guilty to misdemeanor charges related to the killing of two bucks in a Tonawanda area closed to deer hunting on Dec. 14, officials said.
The investigation began on Nov. 14, 2022, when Environmental Conservation Police Officer (ECO) Mathis and the Towanda Police Department received reports of two suspicious men walking in the woods near the Raintree Apartments.
A witness, who is an avid hunter, saw a man crouching in the woods behind his home before he heard what sounded like the snap of a bow discharging.
The witness then observed a large, 16-point buck run into his yard after being struck with an arrow, and a second man took pictures of the deer with his cell phone, the DEC said.
The men fled before police arrived, but were quickly identified as Zorada and Butler by photos taken from trail cameras that were posted online.
Investigators interviewed the men, who denied any wrongdoing; however, search warrants exercised by DEC’s Divsion of Law Enforcement at the hunters’ residences proved this to be a lie.
Officers seized cell phones, hunting equipment and the clothes the hunters wore on the day the buck was killed.
According to the DEC, a larger scheme was uncovered when officials went through phone records. The hunters conspired with a larger group of poachers that used social media posts of hunting and wildlife photography to target bucks in areas closed to hunting.
The warrant also discovered Zorada’s fictitious Facebook profile, on which he posed as a female nature photographer.
Zorada used the account to reach out to photographers and learn the locations of mature urban bucks so he could poach them, the DEC said.
The poachers would hide compact bows in backpacks and put arrows in hollow walking sticks to disguise their intent to potential witnesses.
Zorada and Butler pleaded guilty to misdemeanor charges for the illegal hunting, paid $1,075 in fines and surcharges each and had their hunting licenses revoked for five years.
Other individuals were implicated in this investigation, and those charges are pending, the DEC said.