West Greene board member sentenced to probation for illegal hunting in Ohio
The West Greene School Board member who pleaded guilty in November to illegal hunting over several years in Ohio was sentenced Monday to serve probation.
Jefferson County (Ohio) Judge Michelle Miller sentenced Robert L. Gilbert to five years of probation and gave him a suspended jail sentence of 910 days. His hunting license was also suspended for three years and he was ordered to pay a $6,000 fine and $18,725 in restitution.
Gilbert, 39, of Aleppo Township, pleaded guilty Nov. 19 in Jefferson County Court to 15 misdemeanor charges as part of an agreement with the Ohio attorney general’s office to withdraw felony charges related to the case. He pleaded guilty to six counts of hunting without permission, five counts of receiving stolen property, two counts of failure to permanently tag whitetail deer and one count each of failure to permanently tag a wild turkey and leaving the state with an untagged wild turkey.
Gilbert was charged by Ohio authorities March 9 in an 18-count indictment after investigators said he and two other men poached deer and turkey on at least six occasions near Steubenville, Ohio, between 2011 and 2017. Nathan Cline of Steubenville and Marlon Hale of Irondale, Ohio, were also charged and accused of trespassing on private and public property, hunting out of season and failing to tag their harvests.
Cline, a former Steubenville police officer who was fired in October, was sentenced to two years in prison before serving five years on probation. He was ordered to pay a $3,000 fine and $29,165 in restitution, and will lose his hunting license in the state for three years. He was convicted in December of five felony charges, including attempted engaging in a pattern of corrupt activity and unauthorized use of the Law Enforcement Automated Data System, in addition to 11 misdemeanor wildlife violations.
Hale will serve three months in jail and six months in a community-based correction facility, along with five years of probation and 500 hours of community service. He was fined $3,000 and must pay $2,600 in restitution. He will also lose his hunting license for three years.
The Ohio attorney general’s office said the men took paying clients to private and public properties to hunt without approval from landowners. During that time, Gilbert hosted a popular YouTube television show called “Trapping Time” that ran for three years and attracted more than 1,000 subscribers to his channel. In the shows, which include advertisements and commercial breaks, he traveled across the country and described to viewers various hunting and trapping techniques. Cline also appears in at least one of the 25-minute episodes.
Gilbert’s defense attorney, Dominic Frank, said following the guilty plea that there was “no malice” involved in the hunts and that he expected his client would not be sentenced to jail. He could not be reached for comment Tuesday to discuss the sentencing.
Gilbert won a write-in campaign in November 2015 with 17 votes and began serving on West Greene School Board in 2016. His term is set to expire at the end of this year, and his name remains listed as a board member on West Greene School District’s website. West Greene Superintendent Brian Jackson did not respond to requests for comment on whether the situation would affect Gilbert’s status on the board.