A US District Court Judge sentenced Arthur “Jack” Schubarth–the Montana man who illegally bred and sold gigantic Frankensheep clones to big game preserves–to six months in prison and over $24,000 in fines. In a Department of Justice statement released on September 30, prosecutors explained the 81-year-old Schubarth not only committed two felonies in violation of the Lacey Act designed to combat animal trafficking, but also violated international treaties meant to prevent invasive species from harming domestic wildlife.
[Related: Montana traffickers illegally cloned Frankensheep hybrids for sport hunting.]
According to court documents presented earlier this year, Schubarth and at least five other collaborators began conspiring in 2013 to purchase parts of dead male Marco Polo argali sheep (Ovis ammon polii) from sellers in Kyrgyzstan. Over the next eight years, Schubarth successfully sent genetic material from the world’s largest sheep species to a lab in a bid to create cloned embryos. These embryos were then artificially inseminated into ewes from a variety of (also very illegal) species to create numerous hybrid offspring. During that time, at least two sheep contracted and died from Johne’s disease—a contagious, chronic wasting disease that spreads both directly between animals, or indirectly through contaminated environments.
Eventually, however, one ewe produced a single, pure genetic Marco Polo argali that Schubarth nicknamed “Montana Mountain King,” or MMK. From there, MMK then bred with more ewes to create big game sheep even larger than than the average Marco Polo argali male, which easily weighs more than 300 lbs, stands 49-inches at the shoulder, and sports horns that span over five-feet-wide. MMK’s semen was also sold to breeders in other states. Sheep containing just 25-percent Marco Polo argali DNA fetched $15,000-per-head, while animals produced by MMK’s son, Montana Black Magic, sold for $10,000 each.
“[Schubarth’s] actions threatened Montana’s native wildlife species for no other reason than he and his co-conspirators wanted to make more money,” DOJ Environmental and Natural Resources Division Assistant Attorney General Todd Kimm said in a statement on Monday, adding that such violations “can be devastating for our domestic populations of wild animals.”
“I got my normal mindset clouded by my enthusiasm and looked for any grey [sic] area in the law to make the best sheep I could for this sheep industry,” Schubarth wrote in a letter submitted with his sentencing memo, according to the Associated Press on Monday. “My family has never been broke, but we are now.”
When asked via email if prosecutors will pursue charges against the purchasers of Schubarth’s Frankensheep clones and sheep semen, a DOJ spokesperson informed Popular Science that, “We don’t comment on that.” The did, however, confirm Mountain Mountain King himself is currently in “custody” of the US Fish and Wildlife Services. Popular Science has reached out to FWS for comment on the MMK’s ultimate fate.
