A Montana man who concocted an elaborate plot to clone a massive foreign sheep species will spend time behind bars for his baaaaaaaad behavior.
Arthur “Jack” Schubarth was sentenced to six months in prison on Monday, and will also have to pay $24,200 in fines. The scheme involved importing parts of an endangered, and illegal, species of central Asian sheep, which Schubarth used to make a clone. Marco Polo argali sheep (Ovis ammon polii) are the largest sheep in the world, and they get big—very, very big. Males can top the scales at 300 pounds (136 kilograms), with horns that stretch as long as five feet (1.5 meters). Schubarth’s plan wasn’t to create a wool sweater empire. Instead, he wanted to create a new breed of even more gigantic sheep, just to kill them.
While human cloning is illegal in the United States, the same isn’t true for animals. Schubarth’s crimes were more about acquiring and disseminating the genetic material used in the cloning than the cloning itself. In March, Schubarth pleaded guilty to two felonies: conspiracy to violate the Lacey Act and substantively violating the Lacey Act. The Lacey Act, enacted in 1900, regulates the importation of wildlife that could be harmful to human beings, agriculture, or native wildlife of the United States.
According to a Justice Department press release announcing the sentencing, Schubarth, along with at least five other people, had imported parts of Marco Polo specimens into the U.S. from Kyrgyzstan, without declaring them. One of those unnamed conspirators may have been Schubarth’s son. According to a sentencing memo filed by prosecutors, Schubarth’s son traveled to Kyrgyzstan in 2013, killed an argali sheep, and brought back “viable tissue” for cloning. Between 2013 and 2021, the group used a genetics lab to create cloned embryos from that tissue. That resulted in the creation of a single male argali sheep, which Schubarth named Montana Mountain King, or MMK.
Schubarth and his conspirators then extracted semen from the Montana Mountain King, which they used to impregnate females from other sheep species, which were also illegal to keep in Montana, creating hybrids. The goal, the Justice Department said, was to create a new, even larger, species of sheep that would be sold to captive hunting facilities, which were mostly located in Texas.
As outlandish as it sounds, the plan worked—at least, until Schubarth was caught. The massive mutton mammals were shipped in and out of Montana, using forged veterinary inspection certificates. Schubarth was also selling MMK semen to other breeders. In total, illegal sales were completed to clients in 12 states.
“It was not a spur-of-the-moment or one-off crime,” prosecutors wrote in the sentencing memo. “It was a knowing, planned crime that Schubarth undertook, despite knowing that his actions were violating state and federal law.”
“Schubarth not only violated federal and state law and international treaties, but he and others illegally conspired to conceal their actions from authorities,” said Justice Department Assistant Attorney General Todd Kim. “Violations of the Lacey Act, CITES and other laws can be devastating for our domestic populations of wild animals, which is why we are unwavering in our commitment to enforce them.”
In case you’re wondering why Marco Polos are illegal in the United States, it’s not because of concerns they’d intimidate other, smaller breeds. The Justice Department said Schubarth’s scheme put native sheep at risk of disease, and two sheep that passed through Schubarth’s ranch during the time period in question died from Johne’s disease, a contagious wasting disease. We don’t know if the prospect of decimating native sheep species left Schubarth feeling sheepish.
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