Federal Jury Finds SD Man Guilty Of Smuggling Leopard Hide Under CITES - Faces Up To 20 Years - ENS

[hatrack]

ABERDEEN, South Dakota, October 30, 2009 (ENS) - A leopard shot seven years ago in South Africa caught up with a South Dakota man in an Aberdeen courtroom today. A federal jury in Aberdeen found Wayne Breitag guilty of smuggling the skin of a leopard into the United States in violation of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, a treaty to which the United States and 174 other countries are Parties.

Breitag was also found guilty of violating the Lacey Act, a U.S. federal wildlife statute. Breitag faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison and up to a $250,000 fine for smuggling, while the Lacey Act violations are punishable by up to five years in prison and up to a $250,000 fine.

According to a grand jury indictment issued in August, Breitag traveled to South Africa in August 2002 to hunt leopards while guided by a South African outfitter named Jan Groenewald Swart doing business as Trophy Hunting Safaris. Breitag shot and killed a leopard at that time.

Swart arranged to have the hides smuggled from South Africa into Zimbabwe, where he purchased a fraudulent CITES export permit for the leopard hide. Breitag then submitted an application to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service falsely claiming that he hunted and killed the leopard in Zimbabwe. On November 5, 2004, Fish and Wildlife Service inspectors seized a shipment of five leopard hides and three leopard skulls at the Denver International Airport, which included the hide of the leopard that Breitag killed illegally in South Africa in 2002.

EDIT

http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/oct2009/2009-10-30-094.asp

[peacetalksforall]

1. A lot of money - pre and post shipment ... for killing an animal.