Word: grosz
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Investigator Terry Grosz is screening a snuff film. The quality is poor, but the action is gruesomely clear: a group of hunters, accompanied by Doberman pinschers, is stalking a bear and her cub in the New Hampshire woods. The mother dies relatively quickly from her wounds; her cub is less lucky. "Get her with this!" shouts a man, and pulls out a crossbow. Suddenly the cub squeals; imbedded in its skull, as if in some ghastly Saturday-morning cartoon, is an arrow. The hunter takes his time reloading. Finally, with his second shot, the bear falls to the ground, where...
...video, taken in 1992 by a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service undercover agent, was later used to put the hunter in jail. Grosz, a 6-ft. 5-in. bear of a man who is an assistant regional director for law enforcement for the Fish and Wildlife Service, has seen the footage dozens of times in this Lakewood, Colorado, viewing room, yet he cannot control his sorrow, or his anger. His eyes still damp, he asks, "Did you see that? How they were killing the bears right in front of the camera? Those bastards...
...Butterflies. Of all God's creatures, great and small, there are apparently few that enterprising Americans are unwilling to slaughter or kidnap in the country's national parks. Poaching in the parks has been a problem since they were founded in the 19th century, but never like this, says Grosz, echoing colleagues across the U.S. "I've been in the business for 30 years, and the problem is definitely at its worst," he says. "They're taking everything." Wildlife-enforcement officials estimate that there are 3,000 American black bears taken illegally every year...
...next century if their depletion continues at the current pace, the Park Service warns. Four of them -- the hawksbill sea turtle, brown pelican, peregrine falcon, and Schaus' swallowtail butterfly -- are already endangered. "I remember seeing salmon so damn thick in the river you could have walked on them," Grosz says. "Now they're scarce. And we're killing 5,000 different kinds of birds every year...
...over approximately 750,000 sq. mi. of parks. At Yellowstone National Park, 60 full-time rangers patrol a tract larger than Rhode Island and Delaware combined. Says chief ranger Dan Sholly: "For every poacher we catch, there are 30 to 50 incidents that we don't even see." Adds Grosz: "Some days I figure I have Custer's odds." He has only 24 agents to juggle law enforcement with other duties...