ZIMBABWE: WARNING: Hunting With Juan Pace & Lloyd Yeatman - Don't

Sorry you had such a pathetic experience.

One day Pace is going to screw with the wrong person. Here's to hoping that day comes soon.

 

SAD

 

Sad to hear....

 

Hi Guys

As I said in my post " JP and Mozambique Hunt" this is a crook. I laid a formal complaint with PHASA 6 weeks ago and stil havent heard anything. What tickles me as well -- In the African Hunting Gazette ( www.africahuntinggazette.com ) Visited and Verified section he is LISTED!!!
Will contact Marianne at PHASA again to find out whats happening

Regards

PS: STAY AWAY form Juan Pace and Mr Yateman

 

The section is a paid magazine ad, period. caveat emptor

Sadly, the title implies integrity and respectability: "having visited the following outfitters and compiled the profile independently."

Visited means "someone" (in past the convicted wildlife offender on staff at AHG) went to the lodge and verified there is a lodging still in existence at the time they visited.
http://www.africahunting.com/thread...ng-gazette-convicted-wildlife-smuggler.10615/

 

more you spend,the better the review.

 

richards brother.

 

Hi Gerry

Please see my post and the posts thereafter with PHASA commentary

MOZAMBIQUE: Africa Safari Adventures Juan Pace Mozambique Zimbabwe & South Africa: http://www.africahunting.com/thread...-pace-mozambique-zimbabwe-south-africa.15591/.

 

im not reading anything pertaining to the crook.

 

Gerry, thanks for the heads-up on this guy. Dont feel stupid, we all get taken a few times in this business. Sounds like you vetted him pretty well, but if an outfitter doesnt care about his rep, he can screw you with little or no recourse............................FWB

 

Well Gerry, I sympathize that you got screwed. Nobody deserves to be cheated regardless, but your desire to hunt blocked out your reasoning that should have flagged you away from this deal.

This was clearly going to be a screw job from the onset with no need to do a reference check on the other party. The average monthly wage of an American is $4,328 per month. The average monthly salary of a Zimbabwean is $253 per month. The idea that you were going to fly across the world to provide a service at a better price as an American than they can find locally would be an impossible fallacy. A value of a minute of your time is 17x more valuable than a Zimbabwean's time at minimum. There are surely a long line of extraordinary qualified videographers in Zimbabwe that would be ecstatic to provide their services for a few bucks a day and some of the meat based on the current geo-political/economic situation in Africa. So from the word go you were destined to be scammed on this deal because to quote Judge Judy's old axiom: If it doesn't make sense it isn't true.

Not trying to beat you over the head and I do empathize, but you have to realize that this didn't make any sense whatsoever.

 

What I didn't say is that I sometimes film for a TV show on the Outdoor Channel. Juan had ask us (the host of the show) to come over and film a show the previous year and we weren't able to work it into the schedule. He had written back to us to ask again about a show and that is when the offer to produce a video came up. Was I doing it cheap, yes, but I could get the film edited and there was little expense to me other than the airline ticket, editing costs, and my time. I wanted to see an elephant being hunted and a Hippo, as well as the chance to hunt Buffalo, and knew I would never be able to afford to do all these things on my own. Knowing that he wanted a show filmed in the future I thought he would put his best foot forward to make a connection with us. As I said, I did a lot of background work checking references of both Juan and Lloyd and could find nothing that came across as a negative. In fact Lloyd checked out excellent with several great references about his elephant hunts (one of his clients had taken a 90 pound bull the year before that was the largest taken in Zim that year). He is even still acting as a PH from what I understand by an outfitter advertising on this site. I have booked many, many, hunts for myself and for the TV show and had never run into something like this using the same process I used for this hunt. I felt him "paying" my day rates on a dangerous game hunt wasn't bad as most videographers charge in the neighborhood of $250 a day plus expenses. Looking back on the entire process now I honestly didn't see any red flags. I am not new at booking hunts and if I could be fooled I think many others could be as well. I now know that Juan changes the name of his company every year or so making it very difficult to track down the negatives about the company he owned in the past. He even puts the companies in other people's names (two women the year after I was there). When someone works this hard at fooling you it makes it very difficult. Very easy to say "you were destined to be scammed" when you have no idea all the background and work that went into the entire booking process and the amount of time I spent checking and talking to both Juan, his booking agent here in the states, and references. Do I feel stupid, yes. But I wasn't some guy that made one phone call and jumped at the chance to go to Africa. I have hunted and filmed in Argentina, New Zealand, British Columbia, Alaska, and almost all of the western states, as well as filming a TV show in Africa with White Lion Safaris previously, so I'm not a rookie at booking a hunt. I knew when I posted this thread that I was opening myself up to critics and I'm okay with that if it keeps someone from booking with this guy. I'm not looking for sympathy here, I was fooled and I understand that. What I'm saying is he is very good at this and please be careful booking with him.

