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Prep school teens were accused of massacring protected birds. Did they get off too easy?
Retweeted by David Fahrenthold: https://twitter.com/Fahrenthold
Prep school students and grads massacred Laysan albatrosses and smashed eggs. Sentencing for one on 6th. By @blyte
Link to tweet
Prep school teens were accused of massacring protected birds. Did they get off too easy?
By Brittany Lyte July 5 at 8:00 AM
KAPA‘A, Hawaii — The first of the bodies was discovered by a hiker who snapped a photo of the suspicious scene with his cellphone. Buried in a nest on the westernmost spit of the Hawaiian island of Oahu was a dead bird the size of a human child. On the ground next to it was a large stick.
State conservation officers would later determine that more than a dozen birds had been bloodied and dismembered with a bat, a machete and a pellet gun. Nearby, several smashed eggs were scattered about the craggy, lava rock coast.
That gruesome sight in December 2015 soon became a crime scene, one that eventually implicated six students and recent graduates of a prestigious Honolulu prep school whose alumni include former president Barack Obama. While on a camping trip the night before the hiker’s arrival, authorities alleged, the boys and young men had hiked to the Ka‘ena Point Natural Area Reserve and mercilessly slaughtered at least 15 Laysan albatrosses, federally protected birds that have been the focus of a 26-year-long conservation effort. Nearly a dozen of their eggs were crushed; six other eggs failed to hatch due to the death of a parent.
The night of destruction set conservation efforts back nearly a decade and caused more than $200,000 in damage, state and federal investigators say. It has also fueled outrage among wildlife advocates and nature lovers in Hawaii, who contend that the students — who were accused of severing the birds’ feet to collect their I.D. bands as souvenirs and posting photos of the mutilated birds on social media — have not received punishments proportionate to such a shocking, callous crime. ... “This crime is absolutely heinous,” said Hawaii Department of Land and Natural Resources Chairwoman Suzanne Case. “Jail time and significant community service time should be carefully considered for this kind of crime — as punishment, deterrence and restitution.”
By Brittany Lyte July 5 at 8:00 AM
KAPA‘A, Hawaii — The first of the bodies was discovered by a hiker who snapped a photo of the suspicious scene with his cellphone. Buried in a nest on the westernmost spit of the Hawaiian island of Oahu was a dead bird the size of a human child. On the ground next to it was a large stick.
State conservation officers would later determine that more than a dozen birds had been bloodied and dismembered with a bat, a machete and a pellet gun. Nearby, several smashed eggs were scattered about the craggy, lava rock coast.
That gruesome sight in December 2015 soon became a crime scene, one that eventually implicated six students and recent graduates of a prestigious Honolulu prep school whose alumni include former president Barack Obama. While on a camping trip the night before the hiker’s arrival, authorities alleged, the boys and young men had hiked to the Ka‘ena Point Natural Area Reserve and mercilessly slaughtered at least 15 Laysan albatrosses, federally protected birds that have been the focus of a 26-year-long conservation effort. Nearly a dozen of their eggs were crushed; six other eggs failed to hatch due to the death of a parent.
The night of destruction set conservation efforts back nearly a decade and caused more than $200,000 in damage, state and federal investigators say. It has also fueled outrage among wildlife advocates and nature lovers in Hawaii, who contend that the students — who were accused of severing the birds’ feet to collect their I.D. bands as souvenirs and posting photos of the mutilated birds on social media — have not received punishments proportionate to such a shocking, callous crime. ... “This crime is absolutely heinous,” said Hawaii Department of Land and Natural Resources Chairwoman Suzanne Case. “Jail time and significant community service time should be carefully considered for this kind of crime — as punishment, deterrence and restitution.”
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