Former outfitter pleads not guilty to Alaska grizzly killing

A former Hungry Horse guide and outfitter pleaded not guilty on all three counts of an indictment that charged him with illegally killing and transporting a brown bear in Alaska.

According to court documents, between May 9 to May 12, 2022, Richard McAtee, 46, and Arlon Franz, 51, of Sidney allegedly conspired together to possess and transport a brown bear that they allegedly killed in the Alaska Peninsula National Wildlife Refuge.

The indictment alleges that one of the men was a nonresident hunting without a contract with a master guide, and that the bear was shot and killed before the legal season to hunt brown bear had opened and the same day the hunter had been airborne, in violation of state and federal laws.