When Jason Bietz took his daughter outing on the beach, he didn’t expect it to lead to the federal government spreading his photos in an attempt to find a suspect accused of looking down at the head of a sea lion and taking it away.
But that’s what happened.
On Monday, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Fisheries Enforcement Office released a photo of Bates and offered a $20,000 reward in the information on the decapitation of Point Pinos Beach on July 27 for $20,000 reward.
The next day, the agency deleted the photos and said that the mammals were not taken from the beach after all.
Bates, who lives in Hanford, said he did not behead the animal. He said the investigation stems from a miscommunication with his teenage daughter while searching for the death seal with a teenage daughter who is interested in marine biology.
Monterey resident Rashelle Diaz reported the incident to authorities and had different memories of the incident. She said she faced Bates and his daughter after seeing him leaning against a sea lion and piercing it with a knife.
In the videotape recording the incident, she asked Bates what dead seal he needed, and he replied, “I tell you we’re just looking up.”
“What is it?” she asked him.
“Skull,” he said.
“What do you want to do?” she continued.
“Yes,” he replied.
Bates told The Times Wednesday that he doesn’t remember what he said during the July confrontation, but that he could say “I just want to raise my head” and it was “a clever, ironic word.”
Bates also denied accusing him of holding a knife on the beach, saying that the objects photographed in his hand might be sticks, phones, or lanyards on keys.
Rashelle Diaz photographed Jason Bietz on the beach on July 27, 2025, with an object in his hand. The two fight against a Dead Sea lion on the beach.
(Jason Bietz)
Bates said he contacted NOAA investigators on Monday once he saw the agency emitting photos of himself.
NOAA then removed the photo of Bietz from its post, noting that the man had found it and was sure that the marine mammal parts were not removed from the beach.
When The Times contacted a NOAA spokesperson for comment Wednesday, a reporter received an automatic reply saying the spokesperson was on leave due to the federal closure and would respond to emails once government functions resumed.
The agency’s initial post said a man used a hunting knife to remove the head of the deceased lion’s head at about 8:40 pm on July 27. Further: “After sawing the seal’s head, he placed the head in a postcode plastic bag and left the area.”
This reflects the allegations Diaz made against local TV station KSBW in July. She told the media that she faced Bates because he “decaptured his skinned seal and separated the skull from his body” and he then moved his head away with his Ziploc bag.
According to NOAA’s update, Diaz told The Times that she now knows that her head was not taken from the beach.
“I know at the moment that he hasn’t beheaded, even though he said that’s what he was doing, so that’s what I think he did,” she said, adding that she saw her father and daughter carrying something in a plastic bag, so she thought it was a skull.
“Now he [Bietz] She said, everywhere, saying he was wrongly accused. But I think I really just stopped him from doing it. I grabbed him and then he couldn’t do what he was going to do, which was my goal. ”
Under California’s Marine Mammal Protection Act, it is illegal to injure sea lions or collect any part of them when they die or are alive. Violations may be subject to a civil fine of up to $36,498, or a criminal fine of up to $100,000, each year of breach.
During the recording encounter, Diaz also informed Bates that Pinos Beach is located in a protected area where it is illegal to remove any items.
She told him in the video: “You can’t bring the shells home, you can’t bring the crustaceans home, you can’t bring the skull home.”
Bitz denied accusing him of peeling the sea lion’s skull before confronting Diaz. He said he and his daughter found the body that had cleansed their skin earlier that afternoon.
He provided the Times with a photo showing a clean skull attached to the body of a sea lion, and the metadata showed it was taken at 3:42 pm – about four hours before the confrontation with Diaz.
“She accused me of peeling, and then I cut my head and took it away,” he said. “These statements have been 100% explicitly refuted.”
Diaz said she was trying to protect the marine life on the local beaches but never intended to attack Bates in person.
“My main goal is to spread awareness of the law and protect our beloved marine mammals and not have the entire $20,000 reward – if you are your idea,” she said.
