A man has been sentenced to three months in jail after he and his son were caught on camera killing a mother bear and her two cubs.

Andrew Renner, 41, and his 18-year-old son Owen killed the animals after skiing to the inhabited bear den on Esther Island in the Gulf of Alaska - unaware that the animals were being recorded as part of a wildlife observation program conducted by the US Forest Service and the Alaska Department of Fish and Game.

The Renners were sentenced Tuesday for the April incident, after pleading guilty to multiple counts, including illegal killing of the bears, KTLA reports.

Owen received 30 days of suspended time for his involvement in the incident, and both received fines.

According to a statement released by the Alaska Department of Public Safety in April, the father and son skied up to the den on April 14, at which point the motion-detection camera captured the 18-year-old shoot the mother bear.

A short timeline of elephant poaching Show all 10 1 /10 A short timeline of elephant poaching A short timeline of elephant poaching 1880s.jpg An estimated 26 million elephants roam the African continent when the first Europeans began building forts on Africa’s uninhabited islands. Robert H. Milligan, New York Public Library A short timeline of elephant poaching 1910.jpg At the turn of the century, European empires stretch across Africa. The elephant population halves within a century to around ten million. Ivory is in vogue in Europe and America. Combs, piano keys, pool table balls and ornaments fashioned from elephant tusks are in high demand. Creative commons A short timeline of elephant poaching 1979.jpg In the 20th century, elephant populations dwindle to 1.3 million because of growing demand from the West. Surreal Name Given, Flickr A short timeline of elephant poaching 1980s.jpg Throughout the 1980s, 250 elephants are killed every day. By the end of the decade, only 600,000 elephants remain in Africa. Kenya’s population drops 89% from 167,000 to a mere 19,000. The species is on the verge of extinction in many parts of Africa. Scotch Macaskill A short timeline of elephant poaching actual elephant forensic 1989.jpg CITES bans all commercial ivory trade; the ban comes into force in 1990. Kenya destroys its entire ivory stockpile in a gesture against the ivory trade. Space for Giants A short timeline of elephant poaching 1990s.jpg After the ban, elephant populations began to recover. Within the next ten years, Kenya’s population rises from 55,000 to over 125,000. The Kenyan population also grows to more than 30,000 by 2007 from the historic low of 16,000. Space for Giants A short timeline of elephant poaching 1999.jpg Under mounting pressure from African leaders, Cites allows a ‘one-off’ sale of stockpiled ivory. Japan buys 55 tons of ivory from Zimbabwe, Namibia and Zimbabwe for £3 million. Vidhi Doshi A short timeline of elephant poaching `Ivory elephants 2008.jpeg Cites grants Japan and China permission to import elephant ivory from government stockpiles; 102 tonnes of stockpiled ivory from Botswana, South Africa, Namibia and Zimbabwe were sold to Japan and China for £9.3 million. Space for Giants A short timeline of elephant poaching elephantfence 2009.jpg There is a huge spike in the number of large ivory seizures, with 14 seizures totalling 23,235 tons. Space for Giants A short timeline of elephant poaching Elephant dust 2013(1).jpeg Approximately 450,000 elephants remain in Africa. There have been 18 large-scale seizures of illegal ivory, 41,674 kg in total, the highest annual since records began. It is highly likely just a small fraction of the illegal ivory through the system is actually detected. Space for Giants

His father was then recorded shooting the “shrieking” newborn bear cubs and dragging the bodies away from the den.

Court documents reveal Andrew was caught on camera saying: “It doesn’t matter. Bear down.”

The camera then captured the pair returning to the den two days later to pick up the shells and dispose of the bear cubs.

On April 30, Andrew brought the adult bear’s skin and tracking collar to the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, telling officials that he killed the bear near Granite Bay in Prince William Sound and noticed it was a nursing mother after - but that he did not see any cubs nearby.

The father and son were charged with unlawfully taking a female bear with cubs, unlawfully taking a bear cub, and possessing and transporting illegally taken game.

Andrew Renner was also charged with tampering with physical evidence, and falsifying a document indicating that he killed the mother bear, not his son, according to Anchorage Daily News, and has had his hunting license revoked for 10 years.

Assistant Attorney General Aaron Peterson said the case was the “most egregious bear cub poaching case his office has ever seen.”

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