Anderson: Fired for drunken driving, DNR waterfowl specialist cites hallucinations from an infection

If you hunt ducks or geese in Minnesota, chances are you know the name Steve Cordts.

For 20 years, Cordts has been the Department of Natural Resources waterfowl specialist, a job that’s garnered him considerable respect, even though many waterfowlers have at times disagreed with the way the DNR manages the state’s ducks and geese.

But now Cordts is out of a job, fired by his DNR bosses for something neither he nor others who know him thought he was capable of:

Driving while drunk. In a state vehicle.

Cordts doesn’t deny the charge. But he says he has no memory of consuming the approximately 16 alcoholic drinks he said he would have needed to consume in 2½ hours to blow a .26 when he was pulled over by a State Patrol officer in February near Walker, Minn.

Cordts was en route home to Bemidji from Cragun’s Resort on Gull Lake, a distance of about 95 miles. At Cragun’s, Cordts had played host to about 60 waterfowl managers from 14 states attending their annual Mississippi Flyway meetings.

After Cordts was busted, the DNR put him on investigative leave for three months and then fired him. He lost his health insurance and the sick leave pay he had accumulated.

With no defense — he concedes he was drunk — he was convicted of drunken driving, paid a fine of more than $600 and will have an ignition lock on his truck for a year. An attorney cost him more than $2,000.

“Before this, I’d never had so much as a parking ticket,” Cordts said.

Fellow DNR employees have come to Cordts’ defense, saying whatever happened, it was out of character. And waterfowl managers meeting at Cragun’s say Cordts was sober when they last saw him about noon Saturday, Feb. 24.

How did these life-changing events happen?

Cordts isn’t sure, but he believes it was the result of a diagnosis he subsequently received of Charles Bonnet Syndrome, which can cause hallucinations resulting from the brain’s adjustment to significant vision loss.

Last November, Cordts woke up one morning prepared to pack for a pheasant and duck hunting trip to his home state of South Dakota. But his left eye wouldn’t open. A doctor said it was due to a bacterial corneal infection.

In the days thereafter, Cordts, who lives alone, says he began having hallucinations.

“In the first one, I saw a young girl standing in my bed, also algebraic equations on white ceilings or walls and flocks and herds of ducks, cats, foxes and dogs,” Cordts said. “These were all very vivid. I had no idea how long they lasted, and I don’t have any memory of what I did when they occurred.”

An ophthalmologist subsequently diagnosed two holes in the retina of Cordts’ left eye and prescribed steroids to control rapidly rising fluid pressure inside the eye.

His hallucinations and blackouts returned in January, Cordts said.

“First, I saw fairies flitting around my house, and later that same day or the next day, I saw two women hanging out in my house I didn’t recognize,” Cordts said. “I have no memory of what I did that day, but the following morning I found a bouquet of flowers on my table and eventually a receipt from a store that included flowers and some expensive pasta I’ve never bought. I can only assume I was planning to cook dinner to try to impress the women guests.”

A few weeks later, another episode.

“I had dropped my truck off at a shop in the morning and [a fellow DNR employee] picked me up and drove me home,” Cordts said. “I have no idea what I did that day, except that a large group of people I know from the flyway were at my house and I was taking them perch fishing the next day. I told [my colleague] some of this when he picked me up at night to get my truck, and he wouldn’t let me drive.

“The next morning, I found about 4 pounds of taco meat cooked in my refrigerator and later found all my ice-fishing gear had been rearranged, apparently to guide the flyway group to fish for perch.”

The flyway meetings, which rotate annually among member states, followed soon thereafter.

As host, Cordts set up a hospitality room at Cragun’s with beer and liquor he brought from Bemidji in a state minivan. On Friday, Feb. 23, the last night of the conference, many in attendance had dinner at a brewery, where Cordts had a beer and some portion of a Bloody Mary sampler. Afterward, at Cragun’s, there was more socializing and drinking, Cordts said.

But John Brunjes, Kentucky’s migratory bird program coordinator, said Cordts was sober when he last saw him about noon Saturday, Feb. 24.

“There was nothing in his speech, demeanor, smell or look that suggested he had been drinking in any way,” Brunjes wrote in a letter to the DNR supporting Cordts. “He was the normal version of himself that I have had the pleasure of working with in the Mississippi Flyway for nearly 20 years during two-week-long meetings every year.”

Cordts estimates he left Cragun’s at about 2:30 p.m. that Saturday. At about 4 p.m., he was pulled over near Walker.

In the back of the state minivan he was driving was the leftover beer and liquor from the hospitality room. But none was within Cordts’ reach, and he wasn’t cited for drinking while driving.

After the DNR fired him, the union representing DNR employees — the Minnesota Association of Professional Employees — appealed his dismissal but lost. DNR Fish and Wildlife Division Director Kelly Straka, who in her former position as Wildlife Section Chief was among DNR managers to hear Cordts’ appeal, said personnel issues are confidential and she couldn’t comment.

Now, Cordts awaits the scheduling of an arbitration hearing.

Meanwhile, ophthalmology and neurology specialists who have examined Cordts believe Charles Bonnet Syndrome, perhaps triggered by increased eyeball pressure, caused his hallucinations.

“People don’t live responsibly for 58 years and transform to being grossly irresponsible and reckless in less than 24 hours without something extraordinary or bizarre happening,” Cordts said.