Group Agrees to Stop Illegal Wild-Game Meat Sale, Pay Fine

SANTA ANA —  The organizers of an annual wild-game barbecue have agreed to stop illegally selling the meat of animals such as elk, deer, fish and birds and pay $30,000 to settle a civil lawsuit filed by the county.

“It was the most just and fair way of resolving this,” Deputy Dist. Atty. Matthew Anderson said of the settlement between the county and The Wild Game Feed Inc. “The remedy . . . seems to address the problem.”

Neither the organization’s president, Howard Clark, nor its attorney, Michael Quigley, could be reached for comment late Monday.

The lawsuit stemmed from a $75-a-plate barbecue the organization planned last September near Irvine Regional Park.

Investigators from the state Department of Fish and Game and the U.S. Wildlife Service--some with guns drawn--descended on the site in cars and helicopters before the barbecue began. Their investigation eventually revealed the presence of some illegal meat. Event organizers later chose to cancel the barbecue, Anderson said.

Officials became suspicious, Anderson said, after seeing flyers advertising the sale of meat from fish, deer, elk, mountain lion, black bear and “exotic pig.”

State law prohibits the sale of wild game in California. Fish caught under the authority of a sportfishing, rather than a commercial, license also cannot be sold.

The lawsuit charged the organization with conducting the unlawful business practice of selling meat proscribed by Fish and Game regulations and false or misleading advertising for promising to sell some meats--such as mountain lion and black bear--which were not actually available at the event.

In the settlement, reached Friday, the organization also agreed to reimburse the state Department of Fish and Game $3,790 for the cost of its investigation.