Pensioner facing sentence for illegally cloning giant sheep

A pensioner in the US is due to be sentenced after illegally cloning large sheep to create hybrid animals for captive trophy hunting.

Arthur ‘Jack’ Schubarth, from Montana, United States used tissue and testicles from large sheep hunted in Central Asia and the US.

The 81-year-old pleaded guilty to wildlife trafficking by importing genetic material with the intention to illegally create hybrid sheep for captive trophy hunting in Texas and Minnesota.

The maximum punishment for violating the Lacey Act – a conservation law that bans the illegal trade of wildlife, fish, and plants – is five years in prison.

However, prosecutors are not seeking prison time for Schubarth – according to court records – and he is asking for a one-year probationary sentence.

The fine can be up to $250,000 (£187,000) or twice the defendant’s financial gain.

In his request for the probationary sentence, Schubarth’s attorney said cloning the giant Marco Polo sheep hunted in Kyrgyzstan has ruined his client’s “life, reputation and family.”

However, the sentencing memorandum also congratulates Schubarth for successfully cloning the endangered sheep, which he named Montana Mountain King.

The animal has been confiscated by US Fish and Wildlife Services.

The memorandum said: “Jack did something no-one else could, or has ever done.

“On a ranch, in a barn in Montana, he created Montana Mountain King.

“MMK is an extraordinary animal, born of science, and from a man who, if he could re-write history, would have left the challenge of cloning a Marco Polo only to the imagination of Michael Crichton”, the author of the science fiction novel Jurassic Park.

Schubarth pleaded guilty in March to charges he and five other people conspired to use tissue from a Marco Polo sheep illegally brought into the US to clone that animal.

They then intended to use the clone and its descendants to create a larger, hybrid species of sheep that would be more valuable for captive hunting operations.

Marco Polo sheep are the largest in the world, can weigh 300 pounds (136 kilograms) and have curled horns up to five feet (one and a half metres) long, court records said.

Schubarth, in a letter attached to the sentencing memo, said he becomes extremely passionate about any project he takes on, including his “sheep project,” and is ashamed of his actions.

“I got my normal mindset clouded by my enthusiasm and looked for any grey area in the law to make the best sheep I could for this sheep industry,” he wrote.

“My family has never been broke, but we are now.”