Pennsylvania Game News - December 2011 - 29

“Let’s try to get a search warrant,” he replied. “Do you think we have enough probable cause to get a search warrant on a violation that occurred more than a year ago?” I asked. Anderson just looked at me with his head tilted as if to say, “I got this.” He had given me that look a lot, and I also knew him to be “electronically advanced,” so to speak. Considering what we had just found, I thought trying to obtain a search warrant for evidence of a likely related crime from the year before was worth pursuing. Being a Saturday we had to find out who the on-call magistrate (MDJ) and on-call district attorney (DA) were. As we were driving to the Northeast Region office, thinking about the search warrant application, we realized we would need to describe the residence we would be searching. I contacted WCO Jim Jolley, who covers the area where Dumco lives, and it turned out, Jolley knew exactly where Dumco lived, and said that we’d be driving right past his place on our way to the region office. He also had the phone number for the ADA. As we drove by the residence, Anderson took a photo of it, so we could describe it on our application. Anderson then talked to the ADA about what we wanted to search for and explained that Dumco probably had photos on his computer of the deer we suspected he had shot over bait the previous year. Without knowing for certain that Dumco had a computer, though, the ADA would not agree to let us put that into the search warrant. Anderson thought for a minute and then said, “Okay, we’ll just search for hard copy photos. Then, if we get in there and find a computer, we’ll re-apply and add the computer—unless he gives us consent while we are there.
DECEMBER 2011

When Anderson and I arrived at the region office, we found there was a problem with the phone lines and Internet, so we drove over to Jolley’s house to email the application and probable cause affidavit to the ADA. Within minutes we had the approved search warrant from the ADA. Then we needed to see the on-call MDJ to get him to sign it. Finally, about 6:30 p.m., 12 hours after finding Dumco in his Ricketts Glen blind, we had a warrant. We p u l l e d i n t o Dumco’s driveway and knocked on the door. “Pennsylvania Game Commission, state officers. We’re here to serve a search warrant.” When we met Mr. Dumco, Anderson asked if he remembered talking to us that morning. “Well, we have a search warrant and need to see your deer photos,” Anderson said. Mr. Dumco claimed that he didn’t have any deer pictures, so I asked about the coyote pictures he claimed to have had when we talked to him that morning. After shuffling through the house, he produced three coyote pictures that looked like they had been taken 40 years ago. When we noticed the skull and antlers of a large 6-point buck hanging on his wall, along with a picture of Mr. Dumco and a young girl, posing in the woods with the 6-point, Anderson asked when he shot the deer and who the young girl was. Mr. Dumco claimed that he shot it the year before, near Dutch Mountain, that the girl was his daughter, and that his son-in-law, who helped him get the deer out, took the picture. Anderson and I looked at each other and then back at the skull/picture, both thinking this was the deer killed over bait at Ricketts Glen. Anderson
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Pennsylvania Game News - December 2011

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