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Missouri farmer pardoned by Bush
By Rick Montgomery/The Kansas City Star, Mo.
For his part, Missouri farmer Leslie Owen Collier said he never meant to kill anything but coyotes. But his gripe with the ravenous critters inadvertently led to -- oops -- the poisoning of America's national bird.
It took years for the matter to land on President Bush's desk. But Collier finally has his pardon.
"Little ol' me got a pardon from the president! Kind of mind-numbing, I guess," he said.
Bush has been relatively stingy when it comes to clemency. But this week, among 16 pardons and commutations he approved, the president without explanation plucked out of obscurity the curious case of Collier.
"People think that pardons only go to the rich and well connected, but that's really not the case," said P.S. Ruckman, an Illinois political scientist and editor of PardonPower.com. "The typical pardon goes to the average person" who never made national news.
Coyotes were threatening the turkey population around Collier's land overlooking the Mississippi River, near the Missouri Bootheel town of Charleston. So in 1995, he spiked hamburger meat with carbofuran, a pesticide that worked well in killing the coyotes.
But birds took to pecking the carcasses. Three of the birds were bald eagles. They died, too, prompting the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to charge into town.
Collier admitted setting the bait. He pleaded guilty to felony counts of violating the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act -- a 1940 law aimed at saving the threatened birds from trappers -- and for using a pesticide in an unauthorized manner.
A federal judge could have jailed Collier, 50, for a year, but chose not to so long as he paid $10,000 in restitution.
"I like bald eagles as much as anybody," Collier said. "I never realized they were such scavengers."
The bald eagle law makes no distinction between intentional and accidental killings, said a Fish and Wildlife Service spokesman.
Charleston lawyer James R. Robison, who described Collier as "absolutely a model citizen," but no more politically connected than most Bootheel farmers, said: "They autopsied every dead bird they could find, and every one of them had coyote meat in them."
For Collier, the harshest consequence of the conviction was "I couldn't go hunting with my kids," because felons in most cases are prohibited from owning firearms.
It was this love of hunting that drove Collier to try to save the turkeys from the coyotes in the first place.
Several years ago his family and friends launched the bid for a presidential pardon. Collier's application was one of more than 15,000 requests for pardons and commutations since Bush took office. He has granted only 171.
The government's prosecution of Collier "made a lot of people in Mississippi County real angry," said former Missouri lawmaker Lanie Black, who contacted U.S. Rep. Jo Ann Emerson on Collier's behalf. "It raised the whole issue of the difference between rural America and urban America.
"I think there was a multitude of letters and calls to the White House from regular folks who said, 'This guy's getting the shaft.' ... It was a long shot, but one worth taking."
The FBI revisited the case, and the Justice Department announced Collier's pardon without elaboration.
Also benefiting from Bush's latest round of pardons: a Georgia woman convicted of bank embezzlement, a purloiner of food stamps, a Texas man who transported hazardous waste without a permit, and hip-hop artist John Edward Forte, whose prison term for dealing cocaine was commuted.
Singer Carly Simon rose to Forte's defense.
Collier said he wasn't sure who, if anyone, gave him a political boost.
"Three deacons in my church said they had a few connections with politicians," he said. "All Republicans."
To reach Rick Montgomery, call 816-234-4410 or send e-mail to rmontgomery@kcstar.com.
To see more of The Kansas City Star, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.kansascity.com.
Copyright © 2008, The Kansas City Star, Mo.
Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.
Subscribe To Lake AlertsIt took years for the matter to land on President Bush's desk. But Collier finally has his pardon.
"Little ol' me got a pardon from the president! Kind of mind-numbing, I guess," he said.
Bush has been relatively stingy when it comes to clemency. But this week, among 16 pardons and commutations he approved, the president without explanation plucked out of obscurity the curious case of Collier.
"People think that pardons only go to the rich and well connected, but that's really not the case," said P.S. Ruckman, an Illinois political scientist and editor of PardonPower.com. "The typical pardon goes to the average person" who never made national news.
Coyotes were threatening the turkey population around Collier's land overlooking the Mississippi River, near the Missouri Bootheel town of Charleston. So in 1995, he spiked hamburger meat with carbofuran, a pesticide that worked well in killing the coyotes.
But birds took to pecking the carcasses. Three of the birds were bald eagles. They died, too, prompting the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to charge into town.
Collier admitted setting the bait. He pleaded guilty to felony counts of violating the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act -- a 1940 law aimed at saving the threatened birds from trappers -- and for using a pesticide in an unauthorized manner.
A federal judge could have jailed Collier, 50, for a year, but chose not to so long as he paid $10,000 in restitution.
"I like bald eagles as much as anybody," Collier said. "I never realized they were such scavengers."
The bald eagle law makes no distinction between intentional and accidental killings, said a Fish and Wildlife Service spokesman.
Charleston lawyer James R. Robison, who described Collier as "absolutely a model citizen," but no more politically connected than most Bootheel farmers, said: "They autopsied every dead bird they could find, and every one of them had coyote meat in them."
For Collier, the harshest consequence of the conviction was "I couldn't go hunting with my kids," because felons in most cases are prohibited from owning firearms.
It was this love of hunting that drove Collier to try to save the turkeys from the coyotes in the first place.
Several years ago his family and friends launched the bid for a presidential pardon. Collier's application was one of more than 15,000 requests for pardons and commutations since Bush took office. He has granted only 171.
The government's prosecution of Collier "made a lot of people in Mississippi County real angry," said former Missouri lawmaker Lanie Black, who contacted U.S. Rep. Jo Ann Emerson on Collier's behalf. "It raised the whole issue of the difference between rural America and urban America.
"I think there was a multitude of letters and calls to the White House from regular folks who said, 'This guy's getting the shaft.' ... It was a long shot, but one worth taking."
The FBI revisited the case, and the Justice Department announced Collier's pardon without elaboration.
Also benefiting from Bush's latest round of pardons: a Georgia woman convicted of bank embezzlement, a purloiner of food stamps, a Texas man who transported hazardous waste without a permit, and hip-hop artist John Edward Forte, whose prison term for dealing cocaine was commuted.
Singer Carly Simon rose to Forte's defense.
Collier said he wasn't sure who, if anyone, gave him a political boost.
"Three deacons in my church said they had a few connections with politicians," he said. "All Republicans."
To reach Rick Montgomery, call 816-234-4410 or send e-mail to rmontgomery@kcstar.com.
To see more of The Kansas City Star, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.kansascity.com.
Copyright © 2008, The Kansas City Star, Mo.
Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.
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J. SLUGMAN wrote on Nov 29, 2008 8:40 AM: