We are in person at the 2024 Animal Forensic Conference in Gainesville, Florida! Dr. G will be interviewing several of the speakers to give our audience a bit of the knowledge gained through the presentations. We will be releasing each interview individually to allow our listeners to find topics of interest.

Ken Trusley, from Florida Fish and Wildlife, discusses the types of hunting incidents seen in the field, from human causes to animal causes.

We would also like to invite our listeners involved in animal cruelty investigations to visit and join the International Society for Animal Forensic Sciences https://isafs.org/

Mentioned in this episode:

Keep it Humane Podcast Network

The Animal Welfare Junction is part of the Keep It Humane Podcast Network. Visit keepithumane.com/podcastnetwork to find us and our amazing animal welfare podcast partners.

Our next guest is Ken Trusley from the Florida Fish and

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Wildlife Conservation Commission.

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Thank you for being here,

and welcome to The Junction.

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Ken Trusley: Yes ma'am, thank you.

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DrG: So can you start by letting

our listeners know about your

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background and what do you do?

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Ken Trusley: Uh, I am a lieutenant

with Florida Fish and Wildlife.

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I've been on for about 15 years.

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I was an officer for about five years.

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Then I was an investigator

for a little while and then

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promoted to lieutenant of patrol.

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And about two years ago I switched over

to lieutenant over our investigations

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unit, uh, the South investigations

unit of the Northeast region.

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So we cover about six counties.

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DrG: And your chat today,

your topic was about hunter.

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They said hunter accidents, but

you call them incidents, right?

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So what is a hunting incident?

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Ken Trusley: Uh, so hunting incident

is typically when, um, Somebody is

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legally or illegally hunting and

they Intentionally, unintentionally,

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or accidentally injure another

person, uh, typically with a firearm.

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DrG: So, I would think that accidental

and unintentionally would be kind of

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the same thing, but they're not, right?

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So, like, what's the difference?

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Ken Trusley: So, it's very similar,

but we kind of break it down.

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If it's Accidental, I chalk it up

as like an accidental discharge.

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They did not intentionally point the gun.

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They did not intentionally

squeeze the trigger.

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Versus an unintentional

incident is they purposely and

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intentionally shouldered the weapon.

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They purposely and intentionally squeezed

the trigger, discharging the firearm.

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It just struck an unintentional target.

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DrG: So kind of like a bad shot.

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Ken Trusley: Correct.

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DrG: So, do you see

incidents very frequently?

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Ken Trusley: Um, I would say in our area

we have probably two to three a year

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and throughout the state we probably

have between six and seven a year.

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DrG: And what's going to be the

most common type of incident

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that you see in the field?

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Ken Trusley: Typically for us, it

is legal hunters, um, that failed to

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identify the target or what's beyond it.

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We have deer hunters and Turkey hunters,

hog hunters that, um, accidentally shoot

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another hunter, whether it be someone

in their hunting party or someone that

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they did not know was there at all.

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DrG: A lot of like comedy or spoof

things that are showing hunters,

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they always show him with like a

beer can in their hand or whatever.

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So I imagine that there's going to

be different factors that increase

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the risk of these incidents.

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So what would be the things

that you see the most?

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Ken Trusley: Uh, there's always

a bunch of different factors.

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There have been times in the

past where there are intoxicants

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of some sort involved.

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The biggest factors that I see is a

failure to identify their target or what's

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beyond it and sometimes the victim is

not wearing an orange vest, but they're

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not required to or they're not wearing

an orange vest and they are required to.

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But a lot of times it's a just a

failure on the shooter's part to

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identify what's beyond the target.

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Sometimes they get amped up

their heart rates pumping.

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They see a big deer they've been hunting

all season and it happens to be running.

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They don't wait for it to stop and take a

good controlled shot or it runs in between

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them and their friend and they don't

realize the proximity of their friend.

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Or we've had some to where the

person takes a good controlled shot

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at what he feels is a safe target

but does not realize what's beyond

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it, and the projectiles continue on

behind it and and strike a victim.

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DrG: So when these incidents

happen, do they result in charges?

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Does it depend on the type of

incident and who prosecutes those?

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Ken Trusley: It's all very

dependent on the incident location

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and all the factors involved.

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Um, But what we do is we investigate

it to get all the possible findings

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that there are all evidence gathered

and we put it all together in a

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very thorough incident report.

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And then we go to the state attorney

and we presented the state attorney

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and say this is all the facts of the

case is all the evidence involved.

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Um, either you know, these are the

violations we've identified or or

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we can't identify any violations.

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But either way, we consult with the

state attorney and they'll either

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agree with us or disagree with us.

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Typically, they're pretty

much in line with us.

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Um, it's very hard to get a, um, if

it's, you know, truly unintentional

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or truly accidental, it's very hard

to get a culpable negligence kind

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of charge in the state of florida.

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But there's often different license

violations, game violations, um,

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different things like that that occur.

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DrG: So do you only investigate incidents

when it's like a person on person?

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Or do you also investigate incidents

that is an animal injuring a person?

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Ken Trusley: We do.

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We, we, we do both.

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Um, we, we call it the wildlife

human incident response is what

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we, when it's a kind of like a

hunting incident response, we have

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a wildlife human incident response.

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Um, and we have alligators

are probably the most common.

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the most common in my area, but we do have

some some bear versus human incidents too.

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And we investigate those as

well and try to find out what

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was the determining factor.

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What was the cause of it all?

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DrG: So these investigations ever end up

in identifying illegal hunting activities?

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Ken Trusley: It does.

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Several times in the past we've had

identified that it was either somebody

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trespassing illegally, somebody

that was hunting in a closed season.

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Um, somebody that even as simple

as just a unlicensed hunter that

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didn't have the proper licensing,

which is typically an infraction.

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It's not, it's not a criminal offense.

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Um, but I would say a large

portion of the, of the ones that

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I've responded to lately, they've

been legal to be where they're at

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legal season and legally licensed.

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They were just did not identify

their what's beyond their target.

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DrG: Excellent.

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Well, thank you so much for

sharing your knowledge and

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thank you for what you're doing.

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Ken Trusley: Yes, ma'am.

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Thanks for having me.