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A cougar hunt gone wrong

by Ed Godfrey
The Oklahoman
Published: October 19, 2014

Oklahoma City attorney Jason Roselius never expected his cougar hunt to make
the front page of a New Mexico newspaper.

Nor did he expect it to lead to the resignation of the chairman of New Mexico�s
Game and Fish Commission.


View Larger Image
A mountain lion hunt earlier this year in New Mexico
didn�t go as planned for Oklahoma City attorney Jason
Roselius. AP photo California Dept. of Fish and Game

He was just trying to strike an item off his bucket list when he went on a
mountain lion hunt last February in New Mexico.

�I stepped into a political crossfire,� Roselius said.

The cougar case

Roselius killed a cougar on the hunt, but it was later confiscated by New
Mexico Game and Fish. He was originally charged with two misdemeanor
counts in New Mexico of unlawful hunting and hunting without the proper
license.

Even though Roselius had bought a cougar license, he had failed to buy the
general New Mexico hunting license, which also was required.

Roselius thought he had purchased all of the licenses required on the New
Mexico Game and Fish website. He bought the big game cougar license but
said the website did not direct him to buy an additional general hunting
license.

�I didn�t know I needed it,� he said.

Roselius said he later discovered that failure was the result of a computer
glitch, but he also called New Mexico Game and Fish before the hunt to double
check on the licenses.

�We called the state that day and went over everything,� Roselius said. �We
were told we had everything we needed.�

The unlawful hunting charge stemmed from dogs being released to track the
cougar before Roselius even arrived to the New Mexico ranch.

Under New Mexico hunting regulations, a hunter must be present continuously
once any dog is released.

Roselius said when he arrived in Tucumari, N.M., he met the ranch owner at a
McDonald�s and then they drove to the ranch.

The ranch owner had dogs in the back of his truck and when they got to the
ranch, he released them and they immediately started hunting.

�I have never hunted behind hounds,� Roselius said he told the rancher at the
time. �This is my first mountain lion hunt. Don�t let me get hurt. Don�t let me
get in trouble.�

They began to trail the dogs up a mountain to begin the hunt and later fell in
with another group of guides and dogs who had tracked and cornered a
cougar in a cave.

Roselius said he crawled on his belly down a hole to get a shot at the cougar
and was worried about getting mauled.

�I hadn�t been that scared in a long time,� he said. �The only thing going
through my mind was don�t miss the shot. I had a single shot .243 with no
scope.�

He didn�t. He was excited to bag a cougar and tipped the guides another
$3,500 above the $5,500 he had paid for the hunt.

After checking in the cougar, game wardens discovered the snafu about the
license and started asking more questions about the hunt and who was
involved.

When asked, Roselius admitted that he did not personally see all of the dogs
released and did not know that was a violation of the hunting regulations.

He also did not know until earlier that day that the rancher, Scott Bidegain, also
was chairman of New Mexico�s Game and Fish Commission.

�This wasn�t about me,� Roselius said. �It was about Scott Bidegain.�

The political fallout

Roselius said he booked the hunt on the Bidegain family�s T4 cattle ranch near
Tucumcari at the suggestion of a friend of his father�s.

Bidegain and three others also were charged with unlawful hunting for
releasing dogs without the hunter present.

Because Bidegain was chairman of the New Mexico Game and Fish
Commission, the case received widespread publicity.

�It�s on the front page of the Albuquerque News. It�s in the London Times,�
Roselius said. �It�s all over the world in two days.�

At the time, Bidegain already was under fire for taking part and winning money
in a coyote-killing contest in Nevada. Nine conservation groups had called on
the governor of New Mexico to remove him.

Bidegain resigned in February, shortly after the cougar hunt, even before the
misdemeanor charge against him for unlawful hunting was filed.

Roselius pleaded no contest in May to unlawful hunting and received a $500
fine. The other charge was dropped after he completed 90 days of
unsupervised probation.

Roselius said he made a mistake by not buying the underlying license, but that
he would never intentionally violate a hunting law. He feels the media reports
in New Mexico unfairly portrayed him as an unethical hunter.

Roselius said someone even made a complaint against him to the Oklahoma
Bar Association over the cougar case.

�It�s not as hard to commit a game and fish violation as some people think,� he
said.

Roselius trusted the guides to know the hunting regulations.

�If I was going to go up there by myself on horseback, I would probably have
command of all these rules,� he said. �I thought I knew all of them, but I also
relied on the guides. I paid them a bunch of money.�

Robert Fleenor, head of law enforcement for the Oklahoma Department of
Wildlife Conservation, said hunters are expected to know and comply with all
regulations even when hunting with a guide.

He recommends hunters call the local game warden in the area they will be
hunting to make sure about regulations and licensing or to check out a guide.

�We would much rather keep somebody out of trouble,� Fleenor said. �They
(hunters) wear the phone out up here, which is okay. I don�t want someone
getting in trouble through ignorance.�

Roselius, an avid shooter and gun collector, hasn�t picked up a gun since
killing the cougar.

�I haven�t fired a shot since,� he said. �It�s been such a distasteful experience.