COSHOCTON, Ohio — An Amish man was ordered to pay $28,000 for poaching a 26-point buck — more than $1,000 for each point on the nowhere-near-record-breaking antlers that he had to forfeit.
Junior L. Troyer, 43, of Millersburg, Ohio, entered pleas of no contest earlier this month in Coshocton Municipal Court to several hunting crimes:
- Providing false information while game-checking a deer.
- Attaching a game-check number to a deer originally issued to another.
- Taking more than one antlered deer in a licensed year.
- Possessing deer or deer parts without valid tag or permit.
- Attaching an anterless doe game-check number to an antlered deer.
All are third-degree misdemeanors.
On Dec. 13, Municipal Court Judge Tim France fined Troyer $150 for each charge and $87 in court costs. Additionally, Troyer was ordered to pay $27,904.46 in restitution to the State of Ohio based on the value of the deer.
Troyer's hunting privileges also were revoked for two years, and he was sentenced to serve 60 days in jail. France said he would suspend the jail time and reduce the revocation to one year if Troyer paid the total $28,741.46 in fines in full.
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Troyer is a member of the Amish community in Holmes County and could not be reached for comment. Members eschew electric power from utilities and don't have telephones in their homes.
On Thursday, the municipal court website listed all of his fines as paid.
After shooting an 8-point buck early in the day Nov. 7, Troyer went back out hunting in the evening and shot the 26-pointer, according to court records. He decapitated both deer and tagged in the body of the 8-pointer with the head of the 26-pointer.
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The next morning he checked in the headless body of the 26-pointer as a doe. He threw the head of the 8-point buck in a ditch, and authorities later recovered it.
By the way, Keith Szablewski of Johnson City, Illinois, may have broken the U.S. record in mid-November by legally bagging what could be a 51-point buck. A panel of Boon and Crockett Club judges will score his buck in July after the rack dries out, Farm Week Now radio reported.
Stephen Tucker of Gallatin, Tennessee, now holds the record after taking a buck with a 47-point rack in November 2016.
Contributing: Christopher Salvemini, Knoxville (Tenn.) News Sentinel. Follow Leonard Hayhurst on Twitter: @llhayhurst
