The Case of the Missing Game Warden

by Steven T. Callan

  “Sustained,” said the judge. “Mr. Keane, please refrain from expressing your personal opinions and making prejudicial statements. Just answer the question.” Keane nodded.

  “Please explain what you meant by serving them first,” said Braden.

  “Two men in a pickup, with a dog in back, had driven into the station earlier. They were already waiting for me to open when Gastineau and his friends pulled up to the pumps.”

  “Mr. Keane, who else was in the car with Blake Gastineau?”

  “Jimmy Riddle was driving the car. Blake Gastineau was in the passenger seat next to him. Sitting in back were Hollis Bogar and Richie Stillwell.”

  “How old were the defendant and his companions when this happened?”

  “Gastineau, Bogar, and Riddle must have been twenty-five, like me. Stillwell was probably a year or two younger.”

  “Had you had a problem with Gastineau, Bogar, and Riddle in the past?”

  “Yes. When we were seniors in high school, I turned them in to Warden Bettis for poaching pheasants.”

  “Objection,” said Burke, requesting a private conference with the judge. Judge Rhodes called a recess and instructed Burke and Braden to follow him into his chambers.

  “Mr. Burke, state your case,” said Judge Rhodes.

  “This is not only inflammatory, it is completely unrelated to the murder charge before this court,” said Burke. “So what if my client shot a few extra pheasants or ducks when he was young and stupid? Those were misdemeanors, and the statutes of limitations for any misdemeanors he might have committed have long since passed. Blake Gastineau has become a successful businessman and a pillar of his community. Mr. Braden is trying to portray him to the jury as nothing more than a common poacher.”

  “Mr. Braden?” said the judge.

  “I’m simply establishing motive, Your Honor. Mr. Gastineau was much more than a common poacher. He was engaged in the lucrative black-market business of killing, selling, and distributing waterfowl to restaurants all over California. Had Ralph Gastineau, Blakes’ father, learned that his son had been arrested for this serious crime, Blake stood to forfeit his inheritance. We’re talking about millions of dollars in cash and thousands of acres of valuable land. People have been murdered for a lot less.”

  “You have no idea what Blake’s father would have done,” said Burke.

  “On the contrary,” said Braden. “We do know what Blake’s father would have done, and we intend to prove it as the trial continues.”

  “Let’s go back in the courtroom,” said the judge. “I’ll give you my decision there.”

  Judge Rhodes allowed the district attorney to continue his present line of questioning, as long as he didn’t stray too far. Elwood Keene testified that he had seen fresh blood and duck feathers on the rear bumper of Riddle’s car and fresh mud on Hollis Bogar’s pantlegs nearly an hour before legal shooting time. He’d given this information to Warden Bettis and suggested that the suspected duck poachers might have taken the ducks to Riddle’s grandfather’s packing shed—the same place where Bettis had caught them with a substantial overlimit of pheasants eight years before.

  “Mr. Burke, your witness,” said the judge.

  “Mr. Keane, did Blake Gastineau ever threaten you or retaliate in any way for your having snitched on him to Warden Bettis about the pheasants?”

  “No.”

  “Doesn’t that say something about Mr. Gastineau?”

  “I’m not sure what you’re getting at,” said Keane. “Blake never—”

  “Oh come now, Mr. Keane!” said Burke, raising his arms in the air. “You know as well as I do that Blake Gastineau is a kind man, without a vindictive bone in his body.”

  “Objection,” said Braden. “Mr. Burke should be asking questions, not making statements.”

  “Sustained,” said the judge. “Mr. Braden, would you like to redirect?”

  “Yes, Your Honor. Mr. Keane, you had begun to respond to Mr. Burke’s comment. What were you going to say?”

  “Blake Gastineau never did any of his own dirty work,” said Keane, “even back in school.”

  “Why was that?” said Braden.

  “Because Hollis Bogar always did it for him. That big bully threatened me clear up until graduation. He did it again that morning, when they came into the station.”

  “Objection,” said Burke.

  “Overruled,” said the judge. “Mr. Burke, you were the one who opened this can of worms. If you don’t have any more questions, let’s continue.”

