Sausage-maker shut down; punished for selling poached meat

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By Alicia Karapetian on 3/24/2008 for Meatingplace.com A Nebraska sausage-maker has been put out of business after federal agents discovered Jack McClanahan was processing some 10,000 pounds per year of black-market deer meat in a "filthy garage," the Omaha World Herald reported.McClanahan apparently poached most of the animals used to create summer sausage, salami, jerky and snack sticks.According to federal authorities, McClanahan sometimes shot deer at night with a rifle from a bathroom window and waited until morning to retrieve the carcasses. The deer were baited with corn

scattered under trees close to McClanahan's home in Omaha.What's more, McClanahan would process product for other hunters who illegally shot animals, the World Herald reported. "Everyone knew that if they shot a deer [illegally], to take it to Jack," said Mark Webb, a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service special agent. "He'd process it no questions asked."The equipment used for processing, located in the three-car garage that had no running water, was reportedly plagued with mouse droppings, maggots, deer carcasses, dried blood and deer. "It's a wonder people weren't dying from eating the stuff," Webb said, though he did add that McClanahan had huge demand for summer sausage, which Webb described as "tasty."McClanahan was fined $10,000 and sentenced to three-years probation. http://pets.Fortheanimals7/join