Southern Illinois man charged with killing protected wildlife and trespassing in Perry County
Editor’s note: This story was updated at 3:37 p.m. Tuesday with attorney information.
The Perry County state’s attorney has charged a Pinckneyville man with numerous conservation violations, including trespassing on private land.
Justin Bauersachs, 23, is known to police and property owners as a trespasser and has killed protected wildlife, according to records from Illinois Conservation Police. The agency is the law enforcement branch of the Illinois Department of Natural Resources, which oversees state hunting regulations.
An attorney for Bauersachs did not immediately return a request for comment Tuesday.
Bauersachs was charged with violations from as far back as two years ago, according to Perry County court records:
- Criminal trespass to private land
- Falsifying a deer harvest report
- Unlawful possession of deer and wild turkey carcasses
- Hunting on private property without permission
- Hunting wild turkeys without a permit, failure to tag turkeys after a kill and failure to report turkey harvest
- Unlawful take of a wild turkey by shining a spotlight while the bird roosted in a tree
- Dumping a goose carcass in a creek
- Unlawful possession a hooded merganser duck carcass
- Unlawful possession of a beaver, a protected species, out of season
- Hunting wild turkey after legal shooting hours
- Illegal possession of a wild turkey leg
Bauersachs was the third person to be charged in a trio accused of allegedly connected conservation violations in Perry, Clinton and Jackson counties. Conservation police also cited Greg Cottom of Pinckneyville and Sally Albers of Breese.
Police began investigating the violations in January last year. They delivered their evidence to the Perry County state’s attorney in December.
This story was originally published March 22, 2022 at 12:54 PM.
