State and federal authorities completed a four-year undercover investigation of a Dorchester County hunt club over the weekend, arresting or issuing citations to almost two dozen guides, fishermen and hunters charged with about 400 violations of game and fishing laws.
Maryland Natural Resources Police say they began documenting illegal hunting and fishing at the 2,000-acre Golden Hills Farm in February 1995, booking hunting trips through the farm's guide service. They continued their investigation when the farm became a shooting club and began charging members annual dues in 1996.
Natural Resources Police officers and agents from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service served arrest, search and seizure warrants and citations to 22 people in Dorchester and Montgomery counties and in New Jersey and Michigan early Sunday morning. Golden Hills Farm is in a remote area off Meekins Neck Road, south of Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge.
Members and nonmembers of the hunt club are accused of a variety of violations, including baiting duck blinds, using live decoys, killing waterfowl out of season, failing to register deer kills with the state and taking rockfish and flounder out of season.
"For a number of years, the farm provided guides who took hunters out," said Richard McIntire, a spokesman for the Department of Natural Resources. "Then, in 1996, annual memberships were offered to previous hunters and their guests."
John F. Belfiore, a Washington resident whose family has owned the Dorchester County property since 1959, said he had heard only rumors of the arrests.
The hunt club is operated by his son, Tony, who lives on Golden Hills Farm.
Tony Belfiore could not be reached to comment yesterday.
State officials say this is the biggest enforcement operation of its type since 1990, when 30 people were arrested for violating game and fishing laws along the Chester River.
W. Warren Hamel, a prosecutor in the U.S. attorney's office in Baltimore, said federal and state wildlife agencies frequently cooperate, but that the undercover operation was handled by Natural Resources Police.
"It is relatively unusual to have a case with this many charges and to have this many people involved," Hamel said.
Of the 22 suspects, five -- all Hoopers Island residents -- were arrested.
They were identified as: Robert Larry Gootee, 27; Larry Ritchie Powley, 46; Edward William Davis, 40; Ronnie William Robbins, 39; and Scott Ruark, 30.
Each was released on $10,000 bond yesterday.
Each charge carries a maximum penalty of six months in jail and a $5,000 fine.
Gootee, the hunt club's caretaker, head guide and treasurer, refused to comment yesterday. Powley, said by the U.S. attorney's office to have worked as a guide at Golden Hills, and the three others could not be reached.
The 17 others received citations charging them with lesser violations. They have the option of paying fines ranging from $120 to $200 if they do not contest the charges, McIntire said.
Pub Date: 3/09/99