Terry Halifax
Northern News Services

NNSL (Apr 05/99) - A Fort Smith Metis hunter who intentionally shot a moose in Wood Buffalo National Park in February, was formally charged by park wardens last Monday.

Kenny Hudson is facing one count of hunting moose without a licence.

Under the recently-tabled National Park Act, Hudson is facing a maximum penalty of a $150,000 and/or five years in jail. He will make his first court appearance on April 20.

"That's just to enter a plea," Hudson said. "They said they wanted to have the court date set over until September."

"I don't know if they're just doing that to be mean to me, because that would coincide with hunting season," he laughed.

Hudson shot the moose to bring attention to the law that denies him a park hunting licence. He became frustrated with the inaction of government and said this could have been avoided.

"I'm pissed off at the superintendent here, because he's the guy that I dealt with for over a year," he said. "He said, 'Oh, we're doing this, we're doing that; we're looking into it.'"

"He never even gave me one piece of paper to say this is what we've done so far and these are the steps we've taken," he said.

"I blame it on him because he had the opportunity to sit down with me and Gordie Villebrun (president Metis Local 50) and Gary Bohnet (president Metis Nation) and say, 'Listen, we've just now become aware of the situation and we'd like to open a door to correct this.'"

"But he never did," Hudson said. "They were probably going to treat me like they treated everybody else for 77 years and just say, 'Ignore him and he'll go away.'"

Hudson's confident he'll win his court battle, but hopes the case won't become part of a lengthy appeals process.

"We'll know soon after because as soon as I win in September, I'll go up to the park office and apply for my licence," he said. "If they give it to me, that will be the end of it."

"If they don't, that means they'll be filing an appeal."

Wood Buffalo National Park officials could not be reached for comment, despite repeated attempts.