Hunters have recourse against harassment

The deer hunter approached a treestand on his own property, intending to hunt Ohio’s first firearm season. As the law requires, he wore the proper hunter orange to make him highly visible to anyone else who might be in the area.

Within minutes, the neighbor’s door burst open and several children ran outside shouting “Save the deer, save the deer, save the deer!” Even though the hunter was three hundred to four hundreds of yards from the neighbor’s house, on his own property and hunting legally, this neighbor has taken it upon himself to prevent this hunter from enjoying his legal right.

“I couldn’t believe it,” he told me. “Of course no deer was coming anywhere near that area with those kids out there screaming.”

There’s more. Sometimes the neighbor walks the property line shooting a .22 at nothing in particular during prime hunting hours. Sometimes he bangs pots and pans together. He has fenced off known deer travel routes. More than once he has been caught trespassing on the hunter’s land without explanation. Treestands have been found with the straps loosened, which is more than just annoying – it could prove deadly.

The good news is that virtually every behavior described above is illegal under Ohio’s hunter harassment laws, officially known as Ohio Revised Code Section 1533.03 and Section 1522.031. The laws, like hunter harassment laws in most states, prohibit anyone from using physical, visual, olfactory or auditory means to alter animal behavior in an effort to prevent someone from hunting, or from affecting one’s personal property for the same reason.

The bad news is that the laws are difficult to enforce, because the DNR is understaffed, evidence is hard to come by, and often the aggrieved party is a neighbor who doesn’t want war with someone they have to live with 365 days a year.

On top of all that, one must prove that the harasser is doing so with purpose, according to Ken Fitz, the Ohio DNR’s Wildlife Law Enforcement Director.

“Part of our problem from an enforcement perspective is that with most wildlife laws we don’t have to prove that you were negligent or did what you were doing knowingly,” Fitz said. “All we have to prove is that you did it. But with these laws we have to prove that it’s being done purposely.”

That can be tricky, Fitz said, because the offending neighbor can always say he’s just out walking or cutting wood or mowing his lawn.

But it’s not impossible, especially if the hunter cooperates fully. Fitz said the department tries to establish and document what is normal behavior when no one is hunting, then document the disruptive behavior and link it to the times when the other person is trying to hunt.

“At times we have some cases we’ve had officers go sit out there like a hunter just to go out and document this,” Fitz said.

Hunter harassment is a fourth-degree misdemeanor in Ohio with maximum penalties of a $250 fine a 30 days in jail. However, if an officer warns against it and the offender continues the behavior, it elevates to a first-degree misdemeanor with a maximum $1,000 fine and 60 days in jail.

The sheriff or other local law enforcement have the authority to enforce the laws, but Fitz said they are less likely to understand the details. He recommends calling the DNR, who most likely will ask the harassed hunter to shoot video or gather other evidence. The officer will also work with local prosecutors to determine how much evidence they’ll need to take the matter to court -- and then advise the hunter how to collect evidence.

And then it’s a matter of commitment by the hunter to see it through.

“They have to be willing to come to court and say ‘Hey, I have this problem and here is how it has affected me,” Fitz said. “The guy with the problem has to want to take his neighbor to court and that’s difficult if it’s someone you share a fence with all year.”