If you want to learn more about the topics of
today's episode, visit the podcast website at
naturessecretservice .com. Thanks for listening.
Okay, people, listen up. Here we go. This is
Nature's Secret Service, the podcast that puts
you in the room with the men and women of wildlife
law enforcement. I'm Ed Newcomer, your host,
and this is the final episode of season two.
Don't worry, it's not the final episode of the
entire series, just this season. We're going
to take a break for the holidays and then we'll
be hard at work putting together the content
for season three. Season three, as I've said
before, is going to be completely devoted to
wolves and wolf reintroduction in the US and
the many law enforcement cases that have resulted.
But we're going to do a deeper dive into wolves,
and you're going to learn about the ecology of
wolves, their place in the environment, and their
impact on both people and their prey species.
You'll be hearing from some of the best law enforcement
officers in the country who've worked on law
enforcement cases But also some of the most knowledgeable
wolf biologists and ecologists in the world so
If you haven't signed up on the website already
and subscribe to make sure you do that because
that way you'll get Notices about the upcoming
season 3 and other extras that happen along the
way Couple of things I want to go over before
we introduce today's guest one is the the votes
are in from my previous request for Votes about
my mustache and it's a unanimous keeper. I'm
keeping it My my fans want me to keep the mustache
so it's happening last Soon, I'm gonna add a
reading list to the website So if you're interested
in more information about wildlife trafficking
and law enforcement cases You'll be able to go
to the website and there'll be a long list of
books that have been written about different
wildlife crime cases, wildlife trafficking cases.
All of them read by me, so they've been vetted
as good books. Okay, I've got three great guests
with me today. These are three gentlemen I've
known for years. I worked with professionally
while I was a special agent with the U .S. Fish
and Wildlife Service. And unlike previous guests
that have been... law enforcement officers for
the most part. Today, we actually have three
federal prosecutors, three Assistant United States
Attorneys who work for the United States Attorney
for the Central District of California. I've
got with me Mark Williams, who is the Chief of
the Environmental Crimes and Consumer Protection
Division at the U .S. Attorney's Office in Los
Angeles. Also, Dennis Mitchell, who's an Assistant
United States Attorney in the Environmental Crimes
Section and Matt O 'Brien, who's also an assistant
US attorney in the environmental crime section.
Guys, thank you so much for joining me on this
podcast. I've been looking forward to this. It's
a huge honor to have you guys here. Yeah, you're
welcome. We're honored to do it. Thanks for having
us, Ed. It's going to be a fun discussion. If
you know how we structure this, this is a conversation
between people who've done the job, who've worked
together and know each other well. If you slip
into using acronyms that my audience might not
know, I'll make sure we back up and we talk about
what those acronyms mean. We love acronyms. We
love acronyms in the federal government, that's
for sure. So I think what I want to start with
is there's often a lot of confusion among the
general public, I think, about the difference
between, you know... a district attorney or a
state prosecutor versus a federal prosecutor,
and then also some confusion about what's the
difference between a US attorney and Department
of Justice attorneys. So Mark, since you're the
chief of the unit here in Los Angeles, can you
explain to my listeners a little bit about what
is it the United States Attorney's Office does
and how does it relate to DOJ in Washington DC?
Sure, sounds good. So just big picture, assisting
United States attorneys or AUSAs, as we're called,
are basically federal prosecutors. We enforce
federal law. Big picture. The DA is the same
thing, but at the state level. So the DA is employed
by the county district attorney in Los Angeles
County. That's a really big office across the
street from us. But they enforce state law. We
do felonies and misdemeanors in our office. The
DA kind of does the same thing on the state side.
We're all on the federal side under the Department
of Justice or DOJ. So the Attorney General is
the head of the Department of Justice and they
have attorneys back in Washington, D .C. as well
that work on different types of cases ranging
from terrorism or wildlife crimes or violent
crimes. And then each district in the United
States has its own U .S. Attorney's Office. So
in California there's the Central District which
is headquartered in Los Angeles but encompasses
San Luis Obispo County, Ventura County, Orange
County, San Bernardino County, big area. Then
you have the Southern District in San Diego,
you have the Northern District in San Francisco,
and then you have the Eastern District. And then
each state is kind of the same. They have one
or more districts in each state that's headed
by a U .S. attorney. Our U .S. attorney, as the
others are, are appointed by the president. So
they can change from administration to administration.
But the mission is essentially still the same.
We enforce federal law. We prosecute federal
crimes. And how does that relate to when sometimes
you hear about DOJ in Washington DC? Because
I know Department of Justice does have an environmental
crime section. So how do you guys work together?
You've got an environmental crime section here
in LA, but there's an environmental crime section
in Washington DC, too, at DOJ. Yeah. How does
that work? So DOJ's environmental crime section
known as ECS, they have the ability to work cases
nationwide. So they could work a case in Iowa,
they could work a case in Florida, they could
work a case here in Los Angeles and partner with
us. Not every U .S. Attorney's office has an
environmental crime section like we do. We're
pretty specialized in our ability to do that
because of where we're situated with the ocean
here and all the national forest land and everything.
It's become a priority to work these cases out
here. But really because we have our own section
out here. We'll partner with ECS But they won't
do cases by themselves out here You know if there's
a case maybe in Idaho or Montana ECS would come
in and handle that case if it's a wolf poaching
case or something like that out here the attorneys
in our section do all those cases ourselves right
and you know in I came to Los Angeles as a federal
agent in spring of 2003 after I got out of the
Academy and it was such a treat to be a wildlife
federal agent in Central District of California,
mainly, who had access to an environmental crime
section. Like you said, not every United States
Attorney's Office around the country has one.
