Makah members plead not guilty in whale killing

TACOMA – Five members of the Makah tribe pleaded not guilty Friday to misdemeanor charges in the killing of a protected gray whale during an unsanctioned hunt last month.

The five made their initial appearances in U.S. District Court a week after a federal grand jury indicted them on charges of conspiracy, unlawful taking of a marine mammal and unauthorized whaling, each punishable by a maximum year in jail and $100,000 fine.

According to the indictment, Frankie Gonzales, Wayne Johnson, Theron Parker, Andy Noel and William Secor took two motorboats into the Strait of Juan de Fuca off the tribe’s reservation at the tip of Washington’s Olympic Peninsula on the morning of Sept. 8 and harpooned the California gray whale.

They then shot it at least 16 times with at least one of the three high-powered rifles they had obtained from the tribe, the indictment said. The men did not have the tribe’s permission for the hunt, nor did they have a federal permit to kill the whale, which eventually sank and was not harvested.

The men remained out of custody pending trial, set for Nov. 27.

The Makah, who have been whalers for centuries, have sought to resume the hunts as part of their cultural heritage. But their treaty rights to hunt whales have been tangled in the courts for several years. The rogue hunt was a public relations disaster for the tribe and could delay their application for a lawful permit to hunt whales.