When Jason Bietz took his daughter for an excursion on the beach, he did not imagine that he would result in the federal government circulating a photo of him, seeking to identify a suspect accused of looking at the head of a sea lion and carrying it in a plastic bag.
But that's what happened.
On Monday, the Office of Application of the Law of the Oceanic and Atmospheric National Administration published a photo of Bietz and offered a reward of $ 20,000 for information that led to an arrest, civil sanction or criminal conviction in the decapitation of July 27 of a sea lion in Point Point Pinos Beach in Pacific Grove.
The next day, the agency knocked down the photo and said that after all, pieces of mammals from the beach had not been taken.
Bietz, who lives in Hanford, says he did not decapitate the animal. He said that the investigation derives from a lack of communication with an assistant of the bleach that took place while he and his teenage daughter, who is interested in marine biology, were looking at a dead stamp.
Rashelle Díaz, a Monterey resident who informed the incident to the authorities, has a different memory of the events. She says she faced Bietz and her daughter after she saw him leaning on the lion of the sea and pushing him with a knife.
In a video Diaz engraved from the incident, she asks Bietz why he needs a dead seal, which he replies: “I told you that we are only taking the head.”
“So that?” She asks.
“The skull,” he says.
“To dry it?” She continues.
“Yes,” he replies.
Bietz told Times on Wednesday that he does not remember exactly what he said during the July confrontation, but it is possible that he said “he was going to take his head” as a “sarcastic comment.”
Bietz also denied the accusations that he had a knife on the beach, saying that the object photographed in his hand was probably a stick, his phone or the cord connected to his keys.
Rashelle Díaz photographed Jason Bietz on the beach with an object in his hand on July 27, 2025. The couple dedicated himself to a confrontation about a Dead Sea lion on the beach.
(Jason Bietz)
Bietz said he approached NOA researchers on Monday to clear his name once he saw the photo of himself circulated by the agency.
Noaa then removed Bietz's photo of his post and pointed out that the man had been located and that he had determined that pieces of marine mammals from the beach were not removed.
When the Times communicated with a NOAA spokesman to comment on Wednesday, a journalist received an automated response that indicates that the spokesman is licensed due to federal closure and will respond to emails once the government functions resume.
The initial position of the agency had declared that a man was observed using a hunting knife to remove the head from a deceased sea lion around 8:40 pm on July 27. He said that “after scaring the seal's head, he placed his head in a plastic bag with pulloline and left the area.”
That reflects accusations that Díaz made to the local television station KSBW in July. She told him at the exit that he faced Bietz while he “decapitated a seal that had already broken down, and separated the skull from the body” and that he removed his head into a ziploc bag.
According to NOAA's update, Díaz told The Times that he now knows that the head was not taken from the beach.
“I currently know that he did not decapitate him, although he said that it was what he was doing, so that was what he had assumed,” he said Wednesday. He also said that he saw the father and daughter take something in a plastic bag, so he had assumed that it was the skull.
“Now he [Bietz] He is everywhere, saying that he is being falsely accused, “he said.” But I think I really stopped him. I caught it, and then I couldn't do what I was planning to do, which was my goal. “
Under the Marine Mammal Protection Law of California, it is illegal to damage marine lions or collect any of its parts while dead or alive. The violations are punished with a civil fine of up to $ 36,498 for rape or a criminal penalty of up to $ 100,000 in fines and up to a year in jail for rape.
During the recording of the meeting, Díaz also informs Bietz that Point Pinos Beach is in a protected area where it is illegal to eliminate any article.
“You can't bring shells home, you can't take the crustaceans home, you can't bring skulls home, specifically,” he says in the video, to which he replies: “What law says that?”
Bietz denied the accusations that he decelerated the skull of the lion of the sea before the confrontation with Díaz. He said he and his daughter found the body with the skull already clean of the skin that afternoon.
He provided to the times a photo that shows the clean skull attached to the body of the lion of the sea with the metadata that indicated that he was taking at 3:42 pm, about four hours before the confrontation with Díaz.
“She made accusations that I will slow my skull, and cut her head and then took her with me,” he said. “These statements have been 100% unequivocally refuted.”
Díaz said he was trying to protect marine life on local beaches and that he never intended to personally attack Bietz.
“My main objective was to spread awareness about the laws and protect our dear marine mammals here,” he said, “not having this whole issue of $ 20,000-Reward-Iph-Iou-Find-Him-Him.”
