Tape Backs Up Agents’ Account In Wolf Case 74-Year-Old Rancher Was Aggressor With Officers, Transcript Shows

The three armed federal agents who tangled with 74-year-old Salmon rancher Eugene Hussey on March 8 were packing more than guns. They also had a tape recorder.

A transcript of the taped confrontation obtained by the Post Register in Idaho Falls through the federal Freedom of Information Act shows the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service agents were mostly calm and professional during the exchange with Hussey on his ranch south of Salmon.

The officers were investigating the death of a wolf that was shot on Hussey’s property shortly after being released in central Idaho.

The transcript shows Hussey acted as the aggressor and was far from the helpless old man portrayed by politicians critical of the investigation.

It reveals he called the agents obscene names and “big federal turds,” and tried to pelt the men with rocks.

Hussey calls the tape phony.

The incident drew national attention when conservatives used what they thought happened as an example of excessive federal force. Rep. Helen Chenoweth, R-Idaho, convened a hearing on that issue at which she bawled out federal agents.

Lemhi County Sheriff Brett Barsalou called the federal investigators’ tactics “heavy-handed and dangerously close to the use of excessive force.” Lemhi County commissioners protested their “high-handed actions,” and Republican Sen. Larry Craig said what they did was “inexcusable.”

The agents initially bit their lips, then called Hussey the aggressor.

“I think the transcript … shows that we acted professionally and tried to settle him down as much as we could,” Tom Riley, one of the three agents involved in the incident, said Tuesday.

The agents arrived on Hussey’s property with metal detectors and a search warrant to look for the bullet that killed the wolf in late January. The animal had been brought to Idaho as part of the government’s controversial wolf reintroduction plan. It was found dead on Hussey’s property lying next to a partially eaten dead calf.

Hussey, who fiercely denies any part in the wolf killing, discounted the tape after excerpts from the transcript were read to him over the telephone Tuesday night.

“I think it’s bull,” he said. “There’s things they’re saying there that I know they didn’t.”

The agents said they kept their tape a secret in case they needed it to defend themselves in court. It only became available to the public after they closed their investigation earlier this summer without finding the bullet or determining who shot the wolf.

The transcript shows a foul-mouthed Hussey ready to brawl when the agents presented him with the warrant.

“Here. Take it. This is your copy, sir,” agent Steve Magone told Hussey as he waded across a stream to hand Hussey his warrant.