Most of them don't. Most of them don't. The great
majority do not. Yeah, Dennis, I mean, do you,
I think Miami maybe does, but it might only be
one prosecutor. Yeah, what you typically will
have is in some of the districts at the U .S.
Attorney's Office, there'll be one prosecutor,
maybe two who specialize. in environmental crimes
and in wildlife crimes, but typically there's
not a section. It's extremely unusual to have
a devoted section to the area of enforcement.
It's super lucky because it has been maintained
in Los Angeles, regardless of what administration
is in power in Washington DC, which is great.
Wildlife crime in particular, but I think environmental
crime in general is pretty bipartisan. issue.
I mean, people are opposed to it on a bipartisan
basis. So that's great. And it was always a great
tool. Because to explain to listeners, if you
are in a district where a United States attorney
does not have an environmental crime section,
then if you're a US Fish and Wildlife Service
agent and you have a case, you have to take it
to general crimes at whatever US attorney's office.
And there, you're competing with FBI agents who
have bank robbery cases, terrorism cases, DEA
agents who have drug cases, ATF agents who have
gun cases. And so you're, you know, you're often
trying to sell your case where it was great to
be able to come to you guys. It's a good point.
And I think it works both ways. So I think the
only reason we have a section is because we had
great agents and have great agents like you who've
done undercover work, you know, on the proactive
side, who monitor the ports, who monitor, you
know, things coming in and out of the district.
You know, we've had great relationships with
Fish and Wildlife Service over the years, you
know, in different agencies. And so we only can
really do the work we do because we have agents
like you out there kind of originating these
cases and catching the bad guys. So it does work
both ways as a partnership. Well, I'll tell you
a secret. When I was an agent in LA, I was always
told by my superiors, don't... F up the relationship
with the US Attorney's Office. That's what we
were told. Only take them great cases and don't
piss them off because we need that good relationship
with our prosecutors. And that was drilled into
me from the very first day. It was told to me,
I think, on my first week, we have a great relationship
with the US Attorney's Office. Don't F it up.
Over the years, you guys have handled some of
the best cases. done in the country related to
wildlife trafficking and wildlife crime. And
I want to ask each of you to kind of reminisce
a little bit about maybe your favorite case or
two. And Matt, I'm going to start with you because
you haven't said anything yet. I don't want to
put you on the spot, but have you thought about
any of the cases that kind of stood out for you
working in this unit? Sure. One of my favorite
cases was you were a big help on and it was a
plant smuggler. OK, time out. Just so you know,
you guys don't have to talk about cases you did
with me. I just want you to know. I thought that
was required. That's the whole purpose of it.
I'll go on anyway. Anyway, so these guys, they
were Koreans. And in Korea, on the black market,
there's a huge demand for Dudleya plants, which
are kind of small, succulent plants that take
forever to grow in nurseries. So there's a premium
on Dudleya plants that are taken from the wild.
And so these guys would fly in from Korea to
California and go up to real remote state parks
up in Northern California, typically right on
the coast, which is where these succulent plants
grow. They would rip out of the ground, live
plants, thousands of plants, drive them back
to their nursery in San Diego. Then bring them
up here to Compton and export them to Korea and
so working closely with the state California
Department of Fish and Wildlife They were they
were caught with you know again thousands of
these plants at the export company in Compton
are basically caught red -handed The the state
brought charges the the district attorney up
in Del Norte County And then we also brought
federal charges against them. Right after we
did, two of them, who we had been led to believe
didn't have passports, because the state, the
DA had seized their passports, went to the Korean
embassy and said they had lost their passports
and got new ones. So they then fled on foot to
Tijuana to escape the federal case. And they
succeeded. They flew, got on the first flight
out of Tijuana back to Korea, I think, through
China. So we thought we were kind of out of luck.
We had caught one of them, but he was kind of
the low -hanging, the least culpable guy. And
then where you came in was just kind of by luck.
The main guy whose name was Byung -Soo Kim. was
caught in South Africa doing the same exact thing,
basically the same thing, stealing live plants
from state parks or national parks in South Africa,
trying to smuggle them back to Korea. And just
by luck, you were the Fish and Wildlife Services
attache in South Africa at the time. So we were
able to extradite him to the US, which is a lot
of work, as you know, and we never could have
done it without. your help and the help of the
South African prosecutors. So the guy spent about
a year in kind of a notorious South African prison
awaiting extradition. Then we brought him back
here. He was sentenced to, I think, two years
in federal prison. And then he was actually brought
up to Del Norte County where they'd been waiting
patiently for him all this time. Right. And he
was sentenced up there. I think he got a few
years up there. I think so. So it was just a...
I mean, the case had a lot of ups and downs,
obviously, but I thought it was a great example
of us working with local partners up in Northern
California and then working with the South African
prosecutors to nab this guy. Yeah, I agree. I
also enjoyed that case for the same reasons.
But is that what really like? you liked about
that case was just the interagency cooperation
or was it the plants that you liked so much about
it? Well, I mean both. I didn't know anything
about these Dudley plants before the case. It
was horrible. They would just go to like a coastal
bluff and rip out thousands of plants. These
plants take a long time to grow in the wild.
the destruction they were causing in these beautiful
state parks up north was terrible. And I think
after the state warden seized the plants, I think
they were actually able to replant them in the
wild. So I'm sure not all of them survived, but
that was a great result. Yeah, that was a cool
result. And Savannah Morgan was the state game
warden who worked on that, and she was a guest.
during season one and told her side of the story.
