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<\/a><\/p>\nJohn Waldrop.<\/strong><\/em> BROOKLYN,\u00a0\u00a0 New York\u2013\u2013<\/strong> Brooklyn Federal Court Judge Rachel Kovner on April 9,\u00a0 2025 fined orthopedic surgeon John Waldrop,\u00a0 76,\u00a0 of Cataula,\u00a0 Georgia,\u00a0 $900,000 for conspiracy to smuggle wildlife and Endangered Species Act violations.<\/p>\n Kovner also ordered Waldrop,\u00a0 who pleaded guilty to the charges in August 2024,\u00a0 to serve three years on probation.<\/p>\n At that,\u00a0 Waldrop was prosecuted and penalized for only fraction of his total mayhem against birds.<\/p>\n (U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service photo)<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cWaldrop has turned parts of his 220-acre property into a wildlife preserve,\u00a0 his lawyer,\u00a0 Paul Fishman, said,\u201d\u00a0 \u00a0reported John Annese for the New York Daily News<\/em>.<\/p>\n \u201cAnd,\u00a0 according to court filings,\u201d\u00a0 Annese said,\u00a0 \u201che kept his collection in a lake house that he\u2019d often open up to school children,\u00a0 who called it \u201cDr. Waldrop\u2019s Zoo.\u201d<\/p>\n Google Earth images tell a different story,\u00a0 revealing as many as five shooting ranges surrounding Waldrop\u2019s Cataula home,\u00a0 at least two of which appear to have been built specifically to accommodate competitive pigeon shoots.<\/p>\n \u201cJoe fighting the dogs who killed him.\u201d<\/strong><\/em> The vicinity,\u00a0 33 years before Waldrop was born,\u00a0 became briefly notorious for the September 1916 lynching of Pete Hudson,\u00a0 an African-American man who had allegedly killed Randolph County sheriff W.S. Taylor and also killed several of the bloodhounds used to hunt Hudson during a three-day pursuit through the Cataula swamps.<\/p>\n What became of \u201ctwo escaped convicts,\u201d\u00a0 also African-American,\u00a0 who accompanied Hudson \u201ccould not be ascertained,\u201d\u00a0 according to local news accounts;\u00a0 they too were probably lynched.<\/p>\n Golden eagle.\u00a0 (Beth Clifton photo)<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cAccording to court documents and statements made in court,\u201d\u00a0 detailed a Department of Justice media release,\u00a0 \u201cWaldrop amassed an extensive collection of 1,401 taxidermy bird mounts and 2,594 eggs which included:<\/p>\n \u2022<\/strong>\u00a0 Four eagles protected by the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act;<\/p>\n \u2022\u00a0 <\/strong>179 bird and 193 egg species listed in the Migratory Bird Treaty Act; and<\/p>\n \u2022\u00a0 <\/strong>212 bird and 32 egg species covered by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).<\/p>\n \u201cThis included incredibly rare specimens like three eggs of the Nordmann\u2019s Greenshank, \u00a0an Asian shorebird with only 900 to 1,600 remaining birds in the wild.\u00a0 No North American museum has any Nordmann Greenshank eggs in their collection,\u201d\u00a0 the Department of Justice statement said.<\/p>\n (U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service photo)<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cWaldrop\u2019s gigantic and rare bird collection was bolstered in part by illegal imports, \u00a0where he and his enlisted co-conspirators intentionally avoided permit and declaration requirements,\u201d \u00a0explained acting assistant U.S. attorney general Adam Gustafson of the Environmental & Natural Resources Division of the Justice Department.<\/p>\n \u201cProsecutors set up three birds from Waldrop\u2019s collection on a table in the courtroom \u2014 a Roseate spoonbill,\u00a0 a Eurasian eagle-owl,\u00a0 and an imperial eagle,\u00a0 native to eastern Europe and parts of Asia \u2014 positioning them so their eyes pointed directly at the judge,\u201d\u00a0 recounted New York Daily News<\/em> reporter John Annese.<\/p>\n Continued Annese,\u00a0 \u201c\u2019I hope that you can appreciate the beauty,\u2019\u00a0 Waldrop drawled.\u00a0 \u2018I look at them as pieces of art and not as mounts.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Actor Jim Carrey was unfortunately not present in his Ace Ventura role to appreciate the \u201cLovely room of death.<\/p>\n Barred owl.\u00a0 (Beth Clifton photo)<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cWaldrop has forfeited his entire collection,\u201d\u00a0 Annese said,\u00a0 \u201chanding the birds and eggs over to the Smithsonian Museum,\u00a0 Cornell University,\u00a0 and other zoos and museums,\u00a0 Department of Justice attorney Ryan Connors said.<\/p>\n \u201cThat collection includes herons,\u00a0 a Muscovy duck,\u00a0 and an Elenora\u2019s falcon from Italy,\u00a0 a great gray owl and a boreal owl from Russia.\u201d<\/p>\n Sentenced with Waldrop was Toney Jones,\u00a0 55,\u00a0 of Eufala, Alabama, \u00a0who was sentenced to serve six months on probation for Endangered Species Act violations,\u00a0 after pleading guilty in August 2024.