 

Brickburn.........I saw your letter from Prince Ahmed. I hope you didnt get burned. I was a little shrewder than most. A lot of guys settled for 30% of the funds, but I bargained him up to 40% so I could go on a hunt with Jaun Pace.....no expenses spared.

 

@Gerry Addison thanks for the clarification. Again, sorry you were cheated by a dishonest team.

 

I'm going to add onto this original post because I believe in all fairness it should be said. I just received an email from Lloyd Yeatman concerning this post. I appreciate the fact that he came to me to address this issue in a positive manner and to have a discussion about what happened and why. He brought up the fact that this past year he did offer me a buffalo hunt at a very good price as a way to in part repay me for the trip that was so badly botched. He was basically offering to do the hunt at his cost and I appreciated the offer but did not accept because of the way my first hunt had gone. I have always felt that Lloyd was a decent man and was always confused how he was involved in this crooked affair. He said in the email that I just received that he had been deceived by Juan just as I had and that he lost a great deal of money on this hunt. He also said he has cut all ties with Juan after his last hunter that was booked with him. This still doesn't explain why my animal wasn't given the correct paperwork (I paid Lloyd the $1250 trophy fee) or why Juan was acting as our PH driving us around on the side of the concession with no game, but I do believe he was trying to make amends for the mistakes when he offered me the hunt at the reduced rate. I believe this speaks well for the mans character but none of this should have taken place to begin with. I have to say, it will be three years since my hunt there and I still don't have the one Zebra skin that I shot there. I've paid just about $1000 to get the special paperwork and permits done including $600 for tanning that they told me had to be done before the special permits could be done (tanning would have cost about $250 here in the states) and I still don't have my animal out of Zim. All of this because Juan tried to pull a fast one and run 3 hunters with one PH and Lloyd didn't do the correct permits needed to have the animal shipped, perhaps Juan told Lloyd he would handle it, I have no idea. I have no idea what Lloyd knew, or didn't know going into this hunt, but I have always felt Lloyd hunted as hard as one man could hunt with three hunters, hunting different animals out of one camp. There was just no way to make this happen. It is my belief that Lloyd is a decent person that got caught in a bad situation and tried to "cut his loses". Could he have handled it differently yes, but I do believe Juan Pace was the man that created this negative situation and forced Lloyd to deal with it. I hope this brings some clarity to the situation.

 

Thanks Gerry- you saved me! I have been talking to Juan about a buff hunt. Not now!

 

Lloyd Yeatman and I have been exchanging emails and I now have a much better understanding of his involvement in this whole affair and I believe he was taken as badly as we were. I don't agree with how the entire thing was handled but I understand how he got into this mess and I don't believe it was his fault. I would not be afraid to hunt with him in the future.

 

Thanks for the update Gerry. If you have any further email exchanges with Lloyd, I would be inclined to invite him to join AH and explain his side of this himself. This is not to say I don't believe he got taken in by Juan just as it seems many people have, I just think it would be good to hear directly from him.

 

What was his explanation of his side of the Scam? Perhaps that might help the unsuspecting PH's avoid it in future.