Speaker 1: After a ballgame one evening under a street lights. First
Speaker 1: time I seen him. The first time I seen him,
Speaker 1: I was one hundred percent sure he's two hundred inch deer,
Speaker 1: which I'd never seen a while deer with two hundred
Speaker 1: inch and still at that time wanted to kill this deer.
Speaker 2: Right, we're slipping into the year twenty twenty four behind
Speaker 2: the dull thwack of a bow string as a steel
Speaker 2: tipped arrow arches into the throat patch of a two
Speaker 2: hundred and four and four to eight inch drop time
Speaker 2: Missouri whitetail buck. This might sound like a moment of celebration,
Speaker 2: but you'd be mistaken if you thought that. For this archer,
Speaker 2: it was the beginning of a nightmare. On this episode,
Speaker 2: we're going to reveal the details of an egregious wildlife crime.
Speaker 2: But we won't be talking to the warden who cracked
Speaker 2: the case or the property owner of where the buck
Speaker 2: was poached. We're going to talk to the guy who's
Speaker 2: squeak the trigger, who devised a plan to falsify the
Speaker 2: location of the kill and decided the only thing that
Speaker 2: he could do was live. We will meet the man who,
Speaker 2: in two thousand and nine illegally killed a Boone and
Speaker 2: Crockett class buck on the Fort Leonardwood Military base near Waynesville, Missouri.
Speaker 2: It's a rare occurrence when someone is willing to open
Speaker 2: up about their failures. But that's exactly why I was
Speaker 2: intrigued by this story and this man, this poacher. However,
Speaker 2: as the hackles of justice rise on your neck, I
Speaker 2: want to raise a question of my own. How is
Speaker 2: a society do we judge criminals? How do we decide
Speaker 2: if we demand justice or extend mercy? How do we
Speaker 2: decide who to forgive? Because it's clear that each situation
Speaker 2: is treated differently, we'll learn that it has a lot
Speaker 2: to do with how the accused apologize. I'm interested in
Speaker 2: the metrics use to evaluate this story. We'll be talking
Speaker 2: with an expert to learn more. But the answer of
Speaker 2: this should be evident because you likely cast judgment and
Speaker 2: forgiveness almost daily, and the answer will shine deeply into
Speaker 2: our humanness, our value systems, and sometimes our own hypocrisy.
Speaker 2: And hey, if you want to hear all about and
Speaker 2: I mean all about how poaching this giant deer went down,
Speaker 2: then you're not going to want to miss this one.
Speaker 1: To walk up on him and grab his antlers. You
Speaker 1: should feel the most excitement you've ever had in your life,
Speaker 1: other than like one of your kids being born or something.
Speaker 1: And I kind of have the opposite feeling, and immediately
Speaker 1: I thought, there's no way that I'm going to get
Speaker 1: away with this.
Speaker 2: My name is Clay Nukem, and this is the Bear
Speaker 2: Grease Podcast, where we'll explore things forgotten but relevant, search
Speaker 2: for insight and unlikely places, and where we'll tell the
Speaker 2: story of Americans who live their lives close to the land.
Speaker 2: Presented by FHF Gear, American made purpose built hunting and
Speaker 2: fishing gear that's designed to be as rugged as the
Speaker 2: place as we explore. As I travel through central Missouri,
Speaker 2: stopping at gas stations, having lunch in a small town
Speaker 2: catfish restaurant, I'm struck by how mid American this place is.
Speaker 2: The geographic center of America is Lebanon, Kansas, but I'd
Speaker 2: be tempted to think that it's Dixon, Missouri, which is
Speaker 2: derned near the center of the show me state. And
Speaker 2: I really like miss Zuri like the gouy center of
Speaker 2: a cinnamon roll. The people are hospitable, genuine and modest.
Speaker 2: They seem more trusting than the exterior parts of America.
Speaker 2: My trip up here started about a week prior. I'd
Speaker 2: been contacted by a guy paying Brent and I a
Speaker 2: much appreciated compliment when he slipped in a few sentences
Speaker 2: that caught my attention like a mule when a feed
Speaker 2: bucket rattles. He wrote, I killed a two hundred and
Speaker 2: four inch buck on Fort Leonard Wood in two thousand
Speaker 2: and nine. I let greed in the thought that I
Speaker 2: had to kill him to be a man get the
Speaker 2: best of me. A buddy of mine posted a picture
Speaker 2: on a website and it blew up. Two weeks after
Speaker 2: I killed him, I was arrested at work and things
Speaker 2: got bad. The message continued on with more details, but
Speaker 2: he insinuated that his life unraveled after the event in
Speaker 2: the bigger way than the confiscations and fines instituted by
Speaker 2: a government agency. Something about him and the story caught
Speaker 2: my attention. It wasn't just the size of the buck,
Speaker 2: but a rare genuineness in him. I caught the whiff
Speaker 2: of a man who'd been through the ringer, and I
Speaker 2: figured yet a unique angle on life. At first, I
Speaker 2: didn't know what his motivation would be for talking, but
Speaker 2: I was about to find out. In my next message,
Speaker 2: I asked if he'd be willing to tell this story publicly.
Speaker 2: To my surprise, he said that he would. I want
Speaker 2: you guys to meet Donnie Baker of Dixon, Missouri. He's
Speaker 2: forty years old, a widower, a father of two teenage children.
Speaker 2: He loves to run beagles and bowhunt, and by trade,
Speaker 2: he's a telecommunications technician. But before we meet Donnie, I
Speaker 2: would like to strike a deal with you, the listener.
Speaker 2: I'll tell you the story if you will keep in mind.
Speaker 2: So all I'm asking you keep in mind that he
Speaker 2: didn't have to tell us this one. He didn't have
Speaker 2: to tell us about one of the worst moments in
Speaker 2: his life. He didn't owe that to me or you.
Speaker 2: He volunteered it. And in a way, he's putting himself
Speaker 2: on public trial again. We're going to hear the case
Speaker 2: and make a judgment. These events took place over fourteen
Speaker 2: years ago, So our deal is that you just keep
Speaker 2: that in mind. Now we're going to dive right into
Speaker 2: the story with Donnie. Where do you think a good
Speaker 2: place to start would be.
Speaker 1: Probably about the first time I seen that, dear yeah,
Speaker 1: would have been in two thousand and seven. I was
Speaker 1: playing softball in Fort Leonard Wood and the guy that
Speaker 1: ran the league on Fort Wood's name is John Clapp.
Speaker 1: After a ballgame, he hollered at means and I guess
Speaker 1: they call it like a bird's nest or whatever. It's
Speaker 1: a tower in between all the fields. He said, come
Speaker 1: up here, I want to show you something. When I
Speaker 1: got up there, that buck was out there feeding. It
Speaker 1: was a big mainframe ten and on its right beam
Speaker 1: it had it just looked like a softball. It's a
Speaker 1: big knot, and that's what they called it was softball.
Speaker 1: The ballplayers that year, everybody had eventually seen it. The
Speaker 1: deer was always down there by, and it was after dark,
Speaker 1: you know, it was being illuminated by the ballfield lines.
Speaker 1: And after I saw it, my wife and I were
Speaker 1: dating at the time. We drove around many nights looking
Speaker 1: for him and seeing him. Seeing him a few times
Speaker 1: that year. He would have probably been closer to a
Speaker 1: one hundred and fifty inch deer at that time.
Speaker 2: This story begins with almost biblical vibes to me, like
Speaker 2: when King David looked off the balcony and saw Bathsheba
Speaker 2: bathing on the rooftop below. She was off limits married,
Speaker 2: and David knew it that something took seed in David's
Speaker 2: heart and he began to devise a plan to apprehend
Speaker 2: the Contraband This isn't exact exactly the sequence of what
Speaker 2: happened with Donnie.
Speaker 1: It was a.
Speaker 2: Different internal track towards violation, and as it turns out,
Speaker 2: there are uncountable circuitous ways that can lead a man
Speaker 2: to it. Fort Leonard Wood is a sixty one thousand
Speaker 2: acre military base in central Missouri, near the towns of
Speaker 2: Waynesville and Saint Roberts. It's about an hour northeast of
Speaker 2: Springfield and two hours west of Saint Louis. It's open
Speaker 2: to all kinds of hunting for people who have a
Speaker 2: permit and take a training course. However, there are areas
Speaker 2: where you cannot hunt, and this is important to remember.
Speaker 2: Large sections of the base are off limits to hunting,
Speaker 2: and everyone knows this. This is common for military bases
Speaker 2: where the public is allowed to hunt. But what I
Speaker 2: have not told you yet is that Donnie worked on
Speaker 2: the base. He started the base's first archery pro shop,
Speaker 2: owned by the military, designed to service the soldiers and
Speaker 2: their families who wanted to bow hunt. Donnie was an insider,
Speaker 2: and if you're like me, you probably just got your
Speaker 2: justice and Judgment scorecard out and are keeping track of
Speaker 2: the data points. And this tidbit is not favorable. When
Speaker 2: you saw this deer, like what what were you thinking?
Speaker 2: Were you thinking, I want to.
Speaker 1: Kill us deer? Yeah, and at that time it really wasn't.
Speaker 1: It moved a couple of times. It was close to
Speaker 1: a hunting area. There was a few people hunting him there.
Speaker 1: He was coming out of a legit hunting area and
Speaker 1: I hunted that area. But honestly, when I went to hunting,
Speaker 1: I'd say it was probably the tenth person to see
Speaker 1: that deer. So when I went to that area to
Speaker 1: hunt it, there was just looked like the Walmart parking lot.
Speaker 1: You know, anybody see that deer would hunt it. And
Speaker 1: it just took a little That was in the beginning
Speaker 1: of season and that was it for him. So I'm
Speaker 1: sure the pressure or whatever he went to wherever he hides,
Speaker 1: Like what was your mind frame at that time in
Speaker 1: your life? Would you have broken the law before? And
Speaker 1: you would have thought I'd do whatever it takes to
Speaker 1: kill that deer. I'm maybe, but he wasn't. I seen
Speaker 1: the deer a couple times after that and probably could
Speaker 1: have done something, but at the time, killing it wrong
Speaker 1: it wasn't what I was trying to do. I'd like
Speaker 1: to kill that deer right. Killing him illegally wasn't even
Speaker 1: I really didn't consider it.
Speaker 2: I'm sitting on a brown cloth couch across from Donnie,
Speaker 2: who's in a leather recliner in his comfortable, modest home
Speaker 2: outside of Dixon. The room is full of handsome shoulder
Speaker 2: mounted bucks killed by he and his son, most of
Speaker 2: which are archery kills. I'd shaken this man's hand for
Speaker 2: the first time all of thirty minutes before this conversation.
Speaker 2: I'm surprised by how comfortable he is telling me this story,
Speaker 2: and by how much it seems like he's telling me
Speaker 2: the real story. He isn't justifying his actions, he's not defensive,
Speaker 2: and for this, on my checklist, he gets some points
Speaker 2: for genuineness. I'm mesmerized by every word of this story,
Speaker 2: literally on the edge of my seat. But I'm also
Speaker 2: looking into his soul, trying to discern if he's telling
Speaker 2: me the truth, and I think he is. I ask
Speaker 2: him for more details. In eight, i'd heard stories of
Speaker 2: people seeing him, but I don't. I don't believe I
Speaker 2: ever saw him in O eight. When O nine come
Speaker 2: around summer of nine, everybody that hunts out there drives
Speaker 2: around of an evening right at dark to see where
Speaker 2: the deer are.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's just just something you can do. There's
Speaker 1: a lot of roads on Fort Wood and you can
Speaker 1: find something to hunt like that and not lighting them
Speaker 1: or anything, but just a dusk. And it's playing ball
Speaker 1: at the time. One evening after ball, I make the
Speaker 1: circle in an Army street. It's a street that connects
Speaker 1: Nebraska and First Street, and after a ball game, one
Speaker 1: evening under a street lights, first time I seen him.
Speaker 1: And that'll play into some of this as well, that
Speaker 1: that deer had seen a lot of people and it
Speaker 1: wasn't as wild as as some deer. I'm sure the
Speaker 1: first time I seen him, I was one hundred percent
Speaker 1: sure he's two hundred inch deer, which I'd never seen
Speaker 1: a wild deer with two hundred inch and still at
Speaker 1: that time wanted to kill this deer.
Speaker 2: Right, He gets honesty points by telling me the deer
Speaker 2: was accustomed to human presence. Often people leave out parts
Speaker 2: of stories that are less flattering, adding in parts that
Speaker 2: make them seem competent. I think I probably do that
Speaker 2: a lot. Donnie didn't have to say that about the deer,
Speaker 2: and the stakes also just got a bunch higher in
Speaker 2: two thousand and nine, when the deer was now believed
Speaker 2: to be over two hundred inches. I've seen pictures of
Speaker 2: this buck. He's a mainframe ten point over twenty inches
Speaker 2: wide with two dagger like four inch kickers coming off
Speaker 2: the right base. He's got a big flyer off the
Speaker 2: G two, which is the second time, and the cherry
Speaker 2: on top is that he he's got a Grade A
Speaker 2: American classic tenants drop time with a black lump on
Speaker 2: the end. You know what I'm talking about if you
Speaker 2: are a whitetail antler officionado. The left antler is a
Speaker 2: typical five point side with a cluster of small drop
Speaker 2: times just below the G two. The deer is a
Speaker 2: jaw dropper, and for any serious whitetail hunter, the two
Speaker 2: hundred inch mark is a pinnacle number that I'd guess
Speaker 2: ninety nine percent of hunters will never even see a
Speaker 2: deer that big in the woods much less kill one
Speaker 2: and as a culture, we've been messing around with giving
Speaker 2: cultural value to big antlers for over one hundred and
Speaker 2: fifty years, so we know they make people do crazy things.
Speaker 2: But here's an analogy for the uninformed to describe the situation.
Speaker 2: Everybody sees money all the time that they don't have
Speaker 2: permission to take, like when you see cash and a
Speaker 2: cash register at the store, and hunters see bucks pretty
Speaker 2: often that they don't have permission to take. So here's
Speaker 2: an analogy. The difference between seeing a one hundred and
Speaker 2: twenty five inch eight point, which would be a handsome
Speaker 2: buck anywhere in the country, and seeing a two hundred
Speaker 2: inch buck would be akin to seeing one hundred dollars
Speaker 2: bill on the table, which would be the eight point,
Speaker 2: next to a stack of one hundred thousand dollars cash,
Speaker 2: which would be the two hundred incher. It's a big divide,
Speaker 2: But Donnie wasn't planning on taking the one hundred k
Speaker 2: off the table. He planned to earn it fair and square,
Speaker 2: and he had proven that in the previous years. But
Speaker 2: so goes the plans of mice and men. And I
Speaker 2: have a quick question for you. Just think about this
Speaker 2: should the size of a buck matter in a poaching case? Secondly,
Speaker 2: a more personal question, would you go easier on a
Speaker 2: poacher that killed a basket rack eight point versus a
Speaker 2: hundred hundred and fifty inch deer? And if you have
Speaker 2: a clear answer, tell me why. Let's get back to
Speaker 2: Donnie though. Here's a description of where the buck lived.
Speaker 1: Through the rest of the summer getting into the fall. See him,
Speaker 1: I think, six times, always in the same place, on
Speaker 1: the same street. What that deer done. He lived in
Speaker 1: a little little block of brush behind a dining facility.
Speaker 1: And this deer's in the place you could legally hunting. No, sir,
Speaker 1: I never seen it in a legal hunting area. It
Speaker 1: was one hundred percent no. It was a contonement area.
Speaker 1: There was a running track there, dining facility, people parked
Speaker 1: around there. I mean it was defined. I mean everybody
Speaker 1: that hunts their nose, you cannot kill this.
Speaker 2: So at that time, where you considering hunting it illegally?
Speaker 1: No? At that time, I set cameras where I would
Speaker 1: see deer leave that area going into hunting areas because
Speaker 1: I knew, however he winted those hunting areas, he would
Speaker 1: come back the same way. He was pretty calm deer.
Speaker 1: And I don't know if I never did get a
Speaker 1: picture of him, never did get a game camera picture
Speaker 1: of you.
Speaker 2: At the time, Donnie was twenty six years old and
Speaker 2: he was a solid white tailed bow hunter and an
Speaker 2: archery expert. Remember he started the archery shop on the base.
Speaker 2: He'd formulated a solid strategy to hunt this buck legally. However,
Speaker 2: an early October evening drive would hijack his plan and
Speaker 2: his character. And I've got a second question for you.
Speaker 2: Does premeditated intent matter if the results are the same
Speaker 2: a dead buck or a crime committed, Why does the
Speaker 2: intent matter? Just think about it. But we're going to
Speaker 2: go back now to the character hijack. Here's Donnie October
Speaker 2: fourth of nine. I'd till through the day I was
Speaker 2: allowed to shoot my bow. I could help people shoot,
Speaker 2: and I go down the range take my bow and
Speaker 2: help sight in their bows and stuff.
Speaker 1: I'd shot my bone. I mean, I was dressed by
Speaker 1: like I am here, in blue jeans and probably I'm
Speaker 1: sure it was cool evening. I'd say, probably a camel hoodie.
Speaker 1: I'd shot my bow a little bit. I was driving
Speaker 1: a white Ford four door truck with a topper on it.
Speaker 1: I hit Army Streets soon as work was over, and
Speaker 1: when I was going to drive down through their see
Speaker 1: if I could see him. And as I'm driving down
Speaker 1: Army Street and it's it's not quite dusk yet, there's
Speaker 1: quite a bit of light. I looked to my left
Speaker 1: and he's standing where I've seen him two or three times.
Speaker 1: I thought, good grief.
Speaker 2: This good grief moment combined a new trio of circumstances
Speaker 2: that Donnie had yet to confront. He'd seen the buck
Speaker 2: multiple times over the last two years and never attempted
Speaker 2: to illegally kill it. However, this was the first time
Speaker 2: he'd seen it. Number one during the archery season, number
Speaker 2: two when he had a bow in the truck, and
Speaker 2: number three it was now a two hundred inch deer
Speaker 2: that was in striking distance standing in the ditch. It
Speaker 2: was a one two three judo kick that knocked him
Speaker 2: out cold. Every encounter up until this point had been
Speaker 2: buffered by barriers Donnie was unwilling to cross. However, this
Speaker 2: one was new. I think Biblical references are fair game
Speaker 2: here because of the influence of Judeo Christian ideology and
Speaker 2: American culture, whether you realize it or not. Early in
Speaker 2: this ancient book, in Genesis chapter four, there's the story
Speaker 2: of Cain who killed his brother Abel because of jealousy.
Speaker 2: Prior to the murder, he was warned to watch out
Speaker 2: for crouching sin. It reads, then the Lord said to Cain,
Speaker 2: sin is crouching at your door. It desires to have you,
Speaker 2: but you must rule over it. This is a really
Speaker 2: fundamental and foundational aspect of human life that people have
Speaker 2: to deal with whatever they want to call it. If
Speaker 2: they want to call it sin evil doing something wrong,
Speaker 2: like we all have this kind of code that we
Speaker 2: live by in our cultures. The Bible it wasn't the
Speaker 2: only book that talked about this, but it really helped
Speaker 2: introduce it to civilization. Life is a series of unfolding opportunities,
Speaker 2: often out of our control, but we are in control
Speaker 2: of how we respond to those opportunities. But the age
Speaker 2: old question is how much temptation can a person resist
Speaker 2: until they break their declared value system, until they're unable
Speaker 2: to rule over the power of the crouching evil. The
Speaker 2: ancient philosopher Socrates exhorted people to know thyself, which he
Speaker 2: was saying be aware of your limitations, be aware of
Speaker 2: your motivations, and make educated adjustments to your life based
Speaker 2: on this knowledge. The universal nature of the cane Able
Speaker 2: story is profound because its application isn't just in murder, poaching,
Speaker 2: or bank robbery. It's in the small decisions in our
Speaker 2: lives that no one else sees. Now we're back to
Speaker 2: Donnie in the truck with this bow within striking distance
Speaker 2: of a crouched lion.
Speaker 1: So I drived in Nebraska, turned around, and when I
Speaker 1: come back, I'm looking over there. Where he was at
Speaker 1: was because he was seventy five to one hundred yards
Speaker 1: off the road and he's nowhere to be seen. I thought, well,
Speaker 1: he spooked and I turned to my left and he
Speaker 1: was right in the road ditch on the north side
Speaker 1: of the army, I mean right there. And that's when
Speaker 1: I put it all together. There's a huge culvert there.
Speaker 1: It's almost a concrete bridge. He wasn't crossing over the highway.
Speaker 1: He was walking under it, so as I kind of
Speaker 1: hit my brakes and it spooks him a little bit
Speaker 1: and he hops down to the timber line. Well, when
Speaker 1: he gets to the timberline, in front of him are
Speaker 1: two really good bucks. It was a massive, huge eight
Speaker 1: point with little bitty brow tines and a really nice ten.
Speaker 1: So I pulled down. There's a running track there and
Speaker 1: some porta potties. So I pulled down to those porta
Speaker 1: potties and I thought, I thought I could kill it
Speaker 1: deer right there. And like I said, it was just
Speaker 1: just kind of I don't know if you ever when
Speaker 1: you was a kid shot at a bird on a
Speaker 1: sitting in a tree or something, just kind of and
Speaker 1: then when you do kill it, you think, oh man,
Speaker 1: that's kind of what I went through there. But I
Speaker 1: knew it was a non hunting area, so I grabbed
Speaker 1: my bow and and just jeans and boots, and well
Speaker 1: behind the porta potties up this little rise and there
Speaker 1: was a big old red oak that had died and
Speaker 1: fell over. And when I got to that red oak,
Speaker 1: I was considering if I should hucker down there or
Speaker 1: climb over it. And as I'm as, I'm contemplating that.
Speaker 2: So I mean, at this point, you've made a decision,
Speaker 2: You're legally kill this.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And let me ask you this.
Speaker 2: I mean, I think every human has experienced a moral
Speaker 2: dilemma of being given an opportunity that they know is
Speaker 2: wrong and then not taking it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but then.
Speaker 2: There's like this this suck, this drawl, something happens that
Speaker 2: all of a sudden you cross into a red zone
Speaker 2: and it's something flips.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well was at this time, Clay I had I
Speaker 1: had I'd had twenty two in my truck multiple times
Speaker 1: from squirrel hunting when I'd seen this deer. You know,
Speaker 1: if I had set out to poach this deer, I mean,
Speaker 1: I could have shot it many times. But when I
Speaker 1: saw that deer for the first time, I said, I've
Speaker 1: got to kill that deer. I mean, he just felt
Speaker 1: like that was almost a rite of passage for people
Speaker 1: who think that I was a good quality bow hunters.
Speaker 1: I was gonna have to kill this monster deer.
Speaker 2: There's some profoundness in Donnie's honest, simple conclusion of his motivation.
Speaker 2: He was a twenty six year old man hungry for
Speaker 2: validation from the world around him, and killing a big
Speaker 2: deer with his bow was a pathway to gain respect.
Speaker 2: I get it. I remember when the picture of the
Speaker 2: first decent deer that I killed hung on the wall
Speaker 2: at the local bow shop, and I soaked up any
Speaker 2: validation that I could get from anywhere. Validation for grand
Speaker 2: feats are important in a young man's life or a
Speaker 2: young woman's life, but when they're stolen, the system is
Speaker 2: cheated and it produces the opposite of what it's supposed to.
Speaker 2: It's supposed to create identity and self confidence and a
Speaker 2: sense of worth, but what it actually creates is insecurity
Speaker 2: when it's stolen. But let's get back to Donnie. Here's
Speaker 2: what happened.
Speaker 1: So when I knew where that deer was going to go,
Speaker 1: I knew it was illegal, but never really give that
Speaker 1: a consideration. Just the only thing I was saying about
Speaker 1: is wanting to kill it deer. I needed to kill
Speaker 1: that deer some reason. I just thought that that's something
Speaker 1: I had to do. And as they get to that
Speaker 1: red oak, I'm considered if I need to climb over
Speaker 1: to hunker down there, And it's just a few yards
Speaker 1: off of it's a high line, and it's kind of
Speaker 1: it's pretty clean. There's a little brush there. As I'm
Speaker 1: I'm sure, I'm moving around, and I look up in
Speaker 1: that big ten is twenty five yards from me, staring
Speaker 1: at me. Well, he blows and takes off running, and
Speaker 1: I thought gosh, dang. I mean I blew that up,
Speaker 1: still not thinking, you know, hope nobody's seen me or whatever.
Speaker 1: And as I watched them cross Army Street, I look
Speaker 1: back where they were, and probably thirty five yards behind him,
Speaker 1: that bucks stand there staring right at me, wide open
Speaker 1: between he and I. I really believe if he was
Speaker 1: a National Forest wild deer, he'd have been gone to
Speaker 1: you know. I shoot a single pin hha side, and
Speaker 1: I had had an arrow knock. I knocked narrow forore.
Speaker 1: I set my bow on that red oak, trying to
Speaker 1: side where I was gonna try to get so I
Speaker 1: draw my bow back and he's still just standing there.
Speaker 1: I mean, he's looking right at me. I know that
Speaker 1: if I can fall it into his front end, high
Speaker 1: success rate killing him. And I put that pin right
Speaker 1: underneath his nose, just right about the top of his
Speaker 1: white patch and turn it blues.
Speaker 2: I wonder how long it took at him after sinking
Speaker 2: his teeth through the skin of the forbidden apple, to
Speaker 2: regret his decision. The bite initiated a sequence of unretractable consequence.
Speaker 2: Man's always had a problem with laws, breaking them, that is,
Speaker 2: But laws are the guideposts of societal security designed for
Speaker 2: the well being of us. All the truth is is
Speaker 2: that everybody wants some form of law in their life
Speaker 2: to protect them and their interests, even in a time
Speaker 2: in America where we're talking about liberty and freedom and
Speaker 2: laws take away all this stuff, which I am generally
Speaker 2: absolutely in agreement with. However, I'm telling you we all
Speaker 2: love laws, but we like to cherry pick. The ones
Speaker 2: that we'd like to break are the ones that infringe
Speaker 2: upon our personal freedom. And it's kind of bizarre. Human
Speaker 2: life is complex, society's complex. As I'm sitting here with
Speaker 2: Donnie hearing this story for the first time, I am
Speaker 2: struck with a palpable sense of remorse as the arrow
Speaker 2: drifts through the air and hits the buck just below
Speaker 2: the throat patch. Later we'll learn that as a society
Speaker 2: we demand remorse from the people who've cheated the system.
Speaker 2: But I'm way ahead of myself. The buck has just
Speaker 2: been shot.
Speaker 1: First thing I think is I shot him right in
Speaker 1: the front leg. And that was the first sick feeling
Speaker 1: I got in bout I thought, oh my gosh, I
Speaker 1: just woined that monster, dear, and shouldn't he been doing this?
Speaker 1: And that's still running through my mind when I hear
Speaker 1: him crash, and then reality starts setting in good grief.
Speaker 1: So I set my bow down, ease up to the eye,
Speaker 1: look around, make sure there's no cars coming down the highway.
Speaker 1: And there's nobody really in that area at that time.
Speaker 1: Nobody had to run and track where I was parking
Speaker 1: with him, So I, instead of blood trailing him, I
Speaker 1: kind of stay out of sight, and I sneak down
Speaker 1: there where I thought I heard him crash and he's
Speaker 1: laying there dead, and to walk up on him and
Speaker 1: grab his antlers. You should feel the most excitement you've
Speaker 1: ever had in your life, other than like one of
Speaker 1: your kids being born or something. And I kind of
Speaker 1: had the opposite feeling. And I immediately I thought, there's
Speaker 1: no that I'm going to get away with this.
Speaker 2: There's no way that I'm going to get away with this.
Speaker 2: That's an interesting thought to slide across a man's mind
Speaker 2: moments after an egregious error. The imminent doom of being
Speaker 2: guilty often brings the onset of Shakespeare's Macbeth syndrome, when
Speaker 2: he said, quote, I am in blood steeped in so
Speaker 2: far that should I weigh no more returning were as
Speaker 2: tedious as going over. A modern way to say that
Speaker 2: would be I'm so deep in this thing covered in
Speaker 2: blood that to turn back now would be as treacherous
Speaker 2: as continuing forward. And this thing brings Donnie to another
Speaker 2: juncture of decision. What does he do now?
Speaker 1: Well, as I'm looking at this deer, it broke one
Speaker 1: of its brow tines off, falling there. I can see
Speaker 1: where it's antlers that hit the dirt, and I'm kind
Speaker 1: of wiping around looking for that antler, expecting it to
Speaker 1: be stuck in the dirt. It's probably still there today
Speaker 1: if it hasn't right it away. And I hear car
Speaker 1: doors slam, and I walk down and look, and there's
Speaker 1: a couple of people pulled up to this running track,
Speaker 1: which is just one hundred yards from me at the time.
Speaker 1: So I get that buck he's right on the right
Speaker 1: on the high line edge, and drag him deeper in
Speaker 1: the brush and just sit down there. I'm thinking my
Speaker 1: truck's blocking most poor to John sitting there with the
Speaker 1: keys in it. You know this isn't going to turn out. Well, Well,
Speaker 1: these people get out, get on the track, and don't
Speaker 1: They're not there for five minutes, it seems like two hours.
Speaker 1: But now it's getting pretty dark, so they get in
Speaker 1: their cars and leave. I'm sitting there contemplating, do I
Speaker 1: take this deer out now? If I leave it, will
Speaker 1: it be found before daylight or somebody see it or
Speaker 1: kyots get it? You know. I'm a nervous track. I
Speaker 1: go back down walk out to, you know, try to
Speaker 1: like if somebody over there I just left or whatever.
Speaker 1: Nobody around. I reparked my truck in a parking spot
Speaker 1: and think what I'll do is I'll drag that deer
Speaker 1: back where I went in the woods, which isn't that fart,
Speaker 1: but it's a big old here, guts still in it.
Speaker 1: I didn't want to get it there because I did
Speaker 1: not want to leave any evidence, you know, So I
Speaker 1: drag it back down to where my truck was. Nobody
Speaker 1: ever came to the running track. I back it up
Speaker 1: as close as I can, right beside those port of
Speaker 1: potties to try to help hide me in it and all.
Speaker 1: And I get that deer loaded in the back of
Speaker 1: that truck with its guts in it, which was unreal.
Speaker 1: I get it in that truck, get everything closed up,
Speaker 1: and I start getting kind of a feeling of peace,
Speaker 1: like I'm gonna pull this off. When I pull out
Speaker 1: onto Army to turn back to leave Fort Leonard Wood,
Speaker 1: I see a car coming. I don't think anything about it.
Speaker 1: And as I'm easing up Army, it was an MP
Speaker 1: and you know, I mean trembling, shaking, Oh my gosh,
Speaker 1: I've they followed me down Nebraska all the way to
Speaker 1: Missouri Boulevard, right towards the main gate. And I mean
Speaker 1: I went by many places that I would expected the
Speaker 1: MP to turn around to go back to patrol, and
Speaker 1: he is right behind me, I mean right on me,
Speaker 1: follows me right out the north gate. By now I
Speaker 1: think I'm thinking, what am I going to say? They're
Speaker 1: going to pull me over? You know, I'm just caught.
Speaker 1: And as I go by a gas station, they're all
Speaker 1: Star Gas. That people pulls into that gas station. That
Speaker 1: guy was going to get a pack of cigarettes or
Speaker 1: a soda or something, I'm sure. And I go on
Speaker 1: up to almost I forty four. There's there's a car
Speaker 1: wash parking lot there and I pull in and get
Speaker 1: out and look at the truck and there is blood
Speaker 1: all over that tailgate, and the thought of that was
Speaker 1: where I made the mistakes that I'm gonna make to
Speaker 1: get caught, the mistake I made shooting the deer. But
Speaker 1: then it gets in my head so bad. All I
Speaker 1: can think about is that blood and that mp FA
Speaker 1: on me. So I drive home and uh, all the
Speaker 1: way home, I'm thinking. What I'm gonna do is I'm
Speaker 1: gonna get up early in the morning. There's there's no
Speaker 1: more physical checking in, you know, it's all tailcheck. I
Speaker 1: can sign into my hunting area by a computer. I've
Speaker 1: got tree stands there. I'm gonna take him out there,
Speaker 1: drag him out in front of that stand, gut him,
Speaker 1: break him all loose, give it about an hour, tail
Speaker 1: check him, and go to the house. Like I said, Clay,
Speaker 1: I've still not gotten excited with this deer. You know,
Speaker 1: the biggest deer I've ever killed my life. I'll probably
Speaker 1: never kill or even see a deer that size. I
Speaker 1: didn't kill right, which was weighing on me pretty heavy.
Speaker 2: There are a lot of options in the English language
Speaker 2: that could be used to describe what Donnie had done.
Speaker 2: I think the one he used is interesting. I didn't
Speaker 2: kill it right, And here begins the classic cascade of
Speaker 2: one live being fixed by mora lies like a fox
Speaker 2: and a snare. It's a trap as old as mankind.
Speaker 1: So as I'm thinking about this, I get thinking about
Speaker 1: that MP and that blood on that tailgate, and will
Speaker 1: they be looking for this truck if I drive this
Speaker 1: truck through you know, everything's surveillance there. If I drive
Speaker 1: this truck through the man gate, will they say, we
Speaker 1: need you to come over here check me out and
Speaker 1: see why there was blood all over my truck. So
Speaker 1: I set up all night thinking about this, and I
Speaker 1: advised a plan that I would just just say that
Speaker 1: I killed it at my house. So the next morning,
Speaker 1: at daylight, I go up behind my house and in
Speaker 1: a place I was allowed to hunt, taking back to
Speaker 1: one of my old tree stands, just fields in a
Speaker 1: road all the way to it, and I unload that deer,
Speaker 1: drag him down in the woods and ways gut him,
Speaker 1: go back and get my truck. I get thinking that
Speaker 1: I've got to have proof that I was here, So
Speaker 1: I drive all the way to the next little town
Speaker 1: and get gas on a debit cards save my receipt.
Speaker 1: You know, I was getting pretty deep by now. Talk
Speaker 1: to a few people so I could say that the
Speaker 1: people had seen me there, you know, and that's dragging
Speaker 1: people into something that they don't even need to, you know,
Speaker 1: go back out. I loaded the deer, and a cousin
Speaker 1: of mine, a very close cousin mine, messaged me in
Speaker 1: and asked if I was hunting and I said yeah.
Speaker 1: He said you kill anything, and I said yeah, I've
Speaker 1: killed a giant and he said, send me a picture.
Speaker 1: So I see him photo of it. Well, he's proud
Speaker 1: of me, you know, kill something like that, you know,
Speaker 1: and it's kind of his old stomping grounds where this
Speaker 1: is at. And he was super proud of me. So
Speaker 1: he chilled that picture. Two or three people. Well, Fort
Speaker 1: Woods having big buck contest this time, which I ran,
Speaker 1: so he got gets to hold me. Went to if
Speaker 1: I'm gonna turn this deer in the big buck other
Speaker 1: night and I didn't want to do that and I said, no,
Speaker 1: I'm not going to do that with and he said
Speaker 1: I want to see that deer. And I said, we'll
Speaker 1: come by the house and he had something going on.
Speaker 1: He said, bring it over here. I want to look
Speaker 1: at that deer. And I said, I don't want to
Speaker 1: much people messing around it, you know. The whole time.
Speaker 1: I'm worried about getting caught at something, and he's proud
Speaker 1: of me. I dry, I said, well, I'll be over
Speaker 1: a little bit. I don't want to much. He said,
Speaker 1: don't worry about it, just bring it over and said
Speaker 1: he's an engineer on for larn Would. And when I
Speaker 1: pulled up to where he told me to meet hum Att,
Speaker 1: sure two hundred people are waiting to see this deer
Speaker 1: and they were snapping photos of that thing. I mean
Speaker 1: it was it was. I knew right then that there's
Speaker 1: no way I'm going to keep this deer head. Knowing
Speaker 1: that it was a county record without a.
Speaker 2: Doubt, Donnie's world was about to spend out of control,
Speaker 2: and the leading edge of the whirlwind was lies. And
Speaker 2: I want to take an official time out for a
Speaker 2: minute and ask you, if you had done this, would
Speaker 2: you be willing to share with the national podcaster the
Speaker 2: minute details of one of the biggest mistakes of your life.
Speaker 2: This event is now so long in the past that
Speaker 2: he did not have to dredge it up. He's weathered
Speaker 2: the storm of personal criticism and character attacks over the
Speaker 2: last fourteen years. I'm still myself wondering why He's willing
Speaker 2: to be so open with me. I'm not sure why,
Speaker 2: but I'm grateful for his openness. I think it's pretty rare.
Speaker 2: I feel like I'm living through this, though I personally
Speaker 2: don't have to pay the consequences. Stories are powerful. Okay,
Speaker 2: so time out is over. We're back in the game,
Speaker 2: and we've left Donnie in the parking lot of a
Speaker 2: gas station with an unbelievable amount of people who've shown
Speaker 2: up after he shared a picture with just one person.
Speaker 2: And I've also noticed that Casey's gas stations are on
Speaker 2: every corner of Central Missouri. I'm sure it's the cases
Speaker 2: that they're out back to Donnie.
Speaker 1: While that's going on, some of the people that I
Speaker 1: work with call me asking about this deer that I've killed.
Speaker 1: These people I ain't talked to. I didn't realize how
Speaker 1: fast that news would travel, but it was unbelievable asked
Speaker 1: me to bring the deer by. They wanted to look
Speaker 1: at it. So so I went over there and there's
Speaker 1: just two or three of the people working there, and
Speaker 1: I pulled around, kind of hit my truck around back,
Speaker 1: and they were out there looking at it, and a
Speaker 1: military guy that works in the hospital, which you can
Speaker 1: almost see the junction down there from the hospital, comes
Speaker 1: walking around the building and points and he said, I
Speaker 1: got pictures of that, dear, and he shows me if
Speaker 1: this boy, it looks just like it, don't it? And
Speaker 1: he said, oh, it's it. So I loaded up go home.
Speaker 1: How did you feel when he said that? I knew,
Speaker 1: I really knew when that deer hit the ground how
Speaker 1: it was going to turn out. I didn't know it
Speaker 1: was going to have a snowball effect that it did.
Speaker 1: But so here's oh, at least three hundred people out
Speaker 1: of the gate that I've liked to. I can't tell
Speaker 1: anybody what really happened. You know how that works. And
Speaker 1: it's horrible to kill a two hundred inch deer, and
Speaker 1: it was a nightmare from the beginning.
Speaker 2: Donnie just said two things worth noting. I didn't know
Speaker 2: it was going to have the snowball effect that it did.
Speaker 2: Donnie's talking about what would happen after he got caught,
Speaker 2: but also foreshadowing the ripples of crushing incidents that would
Speaker 2: follow him in the coming decade. Stuff unrelated to wildlife
Speaker 2: crime and punishment. You know, there's a very American ideology
Speaker 2: that says, good things happen to good people, and bad
Speaker 2: things happen to bad people. You get what you deserve.
Speaker 2: Later we'll explore this doctrine and why we all better
Speaker 2: pray that it's not true. The second thing he said
Speaker 2: was that it was a nightmare from the beginning, but
Speaker 2: it just keeps getting worse.
Speaker 1: Here's Donnie well that Ford drug. I put gas in it.
Speaker 1: When I come back home from Fort Wood at eleven thirty,
Speaker 1: I finally want to I'd burned a half tank gas.
Speaker 1: Sitting out they run with the headlights on, people looking
Speaker 1: at the deer, which is just sickening, and uh, not
Speaker 1: telling anybody the truth. My dad and my wife knew
Speaker 1: what was going on. Really, So you told your dad
Speaker 1: and your wife? Yeah, what did they say? Oh? They
Speaker 1: What could they say then? You know?
Speaker 2: I mean, were they upset with you?
Speaker 1: They were?
Speaker 2: They were they wanted you to Were they worried about
Speaker 2: you getting in trouble? What do you think was going on?
Speaker 2: They probably they had the same mindset that I did.
Speaker 2: I believe like we just got to hide this. Well,
Speaker 2: no that that there was no hide in it by then.
Speaker 2: I think they knew from the beginning that this wouldn't work.
Speaker 1: What it was? Your dad mad at you? Yeah, he
Speaker 1: was upset. He My dad is a huge supporter of mine,
Speaker 1: so is my wife, and I think both of them
Speaker 1: believe that I'd hunt that deer down and kill it.
Speaker 1: I think they both had faith that I could kill
Speaker 1: that deer, right. You know. My dad looked at it,
Speaker 1: you know, but it wasn't You told him, Dad, I
Speaker 1: killed this deer illegally. Yeah. What do he do?
Speaker 2: Did?
Speaker 1: I mean? Literally? What did he do? Did he shake
Speaker 1: his head? Did he he? He just said, boy, that's
Speaker 1: a that's a big old deer to not kill, right.
Speaker 1: And like I said, he didn't. He didn't jump all
Speaker 1: over me. Of course, I'm you know, I'm of adult age.
Speaker 2: That's a big old deer not to kill, right, His
Speaker 2: dad said. We haven't talked about him yet, but Donnie's
Speaker 2: dad is an influential player. I met him and shook
Speaker 2: his hand and looked him in the eyes. He was
Speaker 2: wearing a pair of overalls. He's a humble, earnest man
Speaker 2: with a gray beard like a lion's mane. He's retired
Speaker 2: now after a noble career in the autobody repair industry.
Speaker 2: Donnie revealed to me that he was skeptical of me
Speaker 2: wanting to hell the world about his son's story, and
Speaker 2: I get it. He felt his son had already paid
Speaker 2: enough for his sins. We'll get into it more in
Speaker 2: episode two. Yep, this is gonna be a two part series.
Speaker 2: But after the death of Donnie's wife, Angela, his dad
Speaker 2: stepped up to help raise Donnie and Angela's two boys.
Speaker 2: Donnie and his father are extremely close. It's a long story,
Speaker 2: but now I have a hard question for Donnie. My
Speaker 2: wife wasn't as frustrated at me as I'm sure that
Speaker 2: he was. But I know my dad and my dad
Speaker 2: thought I could kill it deer. Would your dad have
Speaker 2: I mean, how would break in the law have been
Speaker 2: viewed inside of your family's world.
Speaker 1: We weren't big lawbreakers? Really, he didn't. I wasn't a poacher.
Speaker 1: A hunted, right, That's why all my prize possession Deer
Speaker 1: one hundred and thirty and forty engineer, I could.
Speaker 2: Really you can you you can honestly say you didn't.
Speaker 2: And I'm not saying I think everybody's broken the law before.
Speaker 2: I mean, if you've hunted as much as I know
Speaker 2: you've hunted, and as much as I've hunted people have
Speaker 2: I broke the law before, But I have dedicated my
Speaker 2: self for most of my life to not breaking the law. Really,
Speaker 2: you didn't go and kill deer illegally before this?
Speaker 1: No, I never killed I've never killed an extra turkey.
Speaker 1: I just I can't think of and I'm sure I have,
Speaker 1: But like killing deer off the road and stuff, he
Speaker 1: just wasn't a hunted hard. When you spend all your
Speaker 1: time in a tree stand, you're not driving the roads.
Speaker 1: And I know I've broken the law, I'm sure, but
Speaker 1: it wasn't something we were used to. Wasn't like I
Speaker 1: was just wearing the roads out shooting deer off the roads. Yeah,
Speaker 1: never with olid and stuff. Yeah.
Speaker 2: I don't have a long history with Donnie to know
Speaker 2: fully if he's telling me the truth. But as I
Speaker 2: look into his eyes and have witnessed the openness of
Speaker 2: which he's already spoken, I believe him. I was able
Speaker 2: to look up his criminal record with the Missouri Department
Speaker 2: of Conservation, and they've recorded what some would consider, including me,
Speaker 2: a few minor violations, like a ticket for not wearing
Speaker 2: hunter's orange during firearm season. I've done that, but not
Speaker 2: being caught and a few other things. So by the
Speaker 2: definition of the law, at this point in our story,
Speaker 2: he's not a convicted poacher, but he's about to get
Speaker 2: smacked hard, or is he? And by now you're starting
Speaker 2: to draw your own conclusions about who Donnie is, because
Speaker 2: that's really what we're all trying to do.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: We already know that he's guilty, but what we're really
Speaker 2: trying to answer, at the most simple level is is
Speaker 2: this a good person? And from that answer we'll make
Speaker 2: our judgments about him. We'll decide if we can forgive him.
Speaker 2: But is that even fair? Can a man's entire life
Speaker 2: be judged by one isolated incident? I think most of
Speaker 2: us like the idea of saying no to that, but
Speaker 2: in reality, we judge people like that all the time,
Speaker 2: or at least I do. The law delivers a much
Speaker 2: needed standard in society and a prescription of justice, But
Speaker 2: the law is imperfect, and a human, a judge, a jury,
Speaker 2: an officer has to decide how justice is delivered. It's
Speaker 2: really not straightforward at all, and from this position, all
Speaker 2: manner of injustice is delivered. It works out good for
Speaker 2: some and bad for others. This injustice is a major
Speaker 2: problem on planet Earth and has been for a long
Speaker 2: long time. And like I said in the beginning, we're
Speaker 2: going to discuss how is a society we demand justice,
Speaker 2: extend mercy, and accept or reject apologies. We're constantly subject
Speaker 2: to politicians, athletes, movie stars, and religious leaders who've messed
Speaker 2: up and are asking for our forgiveness. Some we give
Speaker 2: it to and others we withhold it. I think we
Speaker 2: can learn a lot about ourselves by who we extend
Speaker 2: mercy too. But good gravy, I'm getting way way ahead
Speaker 2: of myself. Donnie still got a giant deer in the
Speaker 2: back of his truck. Let's get back in the game.
Speaker 1: So I cleaned the deer. We're leaving in five days
Speaker 1: or so to Wyoming for a mule deer in aneloe punt.
Speaker 1: And I haven't heard anything about this deer for three
Speaker 1: or four days. You think you've gotten away with us
Speaker 1: in a way, in a way, So I took the
Speaker 1: deer to a taxidermists and he said, don't go anywhere.
Speaker 1: I'm o cape that I don't want them antlers here.
Speaker 1: And to get back there was I don't know how
Speaker 1: many all my family come to see it, you know,
Speaker 1: and that's probably the worst part. I had a in
Speaker 1: church on the Sunday morning. The preacher asked me about it.
Speaker 1: That was probably the hardest one. You know, it's rough,
Speaker 1: and I'm not I'm not pitiful me at all. I
Speaker 1: mean I killed it there and uh went to to
Speaker 1: a hunt in Wyoming for about a week. So on
Speaker 1: the way back, a guy calls me, calls my cousin
Speaker 1: that's with me. He goes, hey, I want to let
Speaker 1: you know they're they're planning on coming to getting you
Speaker 1: soon as you get back. They've been investigating this deer.
Speaker 1: So when I get when I get back to work,
Speaker 1: I'm a nervous erect pins and needles all day. The
Speaker 1: whole day goes by, close up shop, go home. Not
Speaker 1: a word, and I thought, well, maybe he heard false
Speaker 1: or teasing me about it or something, because I, like
Speaker 1: I said, there was there was a few people, a
Speaker 1: handful or more that that knew that that where that
Speaker 1: deer came from. So the next day go back to
Speaker 1: work and pulled my jeep up to the front door
Speaker 1: and was locking up the safe and I don't know,
Speaker 1: three or four agents come through and said hey, we
Speaker 1: need you to come with us. And I said, I
Speaker 1: mean what for? He said, you know what for? Anyway,
Speaker 1: they rested me, not forcefully. I knew almost all the
Speaker 1: agents in there, you know, and they knew I wouldn't
Speaker 1: put up a fight or anything. And we went to
Speaker 1: building fifty two to eighty two, which was the game
Speaker 1: Warden's game Warden station. When we got there, there was
Speaker 1: I believe three fort Leonardwood agents, a couple of Pulaski
Speaker 1: County agents, a Shannon County agent, at least five or six,
Speaker 1: and one of them was it was a polygraph guy. Anyway,
Speaker 1: they opened up their computer and there's that picture that
Speaker 1: guy had showed me, and he shows me like five
Speaker 1: or six of them. They have you hooked to a
Speaker 1: polygraph now. Yet they never hooked me up, just we
Speaker 1: were just having conversation. They also had a guy that
Speaker 1: had worked for the crimes unit that could tell time
Speaker 1: of death on people, and they had brought him into
Speaker 1: but they were there to get me understandably anyway, So
Speaker 1: I said, I told him I killed it where I
Speaker 1: said I killed And we went on for hours.
Speaker 2: At this point, you're still lying, yeah, absolutely, I mean
Speaker 2: you're just like a like a animal trapped in a corner.
Speaker 2: You got no choice, That's what That's what you're thinking
Speaker 2: felt like in your mind.
Speaker 1: Well, in my mind, I thought, if they find out
Speaker 1: that I killed it out here in federal insalation, not
Speaker 1: checked into a hunting area, my job maybe jail hunt,
Speaker 1: you know, I mean that's possible. Yeah, And I thought,
Speaker 1: there's no way, I mean, I have to stick to
Speaker 1: this now. Did you not have any sense of just
Speaker 1: coming clean at that point, when you were at that
Speaker 1: deepning and you knew they had you that not in
Speaker 1: the beginning, No, No, I mean I wanted to, but
Speaker 1: I wasn't going to in any way, shape or for him.
Speaker 2: Finally, after several hours of conversation, though steeped in blood
Speaker 2: and knowing the return trip to honesty will be a
Speaker 2: difficult one, Donnie knew that they had him. He had
Speaker 2: to turn back. The officers made him an offer, guaranteed
Speaker 2: him he wouldn't lose his job, and told him what
Speaker 2: the punishment would be if he confessed, and he did.
Speaker 2: The twenty six year old confessed to killing the buck
Speaker 2: in the restricted hunting area and falsifying where he killed it.
Speaker 1: And I told him the whole story. It was the
Speaker 1: biggest relief I had. But I knew I had five
Speaker 1: hundred people I was gonna have to tell this too
Speaker 1: as well, you know, apologize, and a couple of them
Speaker 1: that had figured out what was going on while I
Speaker 1: was in Wyoming were pretty aggravated at me. You know,
Speaker 1: people that wouldn't have lied to me about it. I
Speaker 1: don't think then I liked to. I had two cousins
Speaker 1: on my dad's side after this it all went down,
Speaker 1: and I'd lighted them too. They spent multiple nights while
Speaker 1: I was in Wyoming with a camera driving up and
Speaker 1: down that road trying to get a picture of that
Speaker 1: deer to prove it was alive. You know, I had
Speaker 1: people really going to bat for me over this, and
Speaker 1: like I said, I think if I'd have been a poacher,
Speaker 1: them guys wouldn't have been doing that. If I'd been
Speaker 1: somebody they knew that that was you know, spot liar
Speaker 1: and stuff that they would say, well, you probably didiculate her.
Speaker 1: But but I lost a lot of respect from some people.
Speaker 1: You know, they were pretty aggravated at me, and rightfully
Speaker 1: so so when I told them that though Clay I
Speaker 1: hadn't hardly slept since I'd killed that deer. It was
Speaker 1: one of the big leaves. Even though when you told
Speaker 1: the wildlife ofught Y, yeah, it just it was a
Speaker 1: big burden. It was a heavy burden, you know, to
Speaker 1: lie to everybody about it.
Speaker 2: The heavy burden of carrying a lie lifted when Donnie confessed. However,
Speaker 2: it was just the beginning of a string of events
Speaker 2: that would change his life. Now that we've heard the story,
Speaker 2: I've got some questions on how is the society we
Speaker 2: handle people who've done wrong, broken the law, or even
Speaker 2: just offended us. I've got a few questions for doctor
Speaker 2: Misty Nukem, who's got a PhD in political science and
Speaker 2: a master's in human development. I think she's pretty sharp,
Speaker 2: and as many of you know, this is my wife,
Speaker 2: and as usual, she's got some good insight. Here's Misty.
Speaker 2: I'm interested in, how is a society we decide how
Speaker 2: we handle people that break the law, and not even
Speaker 2: just the written law, but people that break some moral law.
Speaker 2: How do we decide who we ostracize, who we forgive?
Speaker 2: What goes into that?
Speaker 3: Well, I think that one of the things that goes
Speaker 3: into that is thinking about forgiveness and thinking about apologies.
Speaker 3: A lot of times forgiveness is given when an apology
Speaker 3: is made, and I think inside of social science, a
Speaker 3: lot of times when you look at things that are
Speaker 3: kind of more common to us, a lot of times
Speaker 3: you're surprised by what you find out. The intuitive answer
Speaker 3: is not the thing you find. But with an apology,
Speaker 3: it's kind of different. It is actually exactly what you
Speaker 3: would expect people. If I were to ask you, like,
Speaker 3: what makes an apology good, you would probably say the
Speaker 3: same thing that social science has realized. A good apology
Speaker 3: is when someone takes responsibility and expresses sympathy or remorse
Speaker 3: for the impact that that has had on others. That's
Speaker 3: like considered a good apology. And if you think back,
Speaker 3: the people that you probably find it easiest to forgive
Speaker 3: would be people who.
Speaker 2: Said they personal responsibility.
Speaker 3: Acknowledge that it hurt you. Sometimes, it's interesting to me
Speaker 3: inside of forgiveness. It's one of those things that has
Speaker 3: a really powerful impact on the person extending forgiveness and
Speaker 3: also on the person that's requesting forgiveness. It almost takes
Speaker 3: you by surprise when someone is genuinely humble and exercises
Speaker 3: humility and says, hey, what I did was wrong.
Speaker 2: How does it work in a situation where like someone
Speaker 2: in the public arena that we don't know, we don't
Speaker 2: have a personal relationship with, and they may not necessarily
Speaker 2: have a podium to stand on and say I would
Speaker 2: like to make a formal apology to the world. As
Speaker 2: in the case I'm dealing with here is I have
Speaker 2: a man who is committed an egregious wildlife crime and
Speaker 2: he has to go back into his community. What are
Speaker 2: the people looking for?
Speaker 3: I think they're looking for the same thing. Did he
Speaker 3: take personal responsibility? Does he exercise or express remorse?
Speaker 1: Well?
Speaker 2: Would other options?
Speaker 3: And do you have some that he won't do it again?
Speaker 2: Well, that's big.
Speaker 3: I think it's really big is that the regret is
Speaker 3: significant enough and he recognizes it's wrong enough that he
Speaker 3: won't do it again. It makes you think higher of
Speaker 3: their moral character.
Speaker 2: As I analyze my own self, which that's what I'm
Speaker 2: doing inside the situation, I'm analyzing not what I've been
Speaker 2: taught or what I think I think, but actually, what
Speaker 2: is it about a situation that makes me think this
Speaker 2: is a good guy and he's really sorry, or they
Speaker 2: should lock that guy up. I think what I really
Speaker 2: want to know is do I think this guy would
Speaker 2: do it again? Do I think he's lying to me?
Speaker 2: Do I think he is not taking personal responsibility?
Speaker 3: Because that's what lying is, is not taking personal responsibility.
Speaker 2: Right, or saying I did it and it was wrong, but.
