Convicted poacher must spend every weekend of hunting season behind bars, judge orders

Texas Parks and Wildlife Department

GRAYSON COUNTY, Texas – A judge in Grayson County ordered a man convicted of poaching a 19-point buck to spend every weekend of hunting season behind bars for the next five years.

John Walker Drinnon, 34, was given five years of probation, more than $18,000 in civil restitution and jail time during hunting season.

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Texas Parks and Wildlife said Drinnon must report to the Grayson County Jail each weekend of deer hunting season beginning Dec. 30.

The Whitesboro man is also prohibited from purchasing a hunting license while on probation.

Drinnon's buck had a gross Boone & Crockett score of 202 inches with a rifle while trespassing on private property; a state jail felony.

Drinnon was put on TPWD's radar after photos of the huge 19-point buck surfaced.

"Game wardens received information suggesting the hunter’s story didn't add up," a release from TPWD said. 

Drinnon told game wardens that he "killed the 19-pointer on public hunting land in Oklahoma," but the wardens had obtained a game camera image of the deer in question, photographed on public hunting land on the Texas side of Lake Texoma, which contradicted Drinnon’s claim he killed the deer in Oklahoma.

After investigators put together a case with the help of Oklahoma officials, Drinnon confessed that he had killed the buck in Grayson County from a public roadway with a rifle.