ALBANY -- An undercover investigation into poaching and illegal sales of New York's native turtles, snakes and salamanders has led to charges against 25 people, with more arrests to come, state environmental officials said on Thursday.
Those charged include 18 people in New York state, six in Pennsylvania, and one in Canada.
The investigation also prompted the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to pursue federal charges against a Maryland meat processor for buying hundreds of illegally trapped New York snapping turtles, and against a Louisiana turtle farm operator for buying thousands of New York snapping turtle hatchlings for export to China, officials said.
Those charges are being filed under the Lacey Act, which regulates international trade in wildlife.
In "Operation Shellshock," investigators spent hundreds of hours afield with poachers, trolled Internet sales sites and chat rooms, and posed as vendors at herpetological shows in New York and Pennsylvania beginning in 2007.
The illegal trafficking included dozens of endangered Massassauga rattlesnakes hidden in the door panels of a minivan and smuggled from Canada in exchange for timber rattlesnakes, a threatened species in New York. Canadian agencies have brought charges against a man in that case, officials said.
More than 2,400 individual animals were involved in documented crimes, with state Department of Environmental Conservation officers holding nearly 400 as evidence. Many, including the endangered Massassaugas, will be returned to where they were taken.
New York has one of the strictest laws in the country protecting its reptiles and amphibians from being bought and sold. A law enacted in 2006 bans all commercial trade in the state's native reptiles and amphibians.
The undercover operation was launched after a preliminary investigation in 2006 uncovered extensive wildlife trafficking.
In addition to rattlesnakes, animals confiscated included venomous copperheads, Eastern hognose snakes, snapping turtles, box turtles, Blandings turtles, wood turtles, spotted salamanders, and two yellow-spotted Amazon River turtles, an internationally protected endangered species.
On the Net: www.dec.ny.gov
The investigation also prompted the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to pursue federal charges against a Maryland meat processor for buying hundreds of illegally trapped New York snapping turtles, and against a Louisiana turtle farm operator for buying thousands of New York snapping turtle hatchlings for export to China, officials said.
Those charges are being filed under the Lacey Act, which regulates international trade in wildlife.
In "Operation Shellshock," investigators spent hundreds of hours afield with poachers, trolled Internet sales sites and chat rooms, and posed as vendors at herpetological shows in New York and Pennsylvania beginning in 2007.
The illegal trafficking included dozens of endangered Massassauga rattlesnakes hidden in the door panels of a minivan and smuggled from Canada in exchange for timber rattlesnakes, a threatened species in New York. Canadian agencies have brought charges against a man in that case, officials said.
More than 2,400 individual animals were involved in documented crimes, with state Department of Environmental Conservation officers holding nearly 400 as evidence. Many, including the endangered Massassaugas, will be returned to where they were taken.
New York has one of the strictest laws in the country protecting its reptiles and amphibians from being bought and sold. A law enacted in 2006 bans all commercial trade in the state's native reptiles and amphibians.
The undercover operation was launched after a preliminary investigation in 2006 uncovered extensive wildlife trafficking.
In addition to rattlesnakes, animals confiscated included venomous copperheads, Eastern hognose snakes, snapping turtles, box turtles, Blandings turtles, wood turtles, spotted salamanders, and two yellow-spotted Amazon River turtles, an internationally protected endangered species.
On the Net: www.dec.ny.gov
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