Archery Talk Forum banner

Whats My Chances??? of fighting and winning Pa hunting Fine

27K views 435 replies 167 participants last post by  KS Bow Hunter 
#1 ·
Ok I'll keep it short. After hunting this eve I returned to my truck where I had 2 wardens waiting for me. They come blasting out of the bushes with full "3d leave" camo suits on:mg::mg::mg:, screaming PA GAME COMMISSION STOP WEAR YOU ARE:confused::confused:. I felt like I just got busted poaching a 250" trophy whitetail. So they ask for my license, id, and a few Q's. I was very corroborative and polite the entire time. Then he said you need to be wearing 250 square inches of orange due to the inline season overlap this weekend. I then told him that I was aware and showed him that I had my blaze orange vest and hat on my person. I explained that I wore the vest and hat into my spot and didnt feel that it was necessary to put it back on for my walk out seeing that I had a 120 lumen candlepower headlamp on since the second started to descend in my climber and that it was safer than any amount of blaze orange would be in the dark. Needless to say they went to their truck to return and tell me that they have no problems with giving warning but never with a safety violation and he fined me. He said I will get it in the mail next week $200 plus court cost, roughly another $100...
$300 for that is just ridiculous whenever I could have not been any safer or more polite...

What do you think, will fighting it just waste a day off work and gas money or do I have a chance?

thanks
 
See less See more
#2 ·
My question is was it dark when you left your stand? Around here it's illegal to hunt after legal shooting light so if that's the case are you considered to be hunting after dark? If no then since you're not hunting then are you still required to wear orange? Just my logic...
 
#8 ·
Personally I think you should take it as a learning lesson. You're putting yourself in danger not to mention if someone did mistake you for a deer as you were leaving and they shot you and you died think of how screwed up in the head that person would be.

When you say you are going to "fight it" I don't follow......

You were not wearing your blaze orange...so what is there to fight?

The law for the most part is black and white...very little gray unless you "know someone" and even then....they don't have time to listen to people try and get out of tickets.
I left around dark, but needed light from the start. 10 mins to climb down, a few to pack everything up, and then close to 40 min walk out. Like I said my light was on my head and turned on before I even started down the tree. So why would I be shot after hours, in the dark, with a HIGH beam light on me????
 
#3 ·
Personally I think you should take it as a learning lesson. You're putting yourself in danger not to mention if someone did mistake you for a deer as you were leaving and they shot you and you died think of how screwed up in the head that person would be.

When you say you are going to "fight it" I don't follow......

You were not wearing your blaze orange...so what is there to fight?

The law for the most part is black and white...very little gray unless you "know someone" and even then....they don't have time to listen to people try and get out of tickets.
 
#4 ·
Wow thats why I left PA. Nothing but a bunch of anti wardens that go way out of there way to write tickets.

In August I did a DIY Caribou hunt and was checked by a game warden. He could not have been any nicer, even telling us where the Caribou were as he had been flying around the day before. He did his job and left with a "good luck"
 
#12 ·
My defense would be me taking a picture or video (with the flash off) of myself in the woods with blaze orange on head to toe, and then dressed in full camo with the headlamp on, and present it to the judge and ask them which they fell is more safe for protection of a mistaken kill.
 
#14 ·
I would think the hike out in the dark is NOT considered "hunting" and if it were why didn't they site you for "hunting" after hours? I thought you only had to wear blaze while "hunting" and most certainly in the dark blaze does nothing to help you stand out as it cant be seen.Now the headlamp does warn others from hundreds of yards about your were abouts.

Not sure if fighting it is free or not but if it was i certainly would try.
 
#315 ·
I got stopped one night. I was tracking a deer and left everything sit at my tree. My light went dead at 9pm and I took everything back to my truck to get new batteries for my light. The wardens were waiting. They told me that your bow has to be out of the woods by the end of legal shooting hours. So if you have a 40 minute walk out, you have to be out of the woods by the end of legal shooting time. They let me go that night, but I have never forgotten that.
 
#15 ·
That really sucks. PA is becoming a horrible place to hunt. If they were to put half as much effort into catching poachers a they did in catching you coming back from your stand, we might be going somewhere in the right direction. Both the fish and game commission is useless and corrupt. They would rather pick apart a normal law abiding citizen, rather than to confront what's really destroying our state. We have a ton of poachers who lurk the back roads at night. You rarely see or hear about them getting busted because the wardens are at home sleeping after making their weekly quotas messing with the people who try to do everything by the book.

Your best bet would be to pay the fine. Because the wardens don't have anything better to do besides try to win in court. For they will be getting paid to fight you in court as Joe poaching shmo locks and loads for another nights hunt.

In the meantime I myself, would search for another place to hunt, for where you see them once ( the wardens ) they will definitely be back.

Good luck the rest of the season Brad
 
#23 ·
If in the law it says you have to wear blaze orange when hunting but doesn't stipulate when then you really don't have much of a case. If it says it only needs to be worn during daylight hours that would be a different story.

Blaze orange is meant to make you visible, if it was dark that would defeat the purpose of wearing it in the first place. Plus you mentioned you had a light on, which would also make you visible. An argument could be made that you didn't feel that the blaze orange provided adequate visibility with the low light conditions, so for your safety you opted to use a light instead. They can't prove that you weren't wearing the blaze orange when it was light out. But in order for that argument to work it had to be DARK when they made contact with you.

If it's a couple hundred dollar fine it's probably not worth the time, money and frustration of fighting it, but if you feel like you really weren't violating any laws they you kind of have an obligation to fight it.

To me it sounds like the wardens were power hungry ****, which is too bad because they're supposed to be on our side.
 