So it's great to have you telling the prosecution
side. One thing I wanted to ask you, you mentioned
that the defendant, he was a guy named Byung
Soo Kim, he was charged in state court and federal.
How does that work when, how is it that the feds
can also charge somebody that's been charged
in state court? Well, it doesn't happen all the
time, but typically we we will consider federal
charges against someone who's already been charged
in state court if the kind of the nature of the
federal crime is different. Got it. So I don't
recall specifically what the state charges were,
but I think it was just violating state law that
says you can't rip out plants out of state parks.
Right. When we were presented with the case,
it was as a violation of the Federal Lacey Act,
which is a different crime. The nature of that
crime was that they were taking plants that had
been basically stolen in violation of state law,
and then trying to export them out of the country.
So because our focus was on the attempted export
of these plants, it was a different crime. And
that's a situation where we'll step in and charge
federally, even though there's a pre -existing
state case. You know, I'm interested to see what
all three of you guys think about this, but I've
always viewed that as the place where the federal
government can really help the states, right?
So if somebody does something illegal in violation
of state law, whether it's a wildlife crime or
stealing a car, and they move it across state
lines, it's very difficult for states to like
work those cases outside their jurisdiction.
But of course, the federal government has nationwide
jurisdiction and a lot of international resources.
So that Lacey Act triggering allows the federal
government to come in and really help the state
stop this kind of crime by bringing the power
of the federal government and federal legislation
to it. What are your thoughts on that? Did you
see it in that way? Yes, we're charging a federal
crime. this is a way for us to really help the
state protect its resources. Absolutely. And
often at the state level, the penalties for environmental
crimes are very low. Whereas in a federal case,
if there's a lot of money at stake, even in a
kind of a wildlife or plant context, the penalties
can be more severe. In our case, it was the state
game wardens who had done 95 % of the investigatory
work. They did it. have done an incredible job
surveilling these guys up and down the state.
Just incredible, probably the best surveillance
I've ever seen in a case. They're good. Once
we've caught the Byungsu Kim in South Africa,
I thought that was another instance where the
federal government really has resources to get
this guy back. The state is able to extradite.
Folks but it's a lot easier for the the feds
to do it. Mm -hmm. And so I was happy to that
we could Play a role in supporting the state
case by kind of handling the extra extradition
Mark intense you kind of agree with that in terms
of how the feds can benefit state Yeah, I mean,
I think the other piece of it is sometimes you'll
have a wildlife trafficker or smuggler who's
dealing in rhino horn or other things, but they're
also committing tax fraud. Right. They're also
laundering money. Those are things that the federal
government has jurisdiction over and the penalties
are stiff. You know, if you indict somebody for
tax fraud or money laundering, they're going
to prison for a long time. Right. And federally,
they serve all of their prison sentence. There's
no parole. They can get credit to get out a little
bit early, but you're only cutting maybe 20%.
They'll serve usually at least 80 % of their
sentence. On the state side, they go to prison,
and it can be for a short period of time, low
months, even though they're sentenced to like
three or four years. So when we come in against
these serious offenders like the Dudley, a smuggler
who's traveling internationally and involving
multiple countries and states, we're using our
resources to really put away some of the heaviest
traffickers in the country. And the state doesn't
always have the capacity or the ability to do
that. Cool. Yeah. It's a good point. And the
minute you have interstate trafficking, our jurisdiction
kicks in. Right. So we look for that. And so
a case may not go federal if everything was taking
place within the state. Some of those statutes,
it depends on the interstate commerce connection,
which we're usually able to establish. And international,
of course, triggers smuggling, which is a serious
felony, right? It's a very serious felony. Per
se, right. Yeah, yeah. You know, I'll tell you
just before we get to Dennis and Mark's favorite
cases, I'll tell you just some funny anecdotes
or background. You mentioned that you were real
happy with how you worked with the foreign prosecutors
in South Africa on that case. And just so my
listeners know, starting in 2012, the US Fish
and Wildlife Service started basing special agents
overseas. I think there were about, at its height,
there were about 12 of them based overseas. And
their job really was to provide that kind of
liaison work with foreign countries on law enforcement.
I happened to be in South Africa. Byung -Soo
King. jumps bail basically goes into Mexico and
flees now there's a warrant for him in the US
and My colleague Aaron Dean here in LA had just
remembered off the top of her head that At some
point they found a document in one of these guys
Luggage or on his person that referenced a plant
nursery in Cape Town, South Africa So she just
called me long distance says have you ever heard
of this? And I said, no, never heard of it. But
tell me about this case. So she tells me about
it. And I said, you know, there's only three,
maybe four places in the world that these plants
are found. He knows he can't go back to the states
now because he's got a warrant. He's going to
come here. So I went and I briefed the South
African police. I said, here's what happened
in the states. This guy's probably coming here.
You might want to be on the lookout. And I thought,
oh, I'll never hear about this again, right?
And I swear, 10 days later, the South African
police colonel in Cape Town gets a hold of me
and says, hey, we just got your guy. And he had
a million dollars worth of succulents in his
hotel room when we did a search warrant. So that's
super cool, right? But where it got even cooler
was they wanted to prosecute him in South Africa.
And we wanted to extradite him. But the first
thing that I did was I reached out to the prosecutor
in South Africa and said how can we help you
make your case first, right? So they ended up
making a great case against him They got the
highest monetary penalty ever for any kind of
plant case in the history of South Africa on
that case and Because we cooperated with them.
