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Sarah Brown, an attorney with the US Department of Justice, had asked that Schubarth be sentenced to prison, saying his illegal breeding operation was widespread, involved other states and endangered the health of other wildlife.
Schubarth owns Sun River Enterprises LLC, a 215-acre (87-hectare) alternative livestock ranch, which buys, sells and breeds “alternative livestock” such as mountain sheep, mountain goats and ungulates, primarily for private hunting preserves, where people shoot captive trophy game animals for a fee, prosecutors said.
Schubarth pleaded guilty in March to charges that he and five other people conspired to use tissue from a Marco Polo sheep illegally brought into the US to clone that animal and then use the clone and its descendants to create a larger, hybrid species of sheep that would be more valuable for captive hunting operations.
Marco Polo sheep are the largest in the world, can weigh 300lb (136kg) and have curled horns up to 5ft (1.5 meters) long, court records said.