Punishments for Wildlife Crimes Are Not Acting as Successful Deterrents.

Wildlife smuggling sentences are barely a slap on the hand, and do not do enough to deter smugglers from offending again. In the past few months, two repeat offenders have been in the news, caught again for smuggling prohibited animals.

First, the infamous Anson Wong, otherwise known as ‘The Lizard King,’ who’s name became known from the book, of the same name, detailing his dealings in endangered animal smuggling, mainly reptiles, by Bryan Christy. Wong was caught in Kuala Lumpur, smuggling 95 boa constrictors, a mata mata tortoise and two rhinoceros vipers inside a suitcase, they were heading for Jakarta. The reason that Wong was caught? Not the high-tech scanners that would have picked up the shapes of the animals in the case, nor was Wong stopped for acting suspiciously (one can assume as a seasoned smuggler, Wong has lost any nervousness in illegal activities), it was the suitcase bursting open, and the contents being revealed.

Wong is well known in the world of anti-wildlife smuggling groups and wildlife departments all over the world. Even the 71 month sentence meted out to him by Federal US courts were not enough to persuade Wong that a life of smuggling wildlife is not worthwhile.

So what did the Malaysian courts decide would be a worthy punishment to act as a deterrent? 6 months in jail, and a RM 190, 000 fine. Ideally, he would have received the maximum sentence of 7 years and a 1 million RM fine. Thankfully though, both he and his wife, Cheah Bing Shee, have had their wildlife trading licence revoked. Perhilitan have removed the animals in Wong’s private ‘zoo’’, including two tigers, a crocodile and a variety of other animals, and taken them to Penang National Park.

Given the extortionate prices the endangered boa constrictors from Madagascar would have fetched if they had reached their intended destination, the black market, the RM190, 000 fine (RM2, 000 for each snake) would barely have made a dent in the dealers pockets. The illegal wildlife trade is a lucrative business, and recent figures indicate that US$30 billion in black money has been generated annually by smugglers working in the South East Asian area poaching and transporting endangered animals.

Another smuggler not learning his lesson the first time round, was caught in Bangkok airport trying to get 1,140 live Indian Star Tortoises and a Gavial crocodile to the Chatuchak market, a market popular with tourists, but notorious for the animal section, infamous for supplying protected animals in cramped cages.

The 44 year old man had been previously arrested in 2008 for attempting to smuggle 778 Indian Star Tortoises.

The authorities should make it clear to traders that smuggling protected wildlife is a serious crime, and should hand out sentences strong enough to not only stop the trader from re offending, but act as a deterrent to potential future traders.
Let’s hope that those traders exposed in the recent raid in Kantaban will be given a suitable punishment.

Trade in Endangered Animals Still Rife in South East Asia

More news from TRAFFIC; a live tiger cub was found concealed in a woman’s luggage at Bangkok’s Suvarnabhumi International Airport on Sunday. The tiger was sedated and hidden amongst stuffed toy tigers.

Airport staff suspicions were aroused when the bag went through the sensors and the x-ray showed an image of a cat’s beating heart and other organs. Tests of the tiger DNA are currently being conducted to determine the tiger’s origin and sub species, which will determine whether it was wild caught, or captive born.

Tiger Cub Found at Bangkok's Airport, Sulma Warne-TRAFFIC

While over in Vietnam, a massive seizure of wildlife from restaurants was conducted by the Lam Dong Forest Protection Department (FPD). A huge co-ordinated campaign involving over 100 officers from the province investigated restaurants suspected of selling illegal wildlife based on results from a survey that found that 44 restaurants and 33 Traditional Chinese Medicines (TCM) shops (representing 68% restaurants and 21% TCM shop visited) were serving wildlife.

Civets Found During the Raid. ZooNews Digest

A huge number of animals and animal parts were found, over 300kg of meat from animals including civets, pangolins, porcupine, mouse deer, bear paws, clouded leopard, short-clawed otter, leopard cat, binturong, and small Indian civet. These animals were destined to end up on the plates of customers at the restaurants.

Langurs and Other Animals Seized. ZooNews Digest

The two findings this week indicate that the illegal wildlife trade is still going strong in South East Asia, and with the tiger heading for Iran, the trade is not just staying in South East Asia. Although it is fantastic that the raids occurred, and the staff at the airport were quick witted enough to spot the tiger amongst the toys, it shows that people will still try to smuggle animals, dead or alive, and will continue to poach them unless something is done to really act as a preventative.