They were more than happy to help us get him
extradited and because of that I remember I used
to have meetings with the Homeland Security attache
and the FBI attache or the legat regularly in
Pretoria and the FBI legat was trying to get
a drug smuggler extradited from South Africa
and she'd been trying for about a year and a
half and she couldn't get it done and how long
it took us like six months to get this guy extradited
from South Africa, right? Thanks to you. Well,
I think it was really thanks to all of us, because
you were very cooperative with the South Africans
as well, right? We didn't come in as Americans
who were trying to say, you need to do this for
us. We kind of came in with, how can we help
you? And when we're done with that, we hope you'll
help us, right? And that went a long way. And
at the end, the FBI legat comes into my office.
She's like, how the hell did you get this guy
out of the country in six months? I can't get
this drug dealer out. It was great. It was a
great case all around. I love that one, too.
Yeah, I think it's probably the quickest extradition
I've ever heard of. Extraditing people can be
really difficult, if not impossible, depending
on what country you're dealing with and all of
the political factors. I think it was under a
year from when he was caught in South Africa
to when he got off a plane here in LA. courtesy
of the marshals, which is kind of unheard of.
It was crazy. And the real craziest part of that
case, and we'll end on this part, is that I was
in South Africa when he got arrested there. And
my time, my five -year tour ended right around
the time he was extradited back. So the day he
arrived in Los Angeles, he arrived like about
11 o 'clock at night in LA, at LAX. I was waiting
for him. I actually picked him up, took him to
jail on that night when he came in. His head
must have been spinning. I doubt he was happy
to see you. I mean, I think that has tremendous
deterrence, because he must think, holy smokes,
these guys on a plant case? I couldn't get anything
past them. That's good stuff. I like that case
too, Matt. That was a good one. But you've done
a lot of cool cases. And we were just talking
before we started this recording. You've got
one going on right now that I guarantee you,
you're going to be back here for another episode.
So you're already booked. It's a deal. It's an
ongoing case, so I can't really talk about it.
But it involves kind of a colorful cast of wildlife
smugglers. It's a good one. When we can tell
that one, I think my audience will be like, holy
shit. We can curse on this podcast if you want
to. Dennis, tell us about some of your great
memories. How long have you been with the US
Attorney's Office? 23 years. 23 years. And how
long in the environmental crimes? I think since
2008. Yeah, it's been a while. Yeah. So a lot
of experience. You have a depth of knowledge
and you've done a lot of cases. You and I did
a couple of trials together. We went to trial.
We had a great one. The one I was going to discuss
was the Jerry snap case. Oh, Jerry. I thought
was, you know, because it was it wasn't a major
type case. It dealt with a violation of the Endangered
Species Act. But there's some interesting things
we learned from it, which I think the audience
will should know, for instance. And by the way,
at the very beginning, you were mentioning how.
There isn't much dispute about protecting wildlife
and so forth. I just learned the other day that
the Endangered Species Act, which was sort of
like one of the first things to protect the environment,
federal acts, I think it was inspired or supported
by President Nixon in the late 60s. That's right.
So our friend Jerry Snap, this was kind of a
funny factual scenario as well. And of course,
this case went to trial, and you and I did the
trial, and we had a It was a fun trial. There
was an elephant, an Asian elephant at the LA
Zoo. Her name was Annie. And she passed away.
What she passed away from, I'm not sure. It was
Shigella, of all things. Is that what it was?
Yeah. I can't even really describe what Shigella
is. But it causes a lot of diarrhea and dehydration.
So that's what kills you. And she ended up, you
know, the carcass, I guess they couldn't, from
what I understood was the body couldn't be, the
carcass could not be incinerated. at the zoo.
So the carcass was sent to a rendering plant.
What's a rendering plant? But I learned that
that's where animals are processed into product,
like into soap, for example, and then sold. So
the carcass was sent to this rendering plant.
And one of the guys working there, I guess the
leg and the head of the elephant, of Annie, Was
offered by one of the employees there to Jerry
snap and this was kind of a he was a very colorful
personality He was older guy and he spent probably
a very good chunk of his life collecting all
sorts of animal artifacts Mm -hmm, and he was
able to I don't if he paid for it But he somehow
got his hands on this head of an elephant and
I think maybe the leg as well That's about the
leg, but he definitely got the head right and
he took this thing to his home and He wanted
to get What he did was he put beetles on the
head. This is a little gruesome, but the beetles
over the course of many months or years eat away
at the flesh. In the end, he had a perfectly
preserved elephant skull. And it's kind of a
rare thing to have. And I think, you know, and
eventually he fell on harder times, I guess,
and he wanted to sell it. And he made an offer.
He put it out on Craigslist and he announced,
you know, that this was he was offering to sell
this thing for I think he was trying to get $9
,000 for it. Now, the Endangered Species Act
prohibits you not just from trafficking in live
animals, but it also, and this is the important
thing, is it prohibits you from trafficking in
dead animals or any part of an animal. Dead or
alive, it all counts because you don't want people
trafficking in these things that are protected.
