The Hawaii state parks employee whose unleashed dogs killed a day-old monk seal pup in May had been reported to federal authorities four years earlier when her dogs attacked other seals at the same North Shore beach area, newly released records show.

That state worker, Division of State Parks interpretive technician Lesley Macpherson, did not face any penalties for the 2020 incident. Authorities said they had to prioritize their case load during the COVID-19 lockdowns in place at the time.

Those and other details, revealed in National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration reports and emails released last week, renewed concerns among monk seal advocates over Macpherson’s continued oversight of a critical spot where the endangered mammals often haul ashore to give birth — as well as over state and federal authorities’ handling of the matter.

“It was totally, 100% preventable,” said Melina Clark, a monk seal advocate who spent 15 years volunteering for groups such as the nonprofit Hawaii Marine Animal Response.

Macpherson, whose job includes enforcing the rules at Kaʻena State Park, repeatedly let her four dogs loose around the Mokuleʻia beach grounds there, according to the NOAA report. Dogs aren’t allowed in the park, under state rules.

Longtime volunteer monk seal advocates, including Clark, say Macpherson openly allowed her dogs to roam around Kaʻena Point park grounds for several years and that she would rebuff volunteers’ requests to keep the dogs secured at her home, located on a parcel inside the park area.

Complicating matters is Macpherson’s own yearslong, dedicated history as a monk seal volunteer prior to joining the parks division.

According to her testimony to an investigator, Macpherson in 2008 co-founded a watch group, Hawaiian Monk Seal Response Team Oahu, that eventually became Hawaii Marine Animal Response. The state has promoted her experience with the endangered animals.

Update: Hawaii Marine Animal Response President Jon Gelman said Friday that his organization was not formed out of Machpersonʻs Response Team Oahu and was not related to that group.

NOAA emails discussing both the 2020 harassment and the pup killing in May allude to the tricky nature of those incidents given Macpherson’s background with the seals.

“As you all know this is a sensitive situation considering the severity and who is involved,” a local NOAA wildlife management coordinator told the agencyʻs law enforcement branch hours after the death. He added that he supported those officers “in what you think is the best action to take.”

In June, the federal agency fined Macpherson and her partner, James Lyman, $20,000 for their dogs’ killing of the monk seal pup, known as P07 — a clear violation of the Marine Mammal Protection Act. The couple ultimately agreed to pay $18,000, records show.

But the dogs likely would not have killed P07 if federal and state authorities had addressed the situation at Mokuleʻia much earlier, seal advocates say.

“She’s the caretaker. She was a volunteer for a long time,” Clark said Wednesday. “She knew better and she never got in trouble for her dogs. It’s a big mess.”

Macpherson did not respond this week to requests for comment.

The state’s Department of Land and Natural Resources, which includes the parks division, opened an investigation a month after the pup killing to determine whether Macpherson violated any state or county laws. According to agency spokesperson Patti Jette, that probe is continuing.

In the meantime, Jette said, Macpherson remains on the job. DLNR declined to comment further, citing its investigation.

A Grisly Shoreline Find

Monk seals remain among the most endangered seal species in the world. Currently, there are estimated to be nearly 1,600 individuals left. Roughly 400 live in the Main Hawaiian Islands and the rest in the mostly uninhabited and federally protected Northwestern Hawaiian Islands.

Researchers say the speciesʻ recovery remains a long way off. Thus, local conservation and volunteer watch groups arduously monitor and track individual seals year-round, including females about to give birth. Their efforts help the islandsʻ state and federal conservation agents who are notoriously spread thin.

Macpherson is among those keeping a close eye on the seals.

According to the NOAA report on the Mokuleʻia pup killing, Macpherson told a special agent with the agency’s Office of Law Enforcement that she had encountered P07 and its mother shortly after the pup’s birth the morning of May 23. It was one of two pups born there about a day apart.

She took the unusual step of seeking permission via phone of an agency veterinarian to cut the umbilical cord because it appeared to be too tight. After cutting the cord, Macpherson said she filed a report on the “take,” which refers to any time an endangered species is disturbed, harmed or killed. Typically, only trained professionals are authorized to touch or handle the seals, but Macpherson said the pup’s situation was urgent.

Macpherson and Lyman then left their Mokuleʻia home at around 5:30 p.m. to visit friends in Hawaiʻi Kai, she told the investigator. They left the four dogs unleashed, and when they got home later that night only one of the dogs greeted them. Eventually, the other three dogs showed up, Macpherson told the NOAA agent, and two had blood stains on their face and head.

