I can't help you there because I'm one of those people. If my gun has a clip, the clip is removed. If it's a shotgun, all shells are unloaded. There's no reason to NOT unload.
My father received a ticket similar to this many years ago. He was turkey hunting and heard a gobbler. To get to him he had to cross a corner of someone elses property. We had permission to cross but not to hunt. This one morning he decided not to unload his gun before he crossed. About half way across the corner he met a man wearing a green uniform that gave him a nice ticket for hunting on property without permission. I was with him but was only 12. The lesson I learned was to never put yourself in a situation where you can be accused of something. That's why I ALWAYS unload. I even make it a point to unload my gun before I get within 100 yards of any road when returning to my truck instead of unloading at the truck.
I guess you have to ask yourself in this situation, if you were a game warden and ran across a man with rounds in the clip of his gun and that clip was in the gun, what would you feel that person was doing? I guess you could just ask that person because we all know that EVERYONE would be perfectly honest in answering. I'm not saying what your intentions were because only you know. Sometimes you have to look at things from the other side though and put yourself in the other mans shoes. I'm sure the officer had ran into several people before you that hadn't done anything wrong either......at least that's what they all said. From reading your replies I feel that this was, if anything, just an honest mistake for not taking the clip out. A bad judgement call if you will. Good luck to you.