Otherwise, if someone knows that a particular
part of an endangered species is valuable, then
there's gonna be a race to capture these things,
kill them, and sell the parts. So here he is
offering this elephant skull on Craigslist Craigslist
is a nationwide Service therefore, it's an interstate
commerce and I believe some agents in the state
of Washington picked up on this right and saw
that he was offering it and Then Ed you got involved
and acted undercover and did a fantastic job
and said you were interested in buying it. And
I think he was making you a deal. I think he
wanted to sell it for about $9 ,000, but he was
willing to let it go for $4 ,500. And there was
a research institute that wanted to buy it, but
they wanted paperwork. And Jerry, of course,
couldn't provide paperwork because you couldn't
have it. The Asian elephant is on the endangered
species list. And you cannot traffic in that
in interstate commerce or any part of it. And
you can't offer to do it. And so you negotiated
with him on the phone. And then I think one of
the best things you did in the case, because
when we have federal misdemeanors, those are
typically strict liability. You can have the
best intention in the world. But if you're knowing
what you're doing and what you're doing is a
violation of a federal law, such as the Endangered
Species Act and there are other federal statutes
that impose strict criminal liability, because
what's being protected is so important that you
better know what you're doing. Before you engage
in it, but you went further than that you you
actually you were gonna Transport the skull you
say well, I'm gonna take this up to Washington
What do I do if I get pulled over? And he was
giving you advice like, well, you wouldn't be
as much trouble if you had like the whale skull
that I have here at my house. But just throw
a tarp over it. Don't tell him you're driving
with anything that you're going to sell. Rather,
just tell them that you're moving up there and
you're just dropping off some stuff and so forth.
He was giving advice because he knew you can't
transport that. And that was our interstate commerce
connection. He was offering an endangered species
for sale in interstate commerce. We had a lot
of evidence on Mr. Snapp. For some reason, He
chose to go to trial. And most cases we do, I
think Mark and Matt would agree with me that
over 90 % of what we charge, if not 95%, ends
up pleading out. Very few cases. And that's probably
true with the US Attorney's Office. Most cases
plead. Because the cases are well done when you
get, I mean. Yeah. You want them well done. You
want to have a lot of evidence. And they'll get
a lighter sentence if they accept responsibility
and plead guilty. Jerry Snapp decided not to
do it. And he went to trial. And the trial went
smoothly, and everything went fine. The most
unusual thing, I guess, about the trial was,
you know, exhibit one, I'm not sure what exhibit
number it was, but one of the exhibits was the
elephant skull. The skull itself. And the judge
was rather sensitive about the idea of this thing
being in the court, particularly overnight. So
he would require it. This elephant skull was
the size of these chairs. Yeah, it was huge.
Huge, and it was heavy. Had hundreds pounds.
And Ed, I remember you got, you know, stuck with
the task of taking this thing out of the courtroom
during the break for the next day. And that thing
was huge. And so he ended up getting convicted.
But even before trial and so forth, when you
were negotiating with him, you went to visit
him at his home. And he had lots of different
things from different animals and so forth. He
was really an enthusiast, unfortunately. He was
breaking the law along with it, which was a shame.
He ended up getting convicted. You know, the
Endangered Species Act is a misdemeanor statute.
When you violate it, it's only misdemeanor penalties.
Now, we do have in our arsenal other federal
wildlife statutes that are felonies. The Lacey
Act got mentioned. That you can charge misdemeanor
or felony, depending on the facts. Smuggling,
which often takes place with wildlife trafficking.
Those are felony offenses. But the Endangered
Species Act, all of those offenses are a misdemeanor.
He got convicted. And I think he was ultimately
sentenced to a term of home detention. And then
I remember a year or two later, I think the LA
Times did quite a profile on him. They did, yeah.
And they were very sympathetic to him, actually.
But you know what's interesting about that case,
Dennis? I don't know if you remember this, but
we did him a solid, a big solid, because He offered
to sell that thing in interstate commerce. And
you're right. It was a Washington agent who picked
up on it. And that agent actually got a tip about
it from somebody who was thinking about buying
it and then realized, oh, that's probably illegal.
And me and that agent in Washington kind of cooked
up this undercover. Let's go. Because honestly,
I didn't believe he was going to have an elephant
skull. We never encountered that, right? The
guy's got an Asian elephant skull for sale. We've
never seen that. So I thought it was a scam.
But I thought, OK, we'll go meet with him. But
while we were meeting with him, we talked about,
we're going to take this up to Washington. And
he actually offered to drive it up there for
us. Now, if he had done that, that would have
been a felony Lacey Act violation, right? So
we actually were like, no, no, that's OK. Because
looking at him, like you said, he was a pretty
eccentric guy. He had the one elephant skull
for sale. He was interested in selling a rhino
skull. But other than that, it didn't look like
he was systemically involved in wildlife trafficking.
But we couldn't let him do this crime. But we
actually did him a solid. We could have hooked
him up for a felony right there if we'd let him
drive it to Washington state. And he would have
been looking at a felony record and a lot more
time in jail. And here. You know, that's OK.
I'd never had any hard feelings about him going
to trial. But it's just ironic that he was so
affronted that we gave him a misdemeanor charge.
I was surprised he went. We were up against a
very good defense lawyer from the public defender's
office, Anthony Eaglin, really terrific trial
lawyer. But there's only so much a lawyer can
do when the facts are so heavily against you.
Do you remember what Jerry wore to his trial?
Do you remember? I don't. He wore kind of a flowery
shirt unbuttoned almost down to his navel. And
he was really tan. He was really tan, blonde
hair, stringy, shoulder length hair. And he sat
the whole trial right in front of the jury with
his shirt unbuttoned down to his belly button.
Yeah, it was a jury trial, too. Did he testify
at trial? Did he? I can't remember if he testified.
