A federal grand jury last week indicted two Nevada men for damaging ancient rock formations at the Lake Mead National Recreation Area in April.
Accoring to the indictment, Wyatt Clifford Fain, 37, and Payden David Guy Cosper, 31, pushed large chunks off rock formations millions of years old off the edge of a cliff on or near the Redstone Dunes Trail on April 7, the US Attorney’s Office for the District of Nevada said.
Fain and Cosper were charged with one count each of injury and depradation of government property and one count each of aiding and abetting. They appeared before a federal judge on Friday and had a trial date set for October 8.
If convicted, they face up to 10 years in prison.
A video showing the men shoving the boulders over the cliff edge went viral. The Las Vegas Review-Journal posted a copy of the video in April, showing the men push the boulders down a steep slope of stacked boulders, throwing up red dust as they fall. A young girl screams behind the men as they do their damage.
The recreation area website says that the damaged formations are about 140 million years old. Lake Mead spokesman John Haynes told the paper seeing the video made him “sick to my stomach.”
“That place just happens to be my favorite place in the park,” he said. “It’s so unique.”
