Six men from Colorado have pleaded guilty to poaching fish from the Manistee River in October.

OSTEGO COUNTY, Mich. – Three Northern Michigan men have been arraigned in a 2019 Pigeon River Country elk poaching case. Officials said the three men are responsible for what Department of Natural Resources conservation officers call a “historic elk poaching case.”They were arraigned in the Otsego County 87A District Court. All three men pleaded not guilty to a total of eight wildlife crimes after admitting to poaching three cow elk in Pigeon River Country in December of 2019. Harry White, 70, of West Branch was arraigned on three charges: taking an over-limit of elk, failing to make a reasonable effort to retrieve elk and taking elk in the wrong hunting unit. “Without our officers’ professional commitment to pursuit of the facts, these suspects would have gotten away with one of the worst elk poaching incidents I have ever seen.

WOLVERINE, Mich. A man has been arrested in connection with the poaching of a cow elk in a northern Michigan state forest. Jakob Gagnon, 21, was arraigned Aug. 28 in Cheboygan County District Court on misdemeanor taking an elk without a license and possessing stolen property charges, according to the state's Natural Resources department. Gagnon is accused of shooting and later processing the elk. Gagnon and Turbin live in Cheboygan Countys Wolverine, northwest of the state forest. Authorities continue to investigate the poaching of five elk in late 2019.