“They’ll never be able to link it to us.”
Help bears. Stop this cruelty! hsus.link/383j83
“They’ll never be able to link it to us.”
That's what Andrew Renner and his son, Owen Renner, thought when they skied to a remote den on Esther Island in Prince William Sound, Alaska and illegally slaughtered a family of hibernating black bears.
Their despicable actions were captured on a wildlife camera, set up by the US Forest Service and the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, to study the bears. The haunting video footage shows the men creeping up to the bears’ winter den and shooting the mother as her two babies shriek in fear, until more shots pierce the air.
The hunting of cubs, or a mother bear with cubs, is illegal in this part of Alaska. But that didn’t stop the Renners from murdering innocent animals, posing for a picture with the dead mother on the bloodstained snow and smugly stating, “We go where we want to kill.”
Andrew and Owen Renner were not found innocent, after destroying evidence at the scene and presenting the adult carcass as a legal kill to the state’s wildlife agency, lying about killing the cubs and submitting falsified information. They later plead guilty; each received jail time and had their hunting licenses suspended. Andrew was fined $9,000 and forfeited personal property including a 22-foot boat, his vehicle and various weapons.
Justice was served—but these animals deserve more respect and compassion. Federal law currently forbids this practice on national preserves in Alaska, but the current administration is looking to remove such prohibitions. If this heinous cruelty occurs while protections are already in place, overturning them would all but encourage these massacres to continue.
We need more federal protections, not less, to ensure that these types of cruel and horrific activities are banned for good.