I don't think he did. He didn't testify. That
was an odd case. And so often trials, for me,
I think the two or three of the trials I had
in my career were misdemeanor trials. People
wanted trials for misdemeanor charges. Let me
ask you this, though. So I know listeners sometimes
think, I have a strong opinion about this, why
we did it. But you know, you mentioned this is
a misdemeanor case. It's not a wild elephant.
We know, we found out from our investigation
that the elephant lived at the LA Zoo. Right.
So why is this important from an endangered species
perspective or a law enforcement or a deterrence
perspective? Well, if you don't enforce these
prohibitions against protecting that are designed
to protect an endangered species or a species
that's protected by the International Convention
for the Protection of Wildlife, which is called
Nicknamed CITES, you're allowing a market to
exist. Exactly. And you're going to have poaching.
You know, you're going to have wholesale slaughters
in places of these protected animals. Right.
And you can't have that. And so it was an important
case because here you had a part of a dead animal.
Yeah, it was not roaming in the wild. It was
in a zoo. But an elephant skull is an elephant
skull. And an Asian elephant skull is one of
those two main species. And that one's protected.
And you can't allow that. So we had to do something.
Yeah. And I guarantee you, there's somebody out
there who saw that ad on Craigslist and said,
you know what? I want an elephant skull. Or some
other kind of weird skull, right? So you're right.
It drives a market. And that's one of the things
that our collective mission is to kill the market
as much as we can. We've had separate cases where
what was at stake were parts of animals. We've
had rhino horns. There was a store in West Hollywood
that specialized in selling dried -out animals.
Some of what was being sold there was protected,
and we went after that store and the owner. Nothing
was live. These were just dead animals. It's
interesting because a lot of... It's not always
about protecting the animals. It's a lot of profiteering
on the backs of the animals. Exactly. Because
we have these laws that protect the animals in
the wild. But where we come in, it's where people
are taking animals or animal parts and making
money off of them. They're committing fraud.
I mean, I think everybody understands what fraud
is. You're selling something. in a shady way,
you're trafficking something illegally, and then
you're putting money in your pocket, and that's
really what it's about. Right, it's a greed thing
versus an animal -loving thing, right? Exactly.
And you're getting animals killed for their part,
like a rhino horn, for example. Yeah, I always
try to say to people, you know, our job really
isn't about saving an individual animal, it's
about saving a species, right? Keeping that pressure
off. So OK, so Matt gets a check for talking
about a case I did with him. Dennis, check, did
a case I did with you. Pressure's on. OK, the
pressure's on. You better come up with one I
didn't do with you, Mark. I've got one. I've
done a lot of wildlife cases over the years.
I mean, I think I've done poached leopard sharks.
I've done bear bile, where people are smuggling
bear gall bladders for bile. I've done butterflies.
I've done Asian songbirds in people's pants on
international flights. I've done tarantulas.
I've helped with rhino horns. I mean, it's kind
of run the gamut. And you've been a big part
of a huge chunk of that stuff. And I think, were
you involved in the Leopard Shark case that Dorothy
Kim charged way back? Two, I don't know. Peripherally,
probably. But maybe not as the case agent. Yeah,
but I know we've worked together on a lot of
things over the years. Butterfly guy comes to
mind. But I think the one I want to talk about
is the tarantulas. Yes. That was interesting.
So I like that one, too. There was a great agent
out here. His name was Paul Montorey. Just recently
retired. Really? Did he? I didn't even know that.
Yeah, he's working for the state in Washington
now. Good for him. And he identified what we
believed at the time, if I think correctly, was
the world's largest tarantula exporter. This
guy was selling protected tarantulas like Mexican
red -kneed tarantulas and other things throughout
the world. And he was all over the internet.
He was sending packages with literally thousands
of tarantulas everywhere to Mexico, United States,
all over Europe. And Paul called me one day.
He's like, Mark, I got this lead. you know, what
do you think? And I said, sounds great, Paul,
but where's this guy located? And he's like,
well, let's figure it out. So Paul, unfortunately,
nicknamed the case Operation Spider -Man. Not
the most original operation name, but there you
go. And we figured out the guy was in Germany,
of all places. And so one of the biggest issues
in the case was, well, if we charge him in the
United States and he's in Germany, we're going
to have this extradition process, and it makes
the prosecution a lot more difficult. So we had
some different options. And when we started the
podcast, we talked a lot about partnerships.
We worked with DOJ's Office of International
Affairs to reach out to Germany to say, hey,
we've got this target in your country. Would
you be interested in helping us work this target?
The United States just can't go to foreign countries
and deploy law enforcement to do things. That's
what the movies tell us. Yeah, that is what the
movies tell us. But unfortunately, we're not
Navy SEALs. We don't do black ops wildlife things
yet. Just kidding. But so we worked with the
German authorities. And they said, yeah, we're
definitely interested. He's a high volume guy.
We'll help you do what we call a ruse, where
we work in undercover into Germany. So we post
online as a buyer and did some confidence buys.
We call them with the target. He sent the tarantulas
over here. They were all protected. Of course,
he said really bad stuff on his import paperwork,
like their kids' toys or whatever, when really
they're tarantulas. And the way these things
are packaged are really interesting. They're
in these plastic tubes, and the tarantulas kind
of, they're live, and they're kind of thin. Plastic
tubes almost like a pencil case and there's hundreds
of these in the box. Yeah And if they mark them
as kids toys, you know customs gonna shake the
package and you don't know it's a tarantula But
there are thousands of these things in there.