  “The prosecution would like to excuse Mr. Keane and call Warden Henry Glance to the stand,” said the district attorney.

  “Warden Glance,” said Braden, “when was the first time you suspected that Blake Gastineau might have had something to do with the disappearance of Warden Norman Bettis?”

  “Before I knew anything about Blake Gastineau, I began investigating two individuals named Hollis Bogar and Richie Stillwell,” said Glance. “Bogar and Stillwell had a run-in with Warden Bettis during the summer of 1956, a few months before Bettis disappeared.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “That information was given to me by Pearl Malloy, the owner and operator of Pearl’s Roadside Diner in Gridley.”

  “Objection,” said Burke. “Hearsay.”

  “Your Honor, Mrs. Pearl Malloy is listed as a witness and is outside the courtroom now,” said Braden.

  “Then let’s call her in,” said the judge.

  Pearl Malloy testified to having overheard Norman Bettis tell Earl Glenn about his run-in with Hollis Bogar and Richie Stillwell during the summer of 1956. She had also heard Bettis tell Glenn about seizing a rifle belonging to Stillwell. When Burke had finished cross-examining Mrs. Malloy with a barrage of accusations and poorly thought-out questions, Henry Glance returned to the stand.

  “Warden Glance, what else did you learn about Hollis Bogar and Richie Stillwell that led you to suspect the defendant, Blake Gastineau?” said District Attorney Braden.

  “Hollis Bogar was the son of a man known as Dud Bogar, whom Warden Bettis suspected of unlawfully killing and selling wild ducks. I learned about Dud Bogar by reading thirty-two years of Norman Bettis’s daily diaries.”

  “Objection,” said Burke.

  “Your Honor,” said Braden, “all thirty-two of Warden Bettis’s diaries have been made available to Mr. Burke. He was welcome to read them himself, had he chosen to do so.”

  “I’m going to overrule your objection,” said the judge. “Please continue, Warden Glance.”

  “Warden Bettis had contacted Hollis Bogar and Richie Stillwell while they were hunting somewhere out west of Stony Gorge Reservoir. As a result of that contact, Bettis ended up seizing a rifle owned by Richie Stillwell. The rifle was later logged into the California Department of Fish and Game’s Region 2 evidence locker, in Sacramento. Stillwell never claimed the rifle, so it remained in the evidence locker until it was eventually sold at auction. I ran a check on the rifle’s serial number and traced it to a man named Tucker Stillwell, in Kingfisher, Oklahoma. Tucker was Richie Stillwell’s grandfather. Richie Stillwell had stolen the rifle from him and run off to California.”

  “Your Honor, where is Mr. Braden going with this cock-and-bull story?” said Burke.

  “Mr. Braden, my patience is running thin,” said the judge. “I hope there’s a point to this line of questioning.”

  “There is, Your Honor,” said Braden. “Please continue, Warden Glance.”

  “I began asking around about Hollis Bogar and Richie Stillwell,” said Glance. “No one, including the manager of the trailer park where Bogar and Stillwell lived, had seen either one of them since the middle of December 1956.”

  “In other words, they disappeared approximately the same time as Warden Bettis. Is that true, Warden Glance?”

 
“It sure looked that way to me.”

  “I’d like you to look at these two rap sheets obtained from the Butte County Sheriff’s Department and tell me if you’ve seen them before,” said Braden.

  “Yes, I’ve seen them before,” said Glance. “The last official records I could find of Hollis Bogar or Richie Stillwell were in these documents. On July 4, 1956, Hollis DeWayne Bogar and Ferlin Richard Stillwell were arrested at the City of Chico’s One Mile swimming pool, for disturbing the peace and public drunkenness.”

  “What was it about these records that caught your eye?” said Braden.

  “On that same day, July 4, 1956, Bogar and Stillwell were bailed out of jail by Blake R. Gastineau.”

  “Did you confront the defendant with this information?”

  “Yes. Warden Tom Austin and I contacted Mr. Gastineau on November 3, 1970. Gastineau was leaving his office and walking out to his car when I called out to him.”

  “And how did he react?”

  “When he turned around and saw the two of us walking toward him in our Fish and Game uniforms, he looked like he’d seen a ghost. His face turned red, and his hands were trembling.”

