The Sowinski files: Gossip triggered government search of Sowinski property

Part 3 of 5: DNR plants a timber wolf, and offers Alvin Sowinski a fruit basket

Author’s note: Also upcoming this week, an interview with Republican attorney general candidate Adam Jarchow. A story version will be posted for everyone; for paid subscribers, the complete audiocast will be available.

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DNR undercover agent “Ted Gilbertson” said goodbye by planting a dead wolf and giving Alvin Sowinski a fruit basket. Photo: CommerceBank Fruit

It was April 2010, the calm before a May storm, and federal and state agents in northern Wisconsin were putting the final touches on their investigation of alleged wildlife poisoning activities.

Specifically, the state Department of Natural Resources and the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service—mostly the DNR—had spent months carrying out an elaborate scheme to catch Paul and Alvin Sowinski killing predatory wildlife through various means, mostly by putting poison on and around bait piles.

They had sent in an undercover agent, used mapping and aerial imaging programs, installed a secret video camera in the woods, and planted dead animals—and fake animal tracks—on the Sowinskis’ land in an unsuccessful attempt to get them to set out poison baits. More than that, they searched the property multiple times without warrants.

In effect, law enforcement was setting out its own bait piles to seduce the Sowinskis into their trap. The question is, did they poison due process along the way? That very question will be analyzed at the end of this series, but for now we approach the end of the story as the government amassed its resources for its final attempts to catch the Sowinskis after years of trying.

Preparing for the end game …