Yeah So we did a few buys, you know, and he kept
selling so we thought we got to take this guy
down So we developed a plan where we're gonna
open a pet shop out here At least what we told
them and we wanted him to be our keynote speaker
Marcy guy at the grand opening of our pet shop
nice and He said, well, do I get to come to United
States? We're like, absolutely. You can come
to United States if you really want to. He's
like, yeah, I want to come. And we're like, OK,
how about we buy your ticket? He's like, that's
great. We'll do it. And so we bought the ticket.
He flew over, picked him up at the airport. Good
to meet you. And the agents are all undercover.
They've got the car wired up. So they've got
cameras in the car. They're all mic'd up, recording
everything. You know, they're chit chatting on
the way to the to the grand opening of the pet
shop. Like, yeah, you know, some of these tarantulas
are illegal. We better not tell anybody. It's
like, yeah, that's you know, we shouldn't tell
anybody about this. We get in big trouble. Beautiful.
And actually, I think brought tarantulas with
him to on the flight. So get to the pet shop
and. It's a room kind of like this. It's a warehouse
basically that was rented out and it had cameras
and everything. He made some more great admissions
about not wanting to get in trouble. And then
of course, they brought out the handcuffs and
arrested him. And we charged him here with felonies.
And, you know, when you're charged with federal
felonies, you have a decision to make. You can
either go to trial like Jerry Snap. Which you
have a complete right to and we respect that
and you know It's your constitutional right to
fight the charges if you think it's appropriate
sure or you can plead guilty or you can cooperate
and You know he decided I think to have the benefit
of pleading guilty. I still went to federal prison
for six months though Nice the way fend up federal,
you know this but for your audience the way the
federal sentencing guidelines work are The more
money you deal in illegally the higher your sentence
exposure So you have a guidelines number that
you get, and it could be from zero to 50, basically.
And if you're dealing in the low thousands, you
could be like zero to 10. If you're dealing in
the mid hundreds of thousands, you're maybe 10
to 20. And when you get into the millions and
tens of millions and hundreds of millions, that
level of fraud at your prison exposure goes way
up. And because he was a massive tarantula smuggler,
his exposure is pretty high. But because he did
some work for us and helped himself out, he got
six months in prison. And it was an interesting
case. I remember that Paul was working on that.
Boy, that was a creepy one. It was. Oh, the spiders.
They're either holding still or they're moving
real fast. I'm not a big tarantula guy. But yeah,
there were definitely creepy crawly spiders.
Yeah. So was Germany happy with the result on
that? Or did they do anything? Or what do you
know about what happened over there? So we briefed
them up through our Office of International Affairs,
and they were extremely enthusiastic. They were
happy to be part of the whole thing. I think
law enforcement there doesn't do a lot of wildlife
crimes out of Germany, and they thought it was
a unique case. But given the fraud and the smuggling
aspect of it, which is really a border security
issue, they didn't want this guy sending and
citing contraband. You know throughout europe
and you know, they're happy you got some prison
time. So yeah, it's a great case very cool You
know i'm glad you brought up the sentencing guidelines
because I think sometimes people get confused
You know because in the media a lot of times
when these people are arrested it'll say Facing
up to you know, five years in prison on a laciac
case and a 250 000 fine maximum or a smuggling
case. They'll say facing up to 20 years in prison,
right? and then When the case is over and the
next media report says, well, they got six months
in jail or a year in jail, you did a great job
describing how the sentencing guidelines work.
But I want to dive in a little deeper on that
because you mentioned numbers. And so those numbers
don't necessarily reflect years in prison, right?
Explain how those numbers. You're basically looking
at a book that helps you. come up with a number.
You have this book. It's called The Sentencing
Guidelines. And in the back of the book, you
have a chart. And so on the top of the chart,
it's got your criminal history. So you're a zero
if you've never done anything. And you could
be up to a category six, I think, or five if
you have a lot of priors. OK, so you could start.
You're going to start with a number. It's either
going to be zero or some other number if you
have a prior criminal history. So let's say you've
committed maybe a couple of felonies. You're
probably criminal history two or three. So you
move to that position on the top of the chart.
And down on the left side of the chart, there's
another number zero to I think it's 50 or 40,
something like that. So if you commit a murder,
you know, first degree murder, premeditated stuff
with a number of victims, you're going to be
right at the bottom of 43. Got it. If you committed,
you know, maybe theft of mail or something like
that or a misdemeanor, you're going to be, you
know, zero to six somewhere in there. And then
you have kind of characteristics that are applied
to. So let's say there's a huge number of victims.
So, for example, we. prosecuted a case and took
it to trial a couple years ago involving a dive
boat that caught on fire and 34 people were killed
in that fire. Everybody on board essentially,
all the passengers. That's an enhancement. 34
victims is a big enhancement. Let's say you have
vulnerable victims like children or the elderly,
that's another enhancement. So there's all these
different enhancements that can apply. If you
used a gun, if you're a felon in possession,
those types of things. So those can bump your
number up. So you'll go down the left side of
the column and find whatever your total number
is for the seriousness of that offense. And then
you go to the middle point, and you take your
top and your left, go to the middle, and there's
a prison range associated with that particular
thing. Got it. Could be, and it's always in months.
So it could be zero to six months. It could be
150 to 180 months, whatever the case may be.
And the judge uses that as kind of a guideline,
a starting point for their analysis of the prison
sentence the judge should apply. Now, as you
know, federal judges do whatever federal judges
want to do. They're presidentially appointed
for life. They have the benefit of that. They
look at the guidelines, and they may take it
real seriously, or they may think it overestimates
the offense. They may think it underestimates
the offense. And they'll apply whatever prison
sentence they can up to the statutory maximum,
which is what you said before. So whenever we
charge a case, there's a maximum sentence. Could
be five years or 20 years. It could be life.
