This former Benton official covered up his grandson’s illegal hunt

A former Benton County commissioner has admitted letting his teen grandson hunt deer and elk on the property without the required license and tags.

Max Benitz Jr., caretaker for the historic McWhorter Ranch on Rattlesnake Mountain, tried to cover up the killing of a bull elk one morning last June by driving about 20 miles to Prosser to buy a 2017 hunting license and elk damage tag.

He then returned to the ranch near Benton City, picked up the elk — which had a 4-point rack — and took it to his Prosser home to hang in his shop, according to court documents.

The points are used to determine the age of the animal.

Benitz told an officer with the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife that he went out of his way to get the proper permits from a hardware store in case he was stopped or contacted by anyone while transporting the elk.

The grandson, 14, failed a hunter education and safety course in August 2016, and had never applied for or been issued a deferral.

Benitz managed the hunt and elk permits issued for the ranch. He talked with Wildlife Conflict Specialist Don Hand after the elk was killed and never mentioned it, but later told the officer he “screwed up,” documents said.

Benitz, 70, pleaded guilty this week in Benton County District Court to second-degree unlawful hunting of big game, a gross misdemeanor.

He was given 364 days in jail with all of the time suspended for two years, meaning he can be locked up if he has any violations in that time.

Benitz also was ordered to pay a fine and court costs, including a $4,000 wildlife penalty per state law.

Benitz was a county commissioner for 16 years. Commissioner Shon Small unseated him in 2010.

This is the second time Benitz has had trouble with the law involving wildlife.

In 2005, he pleaded guilty to discharging a firearm in public for killing a skunk with a .22-caliber rifle at the Benton County Courthouse in Prosser.

Benitz and some county employees had called animal control and other authorities, and even tried to coax the animal out of a rarely used building on their own, all with no luck.

He avoided jail time for that gross misdemeanor and had the conviction removed from his record by staying out of trouble for one year.

At the time, Benitz issued a statement saying he considered himself “a law-abiding citizen, and I am keenly aware of safety issues related to firearms.”

He said he was “solely motivated” in shooting the skunk by what he believed was the community’s best interest.

In the more recent case, Fish and Wildlife official received a complaint June 23 of a possible big game hunting violation. The tip came in about 11 hours after the elk was killed.

The person added that Benitz had accompanied and mentored his grandson on multiple hunts.

McWhorter Ranch’s approximately 21 square miles borders the Hanford Reach National Monument on the top of Rattlesnake and stretches down the mountain’s south slope between Prosser and Benton City.

A majority of the ranch is open country with bluebunch wheatgrass and sage, with irrigated rows of grapes, hops and blueberries on smaller properties below.

The McWhorter family sold it five years ago to Gamble Land & Timber of Brewster for $7.6 million.

Court documents state Fish and Wildlife gives damage hunting permits to landowners to help reduce commercial crop damage done by the large Hanford elk herd.

If a landowner has been issued a permit, the hunter is required to have a Washington hunting license and an elk damage tag to lawfully harvest an elk on the permit.

The hunter also must carry a completed damage permit provided by the landowner, and notify the state department within 24 hours of any elk harvested and the location, documents said.

As of June 23, the elk damage season was only open for the harvesting of bull elk. The general elk hunting season did not open until Oct. 28.

Fish and Wildlife Sgt. Brian Fulton and Officer Jonathan Horn reviewed the Facebook and Instagram pages of the grandson — whose name is not disclosed in court documents — and found photos of the boy posing with dead animals.

A June 23 post showed him with a bull elk and background terrain similar to Rattlesnake. The elk’s “antlers were still in velvet, which is consistent with the time of year,” court documents said.

The boy wrote that he killed the elk with one shot.

The boy and his grandfather posed in an October 2016 photo with a 3x2 buck mule deer in the back of a truck. A comment with the post implied that the boy killed the deer, documents said.

The boy is pictured with a spike bull elk in August 2016. And a July 2015 photo had a cow elk carcass in the bed of a pickup and a comment by the boy that it was his elk.

Gamble Land & Timber elk harvest reports showed Benitz had notified the department of an antlerless elk harvest in July 2015 and a spike-antlered bull elk in July 2016, both with permits.

Six days after the June hunt with Benitz and his grandson, the department had not received any reports of elk being taken on permits for the McWhorter Ranch.

The boy, when interviewed by Fulton and Horn, admitting killing two cow elk on McWhorter Ranch, one in 2015 and the other in 2016. He said he had used kill permits to harvest them, and his grandfather was with him both times, court documents said.

The boy said he also killed a 3x4 buck deer during the general deer season in 2016 with his grandfather’s tag, and the branch-antlered bull elk on June 23 that was posted on his social media account.

He said he killed the bull on a damage permit, and that Benitz was aware his grandson did not have a hunting license, documents said.

The teen and his mother showed wildlife officers the elk meat in their freezer, saying they only took from the four quarters and back straps. That meat was later surrendered for donation to the Tri-City Union Gospel Mission.

Benitz, when questioned by Fulton, initially denied knowing anything about the dead bull elk in the photos, court documents said. He then admitted that his grandson had shot it at first light that morning, then they field dressed the elk and drove it to shops on the ranch to be skinned.

Benitz said he drove the 20-plus miles to Prosser to get fuel and the hunting license and elk damage tag. He returned to the ranch, picked up the carcass and went home.

Two days later, he cut the meat up for storage and placed it in his freezer. He turned over nine packages of elk meat in July, which also was donated to the mission.

Benitz told Fulton that anyone who hunts on the McWhorter property has to be with him in his truck or following him in their own car, documents said.

He added that no one is allowed to just go out and hunt the property without him being with them or at the very least knowing about it beforehand.

He showed officers the ravine on the property where he dumped the elk parts.

Benitz denied his grandson’s claims that he had killed a deer in 2016 or several cow elk over two years on the ranch. He repeated that the boy had not killed any elk prior to the June hunt because “that meant (Benitz) would have falsified his hunter/permit reports that he had already turned in to Officer Hand for those time periods,” documents said.

This story was originally published January 4, 2018 at 8:01 PM with the headline "This former Benton official covered up his grandson’s illegal hunt."