Jack Danylchuk
Northern News Services

Yellowknife (Oct 13/00) - A renewable resources officer sent to jail for shooting a bison out of season has lost his job, said Resources Minister Joe Handley.

"He's not working for us anymore," Handley said Thursday.

Handley said Rick Sanderson can appeal the dismissal, and might get a job with some other department of the Government of the Northwest Territories, "but the chance of coming back as a wildlife officer is zero."

Sanderson, who was based in Fort Providence, was sentenced to four months in jail after he pleaded guilty Aug. 30 to hunting outside legal jurisdiction, outside of season and giving false information to a peace officer.

Officials in Handley's ministry said at the time that they didn't know if Sanderson would be fired.

The Renewable Resources Officers Association objected publicly to the implication that Sanderson might return to his job when he completes his sentence at the South Mackenzie Correctional Centre in Hay River.

"For our senior managers to suggest that he may have his job back is something they will have to answer to the public," Keith Hicking, chair of the association, told Yellowknifer.

Sanderson was fired in late September, at the same time that the association went public with its concerns.

Handley said the officer was fired because he was unavailable for work and because of "the nature of the crime.

"If he had been in a bar fight it would have been different, but he broke the law he was sworn to protect," Handley said.

The minister said that the procedure for dealing with such cases is set out in government guidelines and regulations.

"When he was charged he was removed from his regular duties but continued to be paid; when he was convicted, the government had to act," Handley said.