  “Did you say anything to him?”

  “Yes. My exact words were, ‘When was the last time you saw Hollis Bogar or Richie Stillwell?’”

  “How did Mr. Gastineau react?”

  “He became angry and said he didn’t know anyone by that name.”

  “Did you question Mr. Gastineau on another occasion?” said Braden.

  “Yes,” said Glance.

  “Please explain what happened.”

  “I had found a list of three phone numbers at what had been the Butler Farms office. Butler Farms, located a few miles north of Lincoln, was previously owned and operated by a man named Clarence “Pinky” Butler, who was the middleman for a once-thriving black-market duck-selling operation.”

  “Objection,” said Burke. “What proof does the prosecution have that Butler Farms or this Pinky character even existed, let alone that my client was in any way associated with them?”

  “Mr. Braden?” said the judge.

  “Your Honor, if Mr. Burke had examined the witness document I gave him during discovery, he would have seen the names Hector Campos, Lance Kirby, Mike Prescott, and Roy Campbell listed. Those gentlemen are all here to corroborate Warden Glance’s testimony and be cross-examined.”

  “Warden Glance, please continue,” said the judge.

  “Two of those phone numbers belonged to well-known duck poachers,” said Glance, “Homer Leadbetter, in Klamath Falls, Oregon, and Melvin Cobb, in Willows, California. The third phone number was no longer in service, but it had previously been listed to Blake R. Gastineau, at 39680 County Road E, Biggs, California. On November 10, 1970, I contacted Blake Gastineau at his office and asked about his relationship with Pinky Butler and the Butler turkey farm.”

  “What was Mr. Gastineau’s response?”

  “He threw me out of his office and said not to come back unless I had a warrant.”

  “That’s all for now,” said Braden.

  “Mr. Burke, your witness.”

  THIRTY-SIX

  “I’ll tell you what I think, Warden Glance. I think you’re providing exaggerated, if not false, testimony about my client selling ducks to some character named Pinky,” said defense attorney Burke during cross-examination.

  The prosecution countered Burke’s claims by calling Oregon State Police Officer Lance Kirby, retired California Fish and Game Warden Mike Prescott, Mr. Hector Campos, and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Special Agent in Charge Roy Campbell to the witness stand over the next three days.

  Trooper Lance Kirby testified that he had received a call from Warden Henry Glance, asking about a Klamath Falls-area resident named Homer Leadbetter. Kirby had told Glance that Leadbetter was a well-known duck poacher who had been arrested on at least two occasions for taking overlimits of ducks. Leadbetter had been suspected of selling ducks to someone in California, but that information had never been corroborated.

  Retired California Fish and Game Warden Mike Prescott testified that he had received a call from Warden Glance, asking about a Willows-area resident named Melvin Cobb. “Mel Cobb was the closest thing to a professional outlaw I ever knew,” said Prescott. “He was arrested for selling ducks to an undercover U.S. Fish and Wildlife agent in 1939. That didn’t stop him, though. Mel continued to illegally kill and sell ducks right up until the time of his accident.”

  Hector Campos testified that he had been a longtime employee of Clarence “Pinky” Butler’s during the 1950s. That continued until Butler mysteriously disappeared in 1957. Since that time, Campos had remained on the farm as caretaker for Tina Butler, Pinky Butler’s wife, and the eventual buyers of the property.

  “Did you actually witness Pinky Butler purchasing wild ducks from hunters?” said the district attorney.

  “Many times,” said Campos. “Over the years, I watched him buy thousands of wild ducks from hunters who delivered their birds to the farm.”

  “What did Mr. Butler do with the ducks he bought from these hunters?”

  “We processed them,” said Campos.

  “Please explain what you mean by processing them,” said Braden.

  “The ducks were already gutted, so we’d run them through the plucking machine. The machine would remove all the feathers.”

  “Then what?”

  “Then we’d wrap the ducks in cellophane and stuff them inside the turkey carcasses. Señor Pinky’s drivers delivered turkeys to restaurants all over California.”

  “Do you recognize the defendant, Blake Gastineau, as one of the hunters who delivered ducks to Pinky Butler?”

