Stock photo, not intended to represent the bear found in the alley.
Image Credit: Shutterstock
May 28, 2015 - 1:43 PM
KAMLOOPS – A dead bear, wrapped in a tarp, was found in a back alley in downtown Kamloops earlier this week.
The bear was found Monday, May 25, in an alleyway near First Avenue, between Nicola Street and Battle Street.
Stephanie Patsula was walking home when she saw what she describes as 'a corpse…all wrapped up.' Patsula believes the bear had been poached and left in the alleyway, but added that nothing on the animal appeared to be removed as trophy.
Conservation Officer Kevin Van Damme is not willing to say the bear, which was found wrapped in a tarp, was poached or even disposed of in any illegal way.
“We don’t know how this bear arrived there,” he says, adding the bear could have been hunted lawfully and deposited accidentally.
Van Damme says a necropsy was performed and it was determined the bear was shot with a rifle.
“There were gunshot wounds (and) there was evidence of bullets,” Van Damme says.
He would not comment on the investigation, including if criminal charges could be laid.
Anyone with information about this bear is asked to phone the B.C. Conservation Officer Service’s line at the 1-877-952-7277.
To contact a reporter for this story, email Dana Reynolds at dreynolds@infonews.ca or call 250-819-6089. To contact an editor, email mjones@infonews.ca or call 250-718-2724.
— With files from The Canadian Press.
News from © iNFOnews, 2015