The Freeman Davis story...Here's an excerpt from the Rio Grand Sun, June 26, 2008 (or October 22, 2009, or April 29, 2015...I can't tell exactly which)
--------------------------------------------------------
[...]
Another protest that leaves Lindrith residents scratching their heads is the concern that drilling wells will harm deer and elk hunting. In the 1930s, deer were rare in Lindrith and there were no elk.
?I didn't see a deer until I was seven years old,? Welch said.
Beginning in the 1960s, however, Rio Arriba and the Lindrith area in particular became known as a prime spot for trophy mule deer. Elk, which had been exterminated from New Mexico, were reintroduced and they began to breed.
In the beginning, deer licenses were unlimited and unrestricted. During hunting season, hundreds of hunters would pour into the Lindrith area. They cruised up and down the dirt roads, and locals suspected that some were illegally spotlighting deer, according to SUN reports. Fences were cut and private-property boundaries often violated.
?You could post your land and they'd just drive down and cut your fence,? Nelson said. ?Hunting season was a nightmare.?
The tense situation came to a head on November 7, 1990, when Lindrith rancher Freeman Davis confronted a vehicle with two hunters he suspected of spotlighting, past SUN reports state. A shot was fired and Davis was killed. He left behind a wife and three young children.
The man accused of shooting Davis, Edwin Arrieta, was convicted of voluntary manslaughter and sentenced to eight years in prison, SUN reports state.
The incident galvanized the citizens of Lindrith, who demanded a solution. The state Game and Fish Department closed the area to hunting for a year to hammer out new regulations. The Lindrith area, which is primarily private land, was separated from Big Game Unit 5 and renamed Unit 5A ? the Freeman Davis Memorial Unit ? and the number of public licenses for deer and elk were limited.
In 2008, there were just 30 public deer-hunting licenses issued for Unit 5A, along with 220 private-land-only licenses.
The new regulations have allowed Lindrith residents and the Department to control the numbers of hunters coming into the area...
-------------------------------------------------------------
This is Google's cache of
http://www.riograndesun.com/articles/2015/04/25/our_communities/doc4adf455cc39c8757735467.txt. It is a snapshot of the page as it appeared on Apr 29, 2015 15:20:03 GMT. The current page could have changed in the meantime. Learn more