Macpherson and Lyman then headed to the birth site on the beach at around 2 a.m., where she said they encountered a dead pup and an adult seal vocalizing. She then used a plastic tray from the cart they drove to retrieve the carcass, according to the report, and several hours later she delivered it to a NOAA veterinarian.

P07’s necropsy determined that the pup had been killed in a dog attack based on the puncture wounds and “shaking trauma.”

Lyman told the NOAA agent: “Hindsight being 20/20, maybe (we) should have left them in the house knowing there were two seal pups out there.”

Correction: An earlier version of this story attributed the above quote to Macpherson.

Four days later, according to the report, that same agent learned that a dog again had been seen that morning wandering near the other newborn monk seal and its mother.

The investigator identified the dog as “Snowflake” — belonging to Macpherson — based on a photo taken by the person who reported the incident.

Initially, according to the NOAA report, Macpherson denied that one of the dogs involved in the attack had been loose again. Macpherson added that she did see fresh dog paw prints in the sand that morning where the surviving mother and pup were resting but claimed they couldnʻt be Snowflakeʻs.

The investigator then informed Macpherson there was a photo identifying the dog as Snowflake. According to the report, Macpherson said she would double-check with Lyman. A short while later, Macpherson called back and said Lyman had let Snowflake out to urinate for about 15 minutes, the report stated.

It wasnʻt the first time Snowflake had been reported near the seals.

A Troubling Pattern

In November 2020, several monk seal volunteer watchers reported to NOAA that they had witnessed two unattended dogs charge at a pair of seals at Tables Beach in Mokuleʻia, right next to the popular birthing site. They provided photos of the incident.

One of the dogs bit one of the seals as the marine mammals fled to the water for safety, according to the incident report, although the seal later did not appear to be seriously injured.

The witnesses said they were positive the dogs belonged to Macpherson.

“The smaller one (more aggressive one) is called Snowflake,” they wrote. “Snowflake was the chief aggressor, the younger one appeared to follow his lead.”

“We have seen both dogs on multiple occasions without any owners on site,” they added, “and we have also seen them with Lesley and family that reside at the property.”

According to NOAA emails, one of the agencyʻs marine mammal response coordinators, Aliza Milette-Winfree, swiftly called Macpherson and asked her to make sure the dogs were off the beach. Macpherson also confirmed the dogs were properly vaccinated, according to those messages.

However, Milette said when she tried to follow up on the matter by text and asked Macpherson to confirm the dogs were hers, Macpherson never responded.

Milette wrote to her NOAA colleagues that “I do not know if she is purposely ceasing communication or not.”

Adam Kurtz, the NOAA marine wildlife management coordinator, also wrote at the time: “Due to the fact that Lesley is a DLNR employee and has supported our marine mammal response network, which also includes many other agency partners, we understand that there are some sensitivities surrounding this incident.”

“However,” he continued, “we expect that OLE will handle this incident like any other.”

Emails show that both Kurtzʻ division and OLE agents intended to follow up, but itʻs not clear what happened after that. Update: The federal agency on Friday declined to discuss why Macphersonʻs case would not be considered a higher priority in 2020.

NOAAʻs regional Office of Law Enforcement division for the Pacific is known to be understaffed and underfunded, and it often relies on help from its state counterparts to enforce federal marine mammal protections around the islands.

Earlier this year, the enforcement branchʻs Pacific Islands Division reported having fewer than 12 people to cover the entire U.S. Pacific region, including Hawaiʻi, Guam and other U.S. territories. It’s the smallest of the OLE’s five divisions but has to cover the largest area, representing some 1.7 million square miles, according to Martina Sagapolu, the divisionʻs assistant director.

The photos from the 2020 incident helped the separate NOAA investigator in 2024 to identify Snowflake as the dog roaming near the surviving mother and pup, dubbed P06.

Clark and other monk seal volunteers accused NOAA and DLNR of tolerating Macphersonʻs unattended and unleashed dogs in a sensitive and restricted area for several years.

“It’s a sensitive issue because of who’s involved. It’s because it’s her. If it was you or me we would have heard from the authorities,” Clark said Wednesday.  “If they had nailed it a long time ago and cracked down because there are no dogs allowed at Kaʻena State Park … then we would have less harassment and we wouldn’t have this killing, at all.”

It remains unclear whether DLNR has taken any action to address the situation. An online petition created in July calling for Macphersonʻs firing, meanwhile, has collected more than 1,000 signatures.

Read the NOAA report on P07ʻs death here: