Legal Battle: East Texas Breeder, TPWD Clash On The Fate Of 500 White-Tailed Deer

With legal costs mounting and emotions high, East Texas deer breeder Robert Williams is continuing a battle to prevent the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department (TPWD) from depopulating the prize white-tailed deer herd of 500 animals held captive behind high fence at his RW Trophy Ranch in Kaufman and Hunt counties.

TPWD says the ranch was scheduled for depopulation earlier this year after several of the deer tested positive for chronic wasting disease in 2021.

TPWD says CWD is a neurological condition that is incurable, specific to deer and other cervids, slow to incubate and always fatal. The agency claims it is necessary to kill all of the deer on Williams ranch in order to prevent CWD from possibly spreading elsewhere.

Depopulation isn’t pretty, and it is not something the department takes lightly, according to Cory Chandler, TPWD’s communication director.

Williams has managed to delay the action thus far through two temporary restraining orders obtained in Kaufman County Court at Law No. 2 and, most recently, an emergency relief order granted on April 15 by the Fifth District Court of Appeals in Dallas. But he says he is concerned that time might be running out.

Depopulation of penned deer herds in response to CWD detections isn’t anything new in Texas. TPWD has depopulated 10 breeding facilities since 2015, accounting for 2,598 deer, 209 of which showed CWD positive in postmortem testing. Each deer was sampled for research, TPWD said.

The overall total represents the number of deer sold to USDA by the owners of CWD-positive deer breeding facilities for postmortem testing purposes, according to Mitch Lockwood, TPWD big game program director. Lockwood said the breeders were paid up to $3,000 per live deer, but not before signing department “herd plans” tailored to control the spread of CWD from their CWD-positive herds.

Herd plan management strategies may employ several risk mitigation measures like minimum infrastructure requirements, serial antemortem testing, a genetic analysis of the entire herd and regular veterinarian examinations, according to Dr. Hunter Reed, TPWD wildlife veterinarian.

Lockwood said state law requires permitted breeders whose facilities undergo depopulation to pay all expenses associated with the operation whether they sign a herd plan or not. Expenses include disease testing, carcass disposal, TPWD Wildlife Division supplies, salaries, travel expenses, equipment costs, and any other fees or expenses.

Reed said Williams rejected several herd plans offered by TPWD and the Texas Animal Health Commission in 2021. Williams said he refused to sign because the plans seemed overly restrictive and required that he kill most of the deer on his ranch.

“And then I would be expected to pay for it,” Williams said. “I told them they were out of their minds!”

Williams argues the state has made CWD testing and other requirements associated with the breeding business too taxing for some to stay in it. He said a common sentiment is that TPWD doesn’t like the deer breeding business, but the agency says that isn’t so.

Citing new research by the U.S. Department of Agriculture in Ames, Iowa, Williams added that he believes CWD may not be the monster it is cracked up to be.

Williams, along with some whitetail experts, contends CWD may actually be a variant of scrapie, a disease discovered in sheep several hundred years ago.

“They (TPWD) can’t show you one case of a white-tailed deer shriveling up dying in Texas from CWD,” Williams said. “CWD is a political disease in Texas. It’s different in Oklahoma and Louisiana.”

TPWD officials say they have evidence of two free-ranging whitetails that were showing clinical signs of CWD before they were euthanized to avoid further suffering — one in Del Rio in 2019; another south of Dalhart in 2018. Both deer tested positive for the disease, according to Chandler.

Dallam Co. White-tailed Deer South of Dalhart — 2018. (Courtesy TPWD)

Chandler said TPWD also has a convincing video of a clinical mule deer that appeared near an El Paso residence in February. The deer reportedly died before game wardens could euthanize it. A clinical mule deer was also witnessed in 2021 near Lubbock and euthanized. Both mule deer CWD positive, he said.

Mule deer near El Paso in February (Video Courtesy TPWD)

 Chandler added that CWD is real and should not be taken lightly.

“Research conducted in Texas by Dr. Rodrigo Morales at UT Health in Houston indicates that the disease we are dealing with is CWD, and not scrapie,” says Lockwood. “But it doesn’t matter. Regardless of the origin of CWD, which is a TSE that affects cervids, it is still highly infectious and deadly contrary to the assertion of a few. Scrapie kills sheep when they get it. The fact that CWD can look like scrapie and vice versa in species is not novel.”

