Rangers found 1,000 pounds of trash — and a man who wouldn’t leave

About 1,000 pounds of trash, spread across roughly half an acre of public land in Arizona’s Tonto National Forest, is what finally brought a years-long standoff between U.S. Forest Service officers and one illegal camper to a close.

Officers who repeatedly inspected the site over the past year found discarded clothing, tools, old tires, plastic bags, aluminum cans, containers of used motor oil and a growing collection of makeshift structures. Visitors to the forest had complained about the sprawling camp for some time before the inspections began.

Court records identify the camper as 65-year-old Mark Aaron Gatz, who pleaded guilty to unlawfully living in the Tonto National Forest for about eight years. He had spent the final two years at the exact site where he was arrested, after living more broadly across the forest’s Payson Pine area for years before that.

Warnings and citations issued during earlier visits failed to get him to leave or clean up the site, according to officers, who said the camp kept expanding despite those repeated instructions. By the time officers returned on June 25, Gatz had six outstanding federal warrants connected to previous violations.

That same visit turned up an active wood-burning fire, even though Stage 2 fire restrictions were in place at the time. Gatz told officers he was aware of the restrictions but needed the fire to cook food. Federal rules generally limit camping in national forests to 14 days within any 30-day period.

Authorities had considered pursuing thousands of dollars in restitution for the environmental damage, though the final agreement did not require those payments. Gatz was sentenced to time served and three years of probation; court filings do not explain why he chose to live in the forest for so long.

Wikimedia Commons/by Toastdebunny