Speaker 1: That's why you said.
Speaker 3: One of the alternatives, And I think one of the
Speaker 3: alternatives is to justify or excuse it. I think it's
Speaker 3: really easy to say, here's why did it wrong and
Speaker 3: give an explanation. But what it sounds like to the
Speaker 3: receiver is justification. It sounds like I'm saying I did wrong,
Speaker 3: but here's why, and it's kind of justified. And I'm
Speaker 3: not super sorry.
Speaker 2: About it, because we don't like that at all.
Speaker 3: No, we don't like that at all. And if you
Speaker 3: look at like public relations and public communication, when people
Speaker 3: make apologies like that, people are very slow to forgive.
Speaker 2: Social science can be complicated, but it sounds like an
Speaker 2: apology is straightforward and intuitive. But why do so many
Speaker 2: people struggle with it? Why do people struggle with admitting fault.
Speaker 2: I give Donnie a lot of credit for owning up
Speaker 2: to what he did and taking personal responsibility. I was
Speaker 2: surprised with how upfront and honesty was. But more than
Speaker 2: his words, it was his tone. I didn't feel like
Speaker 2: he was trying to prove anything to me. He didn't
Speaker 2: seem bitter, but he did tell me that the first
Speaker 2: few years after it happened, things were very different, but
Speaker 2: time has taken out a lot of wrinkles and put
Speaker 2: it into perspective. For him, defensiveness justification lying a refusal
Speaker 2: to admit guilt as a form of control. An apology
Speaker 2: is a release of that control. I think this is
Speaker 2: helpful for me to understand, even for everyday life, the
Speaker 2: art of authentically apologizing is one of the most powerful
Speaker 2: tools a human can have. We could say that again,
Speaker 2: so the folks in the back could hear the art
Speaker 2: of authentically apologizing as one of the most powerful tools
Speaker 2: a human could have. That's some bear gree stuff right there.
Speaker 2: Turns out I need to apologize quite a bit. It's
Speaker 2: usually for hoots, shame and somebody, or discrediting their claim
Speaker 2: for seeing some kind of wildlife that doesn't exist where
Speaker 2: they live, or belittling Brent's beloved tricolor coonhound. Occasionally it's
Speaker 2: for more serious things. Here's doctor Nukeomb on authenticity.
Speaker 3: This is my misty's personal opinion. I think we're pretty
Speaker 3: good at assessing the authenticity of fault because humility is
Speaker 3: something that I think is very difficult to face.
Speaker 2: It's almost like a humility is almost like a pheromone
Speaker 2: that is released that is not seen in facial express
Speaker 2: or you can see through any external thing. You can
Speaker 2: see through words that are said. Like two people could
Speaker 2: stand and read the same apology and one mean it
Speaker 2: and onenot they have the same grin on their face.
Speaker 2: They could have the same humble remorse on their face,
Speaker 2: but we're like, he was genuine. And I think it
Speaker 2: goes right back to our humanness, Like we are more
Speaker 2: than just a compilation of biological functions. We have a spirit,
Speaker 2: we have a soul. We're connected to something bigger than
Speaker 2: this biological thing we live inside of. That's what makes
Speaker 2: us human. And we sense really the deep internal mechanisms
Speaker 2: of a person's heart when they say they're sorry. Yeah.
Speaker 3: And I think even like you're describing it as a permal,
Speaker 3: I can't back that up with research, but I know
Speaker 3: it was just an analogy that I know even if
Speaker 3: you're watching on TV and someone comes out and apologizes.
Speaker 3: There's this thing in us that's like, hmm, I don't know,
Speaker 3: I don't believe it.
Speaker 2: And everybody has a response immediately immediately. I think the
Speaker 2: best way to think about this is what would you
Speaker 2: expect from someone who had personally done you wrong? And
Speaker 2: you pretty much expect that from everybody at every level. Yeah,
Speaker 2: if your brother deeply offended you, how could he make
Speaker 2: it right? Like he might actually have to fix what
Speaker 2: he did, repair the car that he backed into. He
Speaker 2: would also have to genuinely apologize I'm very sorry for
Speaker 2: the inconvenience, and not blame the dog that ran out
Speaker 2: behind him and say it was my fault.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: Ninety nine percent of people would be appeased by that. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I mean kind of expect that at all levels, Like
Speaker 2: a politician, if you're a governor does something wrong, if
Speaker 2: you're president, if your boss at work, you kind of
Speaker 2: expect the same thing.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and there's always a little bit of tension until
Speaker 3: you get it. I think an apology is so simple,
Speaker 3: but it really has such a powerful healing impact.
Speaker 2: This was an interesting story to put together. I realized
Speaker 2: that I've not told the whole story. There are many
Speaker 2: other avenues we could have explored, but mainly I'm grateful
Speaker 2: to Donnie for opening up to us. As I left
Speaker 2: Donnie's house after the interview, his champion rabbit beagles were
Speaker 2: barking in the background. His father walked around in front
Speaker 2: of the garage to arrange the details of who would
Speaker 2: pick up Donnie's son from school, but Donnie had to
Speaker 2: run back inside to get some sports gear for his
Speaker 2: son's ball practice, and I stood alone with his father
Speaker 2: for a few minutes. I smiled and shook his hand
Speaker 2: again before I left, knowing that that he didn't fully
Speaker 2: understand or maybe even trust, why I was there. I
Speaker 2: told the old man that I wouldn't purposely do anything
Speaker 2: that would hurt Donnie, and that I respected his son's
Speaker 2: courage and openness to look this kind of thing in
Speaker 2: the face and tell this story when he could have
Speaker 2: just let it lie. But mostly I respected Donnie for
Speaker 2: being a different man than he was fourteen years ago,
Speaker 2: and I think that would be hard to dispute. A
Speaker 2: phrase used in our context might be is he a
Speaker 2: reformed poacher? A question meaning has he changed his ways?
Speaker 2: And at this point I do not have twenty years
Speaker 2: of personal history with the man to tell you if
Speaker 2: that's fully true, if he's fully reformed. I wish I
Speaker 2: could proclaim that, but that seems a bit irresponsible. But
Speaker 2: I don't think that's the best question. I mean, what
Speaker 2: does it even mean to be reformed? That a fellow
Speaker 2: promises to never make a mistake again. Only Donnie knows
Speaker 2: if he's really changed and how much. But I'll tell
Speaker 2: you that I do believe he's changed, and I do
Speaker 2: have decades of history with myself, and I can't proclaim
Speaker 2: that I'm fully reformed, though I strive every day. Donnie
Speaker 2: telling his story wasn't exactly an apology, but it was
Speaker 2: a display of humility taking personal responsibility, and I'm proud
Speaker 2: to now call Donnie Baker a friend. I'd hunt with
Speaker 2: him any day. About midway in this story, I said,
Speaker 2: we better hope that we don't get what we deserve.
Speaker 2: It's possible for a statement like that to strike a
Speaker 2: person as odd, because it would have struck me as
Speaker 2: odd at one time in my life. But I've come
Speaker 2: to learn that what I perceive as my own valor,
Speaker 2: or the perception of a decent life, is but filthy rags.
Speaker 2: I sure hope I'm not coach by my worst day.
Speaker 2: On the next episode, we'll learn about Donnie's conviction and punishment,
Speaker 2: and the severity of it might surprise you, and things
Speaker 2: will get very personal as he tells about the cascade
Speaker 2: of incidents in his life in the following decade. I
Speaker 2: can't thank you enough for listening to Bear Grease. Happy
Speaker 2: New Year to everyone, and as we start this new year,
Speaker 2: I hope you'll follow along Brent and I on our
Speaker 2: journey through rural America. These stories are meaningful to us
Speaker 2: and I just can't thank you enough. Please leave us
Speaker 2: a review on iTunes and share our podcast with a
Speaker 2: friend this week, and please be sure to check out
Speaker 2: our new audio original on Audible. It's available now. It's
Speaker 2: called Meat Eater's American History, The Long Hunters seventeen sixty
Speaker 2: one to seventeen seventy five. I hope you all have
Speaker 2: a great week.