It's kind of up to the discression of the C.O. and how they want to play it. This question was brought up at a trapping class last year and my local CO told us a story. They had been getting reports of a spot lighter in an area over several nights, so, they staked it out. Sure enough, the spotlighters showed up again and this time they were there to check them, but just watched for a bit from a distance. One of the spot lighters jumped out of the vehicle with a tire iron and chased a coon across a field trying to beat it to death. They nailed him with spot lighting with a deadly weapon. I can't remember the exact wording to it, but it was somewhere along those lines. I'm pretty sure the law states a weapon with the ability to take game. Pretty much everyone has a tireiron... so, if they want to be a-holes, they'll get ya any way they want... best off just not doing it if you aren't sure