COEUR d’ALENE — The case of a St. Maries family accused of poaching mountain lions and bobcats across North Idaho is in the hands of a jury.

Eddy and Angela Dills, a married couple, and their adult son, Daniel Dills, are accused of conspiracy to commit unlawful killing of wildlife, conspiracy to sell unlawfully killed wildlife and conspiracy to conceal evidence, all felonies. 

The 12-person jury deliberated for about five hours Thursday afternoon before agreeing to return Friday morning and continue. 

Two-thirds of the family have lost their hunting privileges — Daniel Dills for three years and Eddy Dills for life. Prosecutors alleged that Angela Dills, the only one who can legally hunt, provided cover for her husband and son but didn’t kill any animals herself. 

“She is the designated fall person,” said prosecuting attorney Monica Bushling. “She’s taking credit for everything that happens in the woods with the three of them.” 

Bushling said Eddy Dills revealed the family’s motive in a recorded conversation with a plainclothes Fish and Game officer, when he described hound hunting as “the biggest adrenaline rush.” 

“They can’t give it up,” Bushling said. “They’ll do anything to continue.” 

Prosecutors showed records indicating that Daniel Dills completed big game mortality reports and harvest records for numerous mountain lions and bobcats between February 2020 and March 2024, the month before he lost his hunting privileges. During that time, prosecutors said, Angela Dills never completed any such reports or claimed any kills. 

It wasn’t until May 2024, a month after her son’s hunting license was revoked, that Angela Dills began claiming bobcat and mountain lion kills. Prosecutors said that’s no coincidence. 

Bushling argued that the idea of the father and son accompanying Angela Dills as mere unarmed observers who did not participate in the hunting defies logic. 

“What are these two people who are revoked, one for life, doing in the woods with hounds, dog boxes and GPS devices?” she said. “Where did all these dead animals come from?” 

Defense attorneys for the family argued that prosecutors haven’t produced hard evidence that the Dillses poached animals. 

Though hunters and plainclothes Fish and Game officers encountered the family in the woods on several occasions, including dates that matched kill dates later reported by Angela Dills, no one testified to seeing Eddy Dills or Daniel Dills kill an animal. 

Daniel Dills’ attorney, Craig Zanetti, urged jurors to examine the evidence with a critical eye and judge his client as an individual. 

“Danny is a 22-year-old man sandwiched between his parents in this conspiracy trial,” Zanetti said. 

Deborah Belley, defense counsel for Angela Dills, said her client is an avid hunter who has been stereotyped by prosecutors. 

“The state’s theory depends on the idea that Angela could not really have been hunting,” Belley said. “Why? Because she’s a woman. She’s older. She’s with men.” 

Belley also alleged that other hunters had attempted to frame the Dillses. 

Members of another hunting party testified about their encounter with the Dillses around Little North Fork Coeur d’Alene River last February. One of them, Hunter Hedequist, recorded a heated exchange with Eddy Dills in which Dills said his family had killed a mountain lion and planned to go back to collect it. Another hunter photographed blood dripping from the back of Eddy Dills’ truck. 

The hunters followed a blood trail and tire tracks from a forest road to a ditch where they found a dead mountain lion. The group also reported the encounter to Fish and Game. The investigator who responded to the scene testified that he found bloody boot prints that matched the size and tread of boots found in Daniel Dills’ home. 

Prosecutors allege the Dillses dumped the illegal kill because they were worried authorities would catch them. 

Belley accused the other hunting party of poaching and dumping the lion. 

“There was a conspiracy that day,” she said. “I infer it was the Hedequist party.” 

Tyler Naftz, who represents Eddy Dills, said his client was an unarmed observer of his wife’s hunts. 

“What he’s doing is he’s out with his family, lawfully, in the woods,” Naftz said. “There’s no question about it.”