A man who dug up fossilized dinosaur footprints from a protected area in northern British Columbia has been fined and sentenced to nearly a month in jail.
A provincial court ruling released this week says Benward Dale Ingram and three others used power tools and a hammer for more than two hours to remove tracks from the Six Peaks Dinosaur Track site near Hudson’s Hope, about 150 miles away. north of Prince George, British Columbia in summer 2020.
“Large slabs of fossils have either been removed or damaged by being broken off and probably destroyed. The power tools used included a portable generator, an air compressor and an air chisel, as well as heavy hand tools, including hammers and crowbars,” the decision read.
“Mr. Ingram was observed using a hammer, crowbar and other tools for excavation.”
The ruling said the “excavation” only stopped when witnesses came forward and the men left the scene.
Preliminary surveys of the Six Peaks Dinosaur Track site, first discovered in 2008, have found more than 500 dinosaur footprints on approximately 750 square meters of land – about a tenth of an acre.
The tracks were from a range of dinosaurs that roamed the sandy terrain during the early Cretaceous period up to 125 million years ago – including some of three of the “major” groups of Cretaceous dinosaurs, the theropods, ornithopods and sauropods.
The Six Peaks Dinosaur Track site is protected under the Province’s Land Act 2016, which makes it illegal to use the land for anything other than preservation and conservation.
Ingram, who is 39 and lives in Alberta, was charged and pleaded guilty to one count of illegally excavating on Crown land under the Land Act.
Judge Darin Reeves fined Ingram $15,000 and sentenced him to 25 days in jail.
He described the site as one of the “most important track sites in North America” because of the variety of fossils and complained that the stolen tracks had not been recovered.
The decision added that the sandstone damaged during the illegal excavations was now much more likely to erode faster.
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