After months of investigation, it appears no charges will be brought against a man who shot and killed a bear in the Galena area on June 19.
According to a statement made by the Nevada Division of Wildlife, “In complex cases like the one you reference, the Nevada Department of Wildlife routinely works directly with District Attorney offices in order to present the most effective criminal complaints. This strategy allows the Department to present the strongest case possible in helping to ensure the District Attorney Offices can successfully bring the case before a judge with the highest possibility of conviction.
“In this case, an extensive criminal complaint was completed and submitted. The Washoe County DA’s office has met with NDOW staff concerning the complaint and at this time, no charges are anticipated to be forthcoming,” NDOW officials told This Is Reno.
Washoe County District Attorney Public Information Officer and Supervising Investigator Michelle Bays said that while agencies like NDOW consult with the D.A.’s office on investigations of this nature, it is ultimately up to those agencies to determine whether or not to file charges.
According to information on the Washoe County Sheriff’s Department website, “It is unlawful to discharge any gun, pistol, rifle, shotgun or other firearm within any congested area of the county.
“It is unlawful to discharge any gun, pistol, rifle, shotgun or other firearm in, on or across any county road or highway.
“It is unlawful to discharge in the unincorporated area of the county, any gun, pistol, rifle or other firearm, with the exception of shotguns, air rifles or B-B guns, within 5,000 feet of any dwelling occupied by another person or persons.”
Ashley Sanchez, NDOW public information officer, said, “Upon review, we determined there was not adequate probable cause to charge due to self defense claims” made by the shooter.
This Is Reno made a public records request to NDOW and reviewed relevant documentation associated with the case to learn more about what led the man to shoot the bear.
According to reports made by NDOW officers who reported to the scene on the morning of June 19, the bear had been shot sometime around 2:30 a.m., but authorities were not notified until later that morning–and by residents in the area, not by the man involved in the incident.
At first, the man was not particularly cooperative with officers, making a three-sentence statement that read, “I heard someone breaking into my house. Black bear ran at me as I walked out. Fired two shots into bear.”
NDOW officers did find a bear print on the man’s garage door and were later able to get him to speak in greater detail about the incident, though their reports note that the man appeared to still be visibly shaken by it. He explained to the officers that he got about 7 yards down the sidewalk leading to his door when he saw the bear, which he said began making huffing and puffing sounds, a “typical bear stress vocalization behavior as a warning for others to back off,” according to NDOW officers.
When the bear approached the man at a closer distance, he fired one round from his Bushmaster 6.8 SPC AR-15 rifle, striking the bear in the neck. The man said the bear then rolled around on the ground before getting up and heading south toward one of his neighbor’s property. He said he shot it a second time–striking it in the back–in an attempt to stop the animal, which was making “whimpering” noises, from suffering.
No bullet casings were found at the scene, although the man said he did not remember but believed that he did not pick them up after the incident.
The shots, according to both the man and neighbors who heard them, came at about a minute and a half apart. Neighbors who went outside to see what was happening later told NDOW officers that the man was outside in the street in his bathrobe with his gun, using the scope to look around for the bear. They told officers he spoke with them and was visibly upset, speaking rapidly and in a high pitched tone while repeating many times that he’d been in fear for his life when he fired the first shot.
Finding no bear carcass near the scene, NDOW officers, biologists, a veterinarian and vet tech used dogs to follow the blood trail left behind by the bear. It was later located and treed near Galena Creek. After tranquilizing the bear, officials examined its wounds and determined they were too grievous for the bear to be saved. They euthanized it.
This was not the first time a bear has been shot in the area. A bear was shot and killed in Stateline in the summer of 2016 after it broke into a home. In 2008, a bear that had been feeding on livestock south of Reno was shot and killed. In May of 2017, a bear was killed in Incline Village. In all of these cases, the bears were killed by law enforcement or NDOW officers.