<\/p>\n Waldrop and Jones were initially arraigned on the federal charges in October 2023.<\/p>\n John Waldrop.\u00a0 (Beth Clifton collage)<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n While Waldrop was convicted of offenses costing more than 4,000 wild birds\u2019 lives,\u00a0 his pigeon shoots are believed to have killed many times as many.<\/p>\n Animal Wellness Action and Showing Animals Respect & Kindness became aware of the Waldrop pigeon shoots,\u00a0 exposed by ANIMALS 24-7<\/strong> on May 11,\u00a0 2024,\u00a0 \u00a0through their February 2024 investigation of a similar pigeon-shooting complex in south Florida.<\/p>\n The Florida pigeon shooting complex was and is still \u201crun by Troy Link, chief executive of Jack Link\u2019s Meat Snacks,\u201d\u00a0 Animal Wellness Action and Showing Animals Respect & Kindness jointly announced in a May 11, 2024 joint statement.<\/p>\n \u201cThe organizations suspect,\u201d\u00a0 they said,\u00a0 \u201cthat the Georgia shoot is part of a network of such operations in the South and in Mexico.\u201d<\/p>\n (See\u00a0Jack Link\u2019s beef jerky CEO pigeon massacre jeopardizes bald eagles too<\/a>.)<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n Jack & Troy Link.\u00a0 (Jacklink\u2019s.com photo.)<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n At both the Waldrop and Troy Link pigeon shoots,\u00a0 as at others in the suspected covert pigeon shooting network,\u00a0 \u201cthousands of live pigeons are flung from box cages and then blasted by participants in high-dollar contest kills to see who can claim the most shot birds,\u201d\u00a0 explained Animal Wellness Action and Showing Animals Respect & Kindness.<\/p>\n \u201cWhile many of the birds are killed outright, \u00a0others suffer on the ground until contest workers can snap their necks or bludgeon them to death,\u201d\u00a0 as Showing Animals Respect & Kindness drone videos have often documented.<\/p>\n \u201cStill others, \u00a0maimed, \u00a0fly just out of range and are eaten alive by predators,\u201d\u00a0 as videotaped by SHARK drones at the Troy Link complex in Florida.<\/p>\n (Beth Clifton collage)<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cThe predators then suffer the effects of lead poisoning from ingesting the embedded fragments of lead that will speckle the carcasses. Eagles and other rare and protected migratory birds will be at acute risk,\u201d\u00a0 together charged Animal Wellness Action and Showing Animals Respect & Kindness.<\/p>\n Both Animal Wellness Action president Wayne Pacelle and SHARK founder Steve Hindi rose to national prominence in animal advocacy through stopping the Fred C. Coleman pigeon shoot held every Labor Day in Hegins,\u00a0 Pennsylvania,\u00a0 from 1935 to 1999.<\/p>\n Ku Klux Klan recruiters leafleting at the 1992 Fred C. Coleman Memorial Pigeon Shoot in Hegins, Pennsylvania. (Merritt Clifton photo)<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Pacelle,\u00a0 then national director for the Fund for Animals,\u00a0 organized a series of mass protests at Hegins in 1990-1992.<\/p>\n Hindi,\u00a0 then a prominent shark fisher and trophy hunter,\u00a0 attended the 1990 Hegins pigeon shoot,\u00a0 strictly as a spectator,\u00a0 on his way to go shark fishing off Montauk,\u00a0 Long Island.\u00a0 Hindi was so appalled by the lack of anything resembling sportsmanship he saw there that within a year he sold his guns,\u00a0 buried his hunting and fishing trophies,\u00a0 and became an animal advocate,\u00a0 eventually a full-time animal advocate after selling his business,\u00a0 Allied Rivet.<\/p>\n Forming Showing Animals Respect & Kindness in 1992 as the Chicago Animal Rights Coalition,\u00a0 Hindi subsequently \u201cknocked pigeon shoots out of Illinois entirely, \u00a0and stopped them in Alabama and Oklahoma. \u00a0Our video footage of a shoot site in Maryland was instrumental in passing a law to ban pigeon shoots there,\u201d\u00a0 Hindi recalled in a 2020\u00a0ANIMALS 24-7<\/strong>\u00a0guest column.<\/p>\n
(Beth Clifton collage)<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\nWaldrop \u201cpreserved\u201d birds stuffed & mounted<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n\u201cDr. Waldrop\u2019s Zoo\u201d<\/h2>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n
(1853 illustration.)<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\nUgly history<\/h2>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n1,401 mounts & 2,594 eggs<\/h2>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n\u201cI hope you can appreciate the beauty\u201d<\/h2>\n
<\/a><\/p>\nForfeited collection to zoos & museums<\/h2>\n
<\/a><\/p>\nPigeon shoots<\/h2>\n
<\/a><\/p>\nMany birds \u201csuffer on the ground\u201d<\/strong><\/h2>\n
<\/a><\/p>\nLead poisoning<\/strong><\/h2>\n
<\/a><\/p>\nHegins shoot turned Hindi into animal advocate<\/strong><\/h2>\n