Feud between Eddy Co., ND landowner & hunters could lead to charges

EDDY COUNTY, N.D. (KVRR) – We could see the next phase in a disagreement between a group of hunters and a landowner seen in a viral video from Eddy County, North Dakota.

State’s Attorney Ashley Lies tells KVRR she could reach her decision on charging Jacob Sweere, other hunters and a farmer for an incident that happened October 21st as early as Tuesday.

Sweere’s video that’s been seen 1.5 million times starts showing friends having fun shooting birds on farmland with the sun barely creeping in on them. A farmer shows up saying the men are on his land.

“Do you know where the section line is? Move over here because you have to stay a foot off. Oh, this is cute. I was going to hunt here this morning, but I heard you guys were coming. I own the f****** land,” the farmer said.

“If he would have just come up to us nicely, ask to be able to join in, we definitely would have made something work. We decided to edge up to the edge and we were sitting in an A frame with Dustin’s grandpa. He could not sit in a layout. Neither could his brother. They are too old, so they need to hunt in an A frame to shoot,” Sweere said.

Sweere and his friends say they got permission to hunt on another farmer’s land.

There was also another group of hunters shooting when Sweere says the farmer was “harassing his group.”

“They shot more ducks than we did, so they were far enough away that they didn’t care about us. Obviously the birds weren’t coming in. Jeff was sitting there with his side-by-side running screaming at us,” Sweere said.

Sweere says other hunters have had similar problems with the farmer and he hopes to resolve the issue for everyone.

“We’re going to let the DNR and the State’s Attorney kind of dive into it. Let them do their thing. We’re not going to be going out of our way to press charges,” Sweere said.

Sweere says the farmer then asks for money from the hunters to be on land he doesn’t own.

“Give me $300 and I’ll let you hunt here today,” the farmer said.

“We’re not on your land!” Sweere said.

A Game and Fish officer took down the farmer’s and hunters’ information and Sweere gave them his video.

KVRR reached out to the Game and Fish Department for an interview, but haven’t heard back.