A southwest Colorado man was convicted and sentenced to six months in prison for trashing Uncompahgre National Forest land, the U.S. Attorney’s Office, the U.S. Forest Service and the San Miguel County Sheriff’s Office announced. Benjamin Yoho, 41 of Telluride and Ouray, was convicted after a one-day bench trial before U.S. Magistrate David West in Durango on charges of massive littering in an area north of Telluride.
Officials said from October 2014 to April, Yoho lived and had a structure on Forest System land and transported several items from the Telluride “Free Box” where he littered a large area near the Jud Wiebe Trail. In May, 48 volunteers and numerous crews from the Colorado Division of Fire Prevention and Control removed about 8,500 pounds of debris from the forest by helicopter.
Yoho was convicted of residing on National Forest system lands, maintaining a structure in the National Forest and leaving debris in the forest. He will serve one year of probation after his release from prison.
“This was no ordinary case of littering in the National Forest — this was full-scale trashing of the public lands and merited a term of incarceration,” U.S. Attorney John Walsh said in a statement.
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I am Jeff Clark, founder of Internet Brothers, producer of this blog, and passionate about hiking. I live in Western NC near the Blue Ridge and Great Smoky Mountains. Pisgah and Nantahala National Forests are just out my door, so the content will focus on these areas, but let me know what you would like to see on the site. 
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