A man has been found guilty of illegally killing a mother black bear and her cub in Tofino after shooting them out of a tree with a crossbow and a longbow.
Following a three-day trial in provincial court, Justice Alexander Wolf rejected Ryan Millar’s argument that he killed the two bears in self-defence.
Wolf noted Millar went inside his home to retrieve his bows, and then came back outside. “That does not sound like self-defence,” he wrote in his decision.
Thomas Funk told the court that on Oct. 14, 2021, he and his spouse, visiting from Vancouver, were in a hot tub at their Airbnb when they heard a noise in the property next door. They saw two black bears and went into the house to watch the bears safely, thinking there might be a mother bear nearby.
The two bears, one bigger than the other, were about five metres up a tree, Funk said, according to the court decision.
Funk noticed a person next door, who he identified as Millar, also watching the animals. He saw Millar retrieve a couple of bows from inside his house, then put an arrow in a long bow and aim it at the bears.
Funk said Millar shot an arrow and hit one bear, which fell out of the tree. He was about to yell at Millar and ask him what he was doing, but before he could, Millar “took a crossbow to finish off the bear,” Funk said.
Millar walked towards the downed bear and shot it with a crossbow, he said.
The second bear, still in the tree, looked on as Millar shot the bear on the ground, he said.
Millar then turned to the second bear, “loaded the longbow again, and took another shot, and the second bear fell out of the tree,” he said.
The injured bear ran away, but Millar chased after it and took another shot, said Funk, who took video of the accused grabbing the smaller bear by its scruff and hiding it under a tarp.
Funk called police and an officer visited Millar’s residence, but seemed to leave quickly, he said.
Shortly after, Funk saw a white diesel truck pull into Millar’s driveway and it appeared that “a bunch of hunting gear and weapons” were being removed from the home, and that the small dead bear was put into the truck.
Funk and his wife did not feel safe staying in their rental and decided to leave.
He told the court the bears didn’t show any aggressive behaviour and made no noise, other than rustling in the tree.
He remembered a horrible sound of the bear cub shrieking or screaming before it died, he said.
He said Millar made no attempt to scare the bears off before shooting them.
Millar declined to provide any evidence on his behalf, instead arguing that there was evidence in the Crown’s case that supported his argument that he acted in self defence.
Millar suggested the bears had been in his yard earlier in the day burying a deer carcass.
A wildlife veterinarian with the province, Dr. Caeley Thacker, conducted a necropsy on the larger bear, determining it was a female, adult black bear that was lactating.
It was shot and killed with four arrows, two larger and two smaller. She determined the angle that the arrows entered the bear was consistent with the animal being shot while elevated, such as in a tree.
Although only one dead animal was retrieved, Thacker estimated the mother had a bear cub under a year old that weighed no more than 50 pounds.
In his decision, Wolf noted discrepancies in the statements Millar gave to RCMP and conservation officers.
An RCMP officer who was first on the scene told the court Millar initially said he didn’t know anything about a bear being shot. He then told the officer he was worried about his dogs getting hurt, because he had a stash of meat on his property, so he tried to scare the bear off, but it didn’t react. Then he shot it with his bow, he said, telling the officer he only saw one bear.
Millar told one officer he had left deer meat outside on a table and another that it was locked in a shed in a cooler.
However, the first conservation officer on the scene noticed deer meat hanging on the outside of the house.
In different statements, Millar said he had been charged by a bear a month ago, and then said he had never been charged before the day he shot the two bears in the tree, calling it a “near-death experience.”
Millar also asked a conservation officer if he could keep the bear, “or at least the hide,” at one point.
Wolf said in the decision he did not find credible Millar’s testimony that he was in danger or that he made any attempt to avoid killing the bears.
“To be clear, without any hesitation, and to be as polite as possible, I conclude that his version of events is fabricated. … Mr. Millar simply wanted to kill the two bears, and that is what he did,” he wrote.
There are legal restrictions on where, when and why a person can kill a bear, and hunters are not allowed to intentionally kill a sow and cub, with very few exceptions.
Even in situations involving self-defence, there are restrictions on using weapons in certain places, Wolf wrote in his decision.
Sentencing will take place in September.
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