Maine Guide guilty of game violations

PARIS – A registered Maine Guide accused of violating state game laws was found guilty Tuesday in Oxford County Superior Court of nine of the 29 remaining counts against him.

Jurors returned the verdict against Lawrence Perry, 56, of Fryeburg after weighing the evidence for two additional hours on the third day of deliberations.

Perry was found guilty on one of five counts of driving deer, two of five counts of having a loaded firearm in a vehicle and one of four counts of unlawful bear hunting with more than four dogs. Other counts on which he was convicted range from hunting without hunter orange clothing to illegal possession of deer killed at night.

Perry remains free on his own recognizance while he awaits sentencing next month. Two of the violations are Class D offenses, punishable by up to a year in jail and a $1,000 fine, and seven are Class E offenses, punishable by up to six months and a $500 fine. He also faces revocation of his licenses from the Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife.

Perry was one of 15 hunters summoned or arrested after an undercover operation in which a game warden posed as a hunter from Pennsylvania. Perry is the only one of the 15 who decided to take the case to trial.

Both sides hailed the jury’s verdict as a victory.

“This was a very successful operation for us,” said Mark Latti, spokesman for DIF&W. “He was found guilty on some major violations, and he’s going to lose his right to hunt, to fish and to guide people.

Even though his client was convicted on some of the counts, attorney William Maselli said he was pleased at the outcome.

“We won more than a third, and three or four more were dismissed before they even went to the jury,” said Maselli, who promised an appeal. He said it would focus largely on “whether or not it’s constitutional for a law enforcement officer to continually violate the law in the process of entrapping citizens or encouraging citizens to commit crimes.”

Maselli said his client is a construction worker who never actively pursued a career as a Maine Guide. The undercover officer, Maselli said, “was the one person he took money from over the last few years.”