Three tourists jailed over ‘careless’ selfie act in national park

Three men have been handed prison sentences after being unwittingly caught on a national park webcam doing something very “careless”.

Three tourists who were filmed getting too close to feeding brown bears in the wild have been handed prison sentences plus thousands of dollars in fines.

David Engelman, 56, of Sandia Park, New Mexico, and Ronald J. Engelman, 54, and Steven Thomas, 30, both of King Salmon, Alaska, pleaded guilty to leaving the trail in Alaska’s Katmai Park to get closer to the animals, New Zealand Herald reports.

The men were identified after they were captured on a park webcam as they waded out into a salmon run to take selfies as the bears were feeding.

All three men were fined $US3000 each ($A4260) and given a year probation. David and Ronald Engelman were sentenced to one week in prison, while Steven Thomas received a 10-day sentence.

In addition, each defendant is prohibited from entering any national park for one year.

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Three men who were spotted on a livestream in the national park have been imprisoned and fined for getting too close to the bears. Pictures: YouTube/ErumChad

Judge Matthew Scoble called their behaviour “drunken capering, and a slap in the face to those who were there”.

Fines would go towards the Katmai Conservancy, a non-profit that looks after the running of the park.

The incident, which happened in Autumn 2018, caused outrage and the men were eventually identified by the National Park Service Investigative Services, with help of the livestream footage.

“The conduct of these three individuals not only endangered other visitors and wildlife officers at Brooks Falls, they also potentially endangered the life of the bears,” lawyer S. Lane Tucker said.

Had the incident resulted in death or injury, Mr Tucker argued it would have had a huge impact on tourism to the area and the animals would have had to be destroyed.

The National Park Service were alerted to the incident by viewers of their ‘bear cam’ which was being broadcast live to YouTube.

The men were later also identified on CCTV at a local bar, according to a National Park Service spokesperson.

“These individuals behaved carelessly and put themselves at great risk. Brown bears are fierce, territorial predators, especially when concentrated in order to feed on migrating salmon,” said Mark Sturm, superintendent of Katmai National Park and Preserve.

“Things could have easily ended very badly.”

This story originally appeared in New Zealand Herald and was reproduced with permission