“For some reason, a few people seem to imply that because it’s scrapie (if it was), that we should ignore the occurrence and not have a control program in place. In fact, it changes nothing since the disease is highly infectious. We have a scrapie program in the U.S. that has resulted in the depopulation of thousands of sheep over the years. That has only slowed because there is a genetic combination that makes the sheep “resistant” to classical scrapie.”

In Texas, white-tailed deer cannot be privately owned; they are property of the state, high fence or low.

The 500 bucks and bred does are held inside a 68-acre enclosure divided into multiple pens at Williams 1,500-acre high-fence ranch.

For the Love of Deer

Williams, 83, has been in the white-tailed deer breeding business for more than three decades. He has been successful at raising some remarkable bucks with large antlers. He is especially fond of typical racks with tall tines and wide spreads. His biggest typical netted 213 B&C.

The veteran deer farmer says he gets a lot of pleasure out of his deer breeding business, but pointed out the issue he is now facing is far more important than growing bucks with stunning crowns.

“I told them (TPWD) when they started this a year ago that I was going to fight them as hard as I can,” Williams said. “It is ridiculous what they are doing. I just don’t want them to kill my deer.”

Problems surfaced last winter at Williams’ ranch east of Dallas when three does died during the February 2021 cold snap. As required by state law, he said he submitted samples of brain tissue  to a Texas A&M lab for CWD testing.

When one of the tests came back positive, Williams wanted to send the tissue samples to GeneSeek, where the deer are registered, for a second opinion to make sure the test results were accurately linked to the doe from his pen. He said the Texas Animal Health Commission wouldn’t allow it.

“I even offered to pay for it and they said no,” Williams said. “To me that’s just wrong. It threw up a red flag.”

TAHC Executive Director Andy Schwartz said he could not comment because Williams has sued the TAHC (as well as TPWD) and litigation is pending.

 Court documents indicate four more of Williams’ deer tested positive for CWD in September 2021, two in January 2022 and one in February 2022, bringing the total to nine.

Legal Battle

Williams’ legal battle began unfavorably in early 2022. He sued the state in Travis County and lost his request for an injunction, but the case remains open, according to TPWD attorney, Todd George.

The battle has since shifted to Kaufman County. There, Williams’ attorney, Jennifer Riggs, secured a pair of temporary restraining  orders (one signed by Judge Bobby Rich on Feb. 28 and another on April 1) to stop TPWD from carrying out the depopulation of the deer.

Williams said he received notification of the second TRO on the morning of April 4, one day before TPWD wildlife staff were scheduled to commence shooting the deer. More than 40 TPWD employees had already gathered in Kaufman County when the department was told to stand down and go home, Lockwood said.

The second TRO was good through April 14, and court records show TPWD moved quickly to try to suspend the order with an  April 6 appeal filed in the Fifth District Court of Appeals in Dallas.  On April 15, the court issued Williams emergency relief while the case undergoes further evaluation before a ruling is made. As of April 22, the verdict was still out.

Riggs says she is challenging Section 43.953 of the Parks and Wildlife Code. She argues the law is unconstitutional because it allows TPWD to enter private property and kill deer without a hearing.

“That section says the department can only kill deer if they pose a threat to the health of other deer or other species, including humans,” Riggs said.

Riggs claims the deer in William’s pens are not a threat, because they are contained behind a high fence on 68 acres.

“Nobody has ever tested TPWD’s assertion that these deer are a threat to other deer,” she said.

“They’ve never had a court or independent agency to review it. It could be nothing more than a short trial, but it’s an opportunity for us to challenge their science — an opportunity for us to cry foul on their allegation that they have to kill all the deer to prevent the spread of CWD. They are killing the deer to test them to see if they have CWD.”

Riggs says the case also raises issues of property rights and  procedural due process.

“When you have a property right you are entitled to notice in a hearing. It’s one of the fundamental premises of our constitutional system. Government can’t run over you unless they give you the opportunity to say why they shouldn’t.”

Riggs also argues that the statute is defective, as is the way the department is enforcing it. “Killing all the deer takes away the entire business, takes away the entire value of his investment, all he’s worked for,” she said.

According to court documents, TPWD contends the statute is lawful and that it gives express authority to the department to euthanize deer in deer breeding facilities to control the spread of the disease.

Riggs says Williams’ next play hinges on the decision of the appellate court in Dallas.

“We’ll just have to deal with the hand that is dealt us,” she said.

 Matt Williams is a freelance writer based in Nacogdoches. He can be reached by e-mail, mattwillwrite4u@yahoo.com.