GUNTERSVILLE, Alabama - Competitors became suspicious of two Marshall County men charged Thursday with cheating at a fishing tournament on Lake Guntersville after they won six tournaments in a row, District Attorney Steve Marshall said.

Gary Lee Minor Jr., 37, of Albertville and Robert Scott Gillaspie, 45, of Boaz were charged with tampering with a sports contest, which is a misdemeanor, Marshall said. They were booked at Marshall County Jail and released on bond.

The men were arrested after someone tipped officers with the Alabama Department of Conservation that the men were keeping fish in a pen in the water and using those fish for the tournament weigh-in. The officers conducted an investigation and got "enough evidence to be confident of a conviction," according to conservation officer Lt. Jim Kirkland.

"They won six tournaments in a row and folks got suspicious," Marshall said. "This investigation will focus only on this most recent incident, but everybody believes they've been cheating for a while."

Marshall said Thursday's tournament was one in which men placed money in a pot at the dock and the one who caught the largest bass won the pot.

"There was some money involved there," he said.

Kirkland said allegations of cheating don't occur often.

"It's been about 15 years since we made arrest in this part of the state," he said. "It was the same type case, where someone was pre-fishing and catching a big fish then hiding it until the weigh-in like they caught it that day."

He said the pots in these small tournaments are probably a few hundred dollars, depending on the number of competitors, and some people likely cheat as much for prestige and ego as money.

"Most fishermen and hunters we deal with, they're good people," Kirkland said. "It's not fair to the other people in the tournament who are participating fairly and abiding by the rules, those who are wanting to be real competitors by doing it the right way."

Updated at 9:30 .m. May 13, 2014, to add comments from Jim Kirkland.