  “Yes. He looks older now, but he’s definitely one of the hunters who sold ducks to Señor Pinky.”

  “How many wild ducks would you say Blake Gastineau sold to Mr. Butler?”

  “I’m not sure of the exact number, but over a two-year period between 1954 and 1956, Señor Gastineau brought over a thousand wild ducks to the farm. He quit coming sometime in December 1956, a year before the federales arrived.”

  “What do you mean, the federales arrived?” said Braden.

  “In 1957, federal game wardens came to the farm with a search warrant,” said Campos. “They left with many boxes of records, papers, and at least ten large bags of feathers.”

  When defense attorney Burke had finished cross-examining Hector Campos, District Attorney Braden called U.S. Fish and Wildlife Special Agent in Charge Roy Campbell to the witness stand. Agent Campbell testified that he had supervised the 1957 search-warrant detail at Butler Farms.

  “When you seized Pinky Butler’s records, did you find evidence that Blake Gastineau or other hunters had come to the farm and sold ducks?” said Braden.

  “We were unable to find any specific information about hunters who had come to the farm and sold ducks to Clarence ‘Pinky’ Butler,” said Campbell.

  “What did you find?”

  “We did find records of over fifty thousand ducks being sold to restaurants in California and the Western U.S, going back to the 1930s, when Pinky Butler’s father operated the business. A list of Butler’s regular customers led us to a number of restaurants where arrests were made.”

  “Were any of these restaurants in Glenn County or Butte County?”

  “I don’t believe so. It’s been fifteen years since that detail went down, but I do remember one particular restaurant in San Francisco called Vannucci’s. I walked in the kitchen waving a search warrant, with five more federal officers right behind me. All of us were wearing blue, federal-agent windbreakers. The head chef, who was basting two ducks in wine and butter when we entered, dropped his spoon, began whimpering, and ran out the back door. We later obtained arrest warrants for the owner, the manager, and the head chef. They each paid several
thousand dollars in fines and spent six months in jail.”

  “What about Pinky Butler? What happened to him?”

  “Mr. Butler weighed almost 300 pounds. One would think a man that large would be easy to find. When we returned with an arrest warrant the day after our search, he was nowhere to be found. No one has seen hide nor hair of him since.”

  By the afternoon of April 6, after listening to four days of testimony and cross-examination, Blake Gastineau concluded that his business partner and attorney, Gerald Burke, was overmatched and out of his league. The judge agreed to excuse the jury until Tuesday, April 11, giving Gastineau four days to secure additional counsel. On Tuesday morning, April 11, attorney Marvin W. Spratt, of the San Francisco firm Paddock, Mahill, and Spratt, introduced himself as Gerald Burke’s co-counsel. A portly man in his early fifties, Spratt wore glasses, spit-shined wingtip shoes, and a dark-gray continental suit.

  District Attorney Braden returned Henry Glance to the witness stand. Glance testified that on August 21, 1971, while patrolling behind a locked Forest Service gate—on Logging Spur A-26, off Bald Mountain Road—he discovered where a timber harvesting clear-cut had caused part of the mountainside to cave in.

  “A deer hunter at the scene told me about finding a heavy-duty wire sticking up out of the fallen debris at the bottom of the canyon,” said Glance. “An orange styrofoam ball, which was slightly larger than a golf ball, was attached to the end of the wire.”

  “Was this heavy-duty wire attached to something?” said Braden.

  “Yes. The wire, which turned out to be a radio antenna, was attached to the rear bumper of Warden Bettis’s patrol car,” said Glance. “On Wednesday, August 25, 1971, we found the car buried directly under that orange styrofoam ball.”

  “When was the patrol car reported to have disappeared?”

  “On December 13, 1956—the same day Warden Bettis disappeared.”

  Warden Henry Glance, Detective Bradley Foster, Sergeant Jack Weaver, and Deputy Holly Ward each testified to details related to the discovery of Hollis Bogar’s body in the front seat of Bettis’s patrol car. Bogar had identification on him and was identified through dental records. Also found in the patrol car were a 1956 diary belonging to Norman Bettis and a gas receipt, dated December 13, 1956, that Bettis had signed.