#24 ·
Fight it ! what's the worst that can happen. I would say on the approach to your truck you took off your vest and hat and that you did wear it out the stand.
 
#74 ·
Then that would be lying to the court, dont know about the US but here in the UK you can get some serious jail time for lying in court.

Why did the OP take off the Orange.??
I would chalk this one up to experience and take the hit, and dont give them an excuse the next time.
 
#25 ·
I'd fight it for sure. I'm just that type. Having said that, you'll prolly lose. The law is the law and I don't think it'll matter to the judge whether you can actually see the orange or not. This is where some discretion on behalf of the wardens should've been exercised. Sounds like that didn't happen. Sounds like total BS. Good luck.

Dawg
 
#28 ·
ask for a reduced fine.
This generally works only if there are extenuating circumstances such as financial hardship (unemployed; bankruptcy; etc.)

Even then the judge may order the monetary equivalent of community service. (I know this from firsthand experience. :redface:)
 
#27 ·
Fight it.

Anecdotal story: I got a traffic ticket. I showed up for court--along with dozens of others. Before the appointed time, a woman announced, "Let's see a show of hands if you're going to plead not guilty."

So a few of us raised our hand, and then she asked us to leave the room and follow her.

We went to another waiting area, and one by one she called us into a tiny room.

"If you plead guilty, here's what I'll do..."

Suddenly it dawned on me that they did not want to incur the costs and etc. of a trial (maybe jury? I dunno.) so she was willing to "Let's Make A Deal!"

Anyway, if you pretend you're gonna "fight it," maybe you will get lucky and be similarly approached.

Also consider this: if you do fight it, there's a chance one or both of the wardens won't appear--in which case you may win by default. (This happened to a friend; the cop who wrote the ticket failed to appear in court.)
 
#30 ·
Correct. Under the guise of "public safety" of course. (Hence a ticket instead of a warning.)

It's much more profitable and safer to target citizens who are a) non-violent; b) capable of paying; c) not likely to contest it.
 
#31 ·
If he got you in the parking lot, your golden. He didnt actually catch you in the woods. You where just peeing. No law against wearing orange to pee at night.


Fight it. I beat one a few years ago for me being a dumb. Game warden was a bit on the gung ho side. When we got to court, his lawyer( thats right) told me i should just pay the fine, cause the judge may rule that i have to pay more. I would have just paid the fine, but in PA you never know if they will take your license. I asked him, and he just kinda mumbled, so i said lets gamble. Long story short, once the judge heard the story he dismissed the case.

Depends alot on the judge. you get a nuuty liberal judge you may be toast.
 
#33 ·
Fight it...It's your word against theirs. Depending on how the judge in your county is inclined to react will decide the outcome. Game Wardens get a bad rep because most of them are wanna be cops that couldn't cut it in real law enforcement. That being said, there are some truly great ones out there. You're just not likely to run into them. The worst thing about it is the amounts of their fines. It's legal robbery. I would compare the offense of not having your hunter orange on to jaywalking. The only person in any kind of arguable danger was yourself and you decided to take the chance based on your personal assessment of the risk involved. Only difference is a jaywalking ticket usually runs about 10% of what those crooks are charging.

Any game warden who wears a leafy suit and hides in the bushes waiting for someone to walk by is an idiot. And in fact they were acting in a way that was much more dangerous than you were. If I am walking through the woods in the dark and a man dressed like that advances on me the way you describe, he's going to have a bullet hole in him.
 
#35 ·
You will probally get a reduced fine if you take it to court and explain.

I do have to admit that I have hunted 5 different states in my life and I have never experienced wardens like in PA. They are sob's.
Always have a chip on there shoulder even during routine stops.
 
#36 ·
Text Joint Line Parallel


This came from page 64/65 of the 2014 PA hunting and trapping digest. That whole "at all times while moving" part probably has you hosed, but I'd still go plead my case and use the time approach. sunset + 60 minutes = not hunting. Add the 40 minute hike to that and see where your timeline adds up on the ticket. Use any evidence you can as far as what time the offense actually happened (did you call anyone etc) that way there can be no discrepancies.

At the bottom of the next page, it specifies that it must be worn from 1 hour before legal hunting hours until 1 hour past legal hunting hours.

Which leads me to this page (14 of said digest):

Text Line Font Parallel Document


For Oct 18, you would have been required to wear orange from 545am until 745pm.

Good luck! They sure can be jackholes!

edit: found time table
 
#73 ·
View attachment 2065118

This came from page 64/65 of the 2014 PA hunting and trapping digest. That whole "at all times while moving" part probably has you hosed, but I'd still go plead my case and use the time approach. sunset + 60 minutes = not hunting. Add the 40 minute hike to that and see where your timeline adds up on the ticket. Use any evidence you can as far as what time the offense actually happened (did you call anyone etc) that way there can be no discrepancies.

At the bottom of the next page, it specifies that it must be worn from 1 hour before legal hunting hours until 1 hour past legal hunting hours.

Which leads me to this page (14 of said digest):

View attachment 2065119

For Oct 18, you would have been required to wear orange from 545am until 745pm.

Good luck! They sure can be jackholes!

edit: found time table

Yes I looked up all this info in the book this morning.. Can you believe he busted us at exactly 7:42 PM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 3 farting minutes to early, 120 seconds later and I highly doubt he could have done anything, UNLESS he dug even deeper and got us on something else.
 
#40 ·
Personally. . . . I would fight it. . . but im stubborn. . .

In your situation . . common sense says you shouldnt need to wear orange after dark, with a headlamp on, but the law is the way it is, and you woud lose. . . . Chalk it up as a learing experience, pay the fine, and move on, .. .
 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top