Florida Cases of Dolphins Shot and Stabbed: Reward Increases to More than $50,000

NOAA’s Office of Law Enforcement and Agency partners are offering a reward of up to $54,000 for information on the recent deaths of two dolphins in Florida.

Biologists with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission discovered a dead dolphin off Naples, FL, late last week. The animal was fatally wounded from what appeared to be a bullet and/or a sharp object. Within the same week, Emerald Coast Wildlife Refuge experts recovered a dolphin with a bullet in its left side along Pensacola Beach, FL.

A dolphin, also with a fatal puncture wound to its head, was found dead off Captiva Island, FL, in May 2019. That investigation is ongoing and also offers a reward for information.

NOAA officials are seeking information from anyone who may have details about these incidents. Please call the NOAA Enforcement Hotline at 1-800-853-1964. Tips may be left anonymously.

NOAA’s Office of Law Enforcement and our agency partners, including Lightkeepers, Animal Legal Defense Fund, the Animal Welfare Institute, Cet Law, legaSeas, Oceanic Preservation Society, the International Fund for Animal Welfare, Hunter College Director of the Animal Behavior and Conservation MA Program, Dolphins Plus Marine Mammal Responder, Ocean Experience, Regency Crematorium are offering combined rewards of up to $54,000 ($34,000 from our partners and up to $20,000 from NOAA’s Office of Law Enforcement) for information leading to:

1. The successful identification and/or
2. Successful prosecution for the person(s) responsible and/or
3. An arrest, conviction or civil penalty assessment. 

Please include your name and contact information when calling enforcement to be eligible for the reward.

Biologists believe these cases may stem from humans feeding wild dolphins. Dolphins fed by people learn to associate people and boats with food which can put them in harmful situations. Dolphins may suffer fatal impacts from boat strikes, entanglement in or ingestion of fishing gear, and acts of intentional harm like these. People can prevent harm to wild dolphins by not feeding or attempting to feed them.

Since 2002, at least 29 dolphins (including these) have been stranded with evidence of being shot by guns or arrows or impaled with objects like fishing spears. Four incidents have occurred within the last year. 

Harassing, hunting, killing or feeding wild dolphins, or attempting to do these activities is prohibited under the Marine Mammal Protection Act of 1972. Violations can be prosecuted either civilly or criminally and are punishable by up to $100,000 in fines and up to one year in jail per violation.

NOAA continues to actively enforce these prohibitions. A recent case resulted in NOAA assessing a civil penalty of $1,250 against a Kansas man for feeding a dolphin while in Florida on vacation in a case that became final in January. NOAA also works with the Department of Justice to initiate criminal prosecutions for more egregious cases such as the 2009 conviction and jail sentence given to a fishing captain for making homemade pipe bombs and throwing them at dolphins.

Editor’s Note: Bob McConville, Coastal Breeze News Columnist and Master Naturalist aboard the Dolphin Explorer survey boat, weighed in on this subject. “The $1,250 is just a civil fine for feeding or trying to feed dolphins. The Marine Mammal Protection Act covers the entire U.S. and can incur Federal punishment with a penalty of prison time and fines ‘may’ be imposed. Manatees are mammals as well. I can’t tell you how many people give them water from a hose on their dock or hose to a freshwater supply on their boat to give them a drink. This can also be an offense that would incur a fine. Keeping mammals away from human contact, the better it is. These mammals would eventually turn to boats more often for food and drink. In Sarasota, a dolphin named ‘Beggar’ lost its life because of humans feeding it.”