I've only had a few cases where a judge maxed
out a defendant. Usually you're not anywhere
close to that statutory maximum sentence, but
you always want to make sure the defendant knows,
hey, this is my total exposure here. If I go
to trial, I could go to prison for 20 years.
Maybe very unlikely, but you want to make sure
they're on notice that, yeah, this could happen.
And that's a good point, because defendants are
always told. The US government does not keep
secrets from people that they're prosecuting,
right? And they're always told exactly where
they come out on the sentencing guidelines or
where the government believes they come out,
right? So they kind of know, OK, the government
thinks I'm at a seven or whatever, so that's
going to expose me to this possible sentence,
right? Exactly. And that's the key thing. The
guidelines are just that. They're guidelines.
So federal judges don't have to follow them.
They can upward depart or downward depart. But
generally, they all want to sentence similarly
so that if you're in New York, you don't get
a harsher sentence for the same crime that somebody
else did in Los Angeles. You want to keep it
relatively the same for similarly situated defendants.
So you've mentioned some things where you can,
like, Certain behaviors that a defendant can
engage in can add points to their where they
come out on the sentencing guidelines But it's
also possible for a defendant to reduce their
numbers, right? Right. How can what sort of things
can a defendant do to reduce the numbers? Well,
the biggest thing is to cooperate, you know I
think right off the bat telling the truth and
cooperating with law enforcement gets you a big
benefit if you accept responsibility That's a
three -point reduction, right? If you cooperate
the government can make a motion that says this
defendant assisted us by providing information
about other targets, by being truthful about
what they did. Could be a situation where the
defendant, him or herself, goes undercover and
does transactions. We've certainly had a number
of wildlife cases where we've had cooperating
targets and cooperating defendants. And that
will immediately reduce the prison exposure.
And then the government... keeps all that information
sealed until we need to produce it for a trial.
But then the person gets a benefit at sentencing
after they plead guilty because the guidelines
are reduced, which means the prison exposure
is reduced too. So that's probably the biggest
way. Yeah. Yeah. OK. I think that helps people
understand how you can be charged with a crime
that has this horrendously frightening max. Right.
And then you can get it down to a lower level.
What are your thoughts on that? I mean, have
you seen, do you guys feel that that had, does
that decrease the deterrent impact of prosecuting
these crimes to have, you know, somebody who's
charged and they're, you know, looking at five
years max, but then they only get six months.
Does that increase the deterrent value just based
on your experience, what you've seen? You know,
with the guidelines, it's really, it's trying
to custom, well, not custom make it, but have
that defendant get what should be a just sentence.
Right. And that means taking into account. the
criminal history, the offense level. And the
offense level, as Mark pointed out, is based
on how much money was involved, what kind of
characteristics were also involved, like vulnerable
victim was involved. It's going to increase the
offense level. Where sophisticated means used.
That's going to increase it. Yeah. Sometimes,
you know, you mentioned this a second ago about
decreasing it. And one of, of course, would be
cooperation. Another one is somebody could be
involved in a conspiracy to do something, but
was really sort of a minor participant or a minimal
participant. And there are occasions where we'll
see that as well. And we'll say, well, you know
what, let's decrease the offense level a little
bit to compensate for that, because this person
really wasn't the leader. On the other hand,
if somebody was a leader, we call that an aggravated
role. And it goes up. So it's these characteristics
that are going to drive somebody in being able
to consult with their lawyer to figure out where
do they stand in the guidelines. We usually won't
advise them of that. It's more the defense lawyer
is going to tell his client, look, I think this
is where you're going, but there's no guarantees.
And when defendants plead guilty, the judges
make a point of saying, look, the sentence is
up to me. I'll listen to what your lawyer has
to say. I'll listen to what the government has
to say. I'm going to consult the guidelines,
and then I'll decide. I mean, not to get you
technical, but I think anytime you're sending
somebody to prison for wildlife crimes, that's
a deterrent. People think that they're going
to sell an elephant skull and everything's going
to work out fine, and they're going to pocket
$10 or something. But anytime they're going to
prison for things like that, I think that's very
important for deterrence. Yeah. Aaron and I used
to have, Aaron Dean and I used to have a saying
that if we caught somebody blatantly smuggling,
they were getting arrested. Because just that
one night that they spend means a lot. Give a
sample. That first night they spend in jail means
a lot. And in terms of deterrent, have you guys
seen a lot of repeat offenders? I think that's
a telltale sign of whether deterrence is working
or not. Do you see a lot of repeaters? That's
a good question. I mean, we were talking about
the Byung -Soo Kim earlier, the classic example
of a repeat offender. He gets caught here. flees
the country and then just goes to South Africa
and does the same thing. I mean, that's kind
of an extreme example. I think, at least in my
experience, defendants don't necessarily get
caught doing the same thing a few years later.
It's more that they were caught in their past
for committing other crimes. some sort of prison
or jail sentence. And then we catch them again,
doing something a little different or doing something
that they, you know, a wildlife crime that maybe
they hadn't gotten caught doing in the past.
And now they get caught. So it's the recidivism,
which is something federal judges take very seriously
is a it's always an issue. But some people just
Can't help themselves. So I've had cases not
in the wildlife context where someone gets Caught
doing one thing. Maybe it killed somebody and
then they go to prison Then they get out and
they just keep at it and it's it's just kind
of human nature. Unfortunately and in that situation
that federal judges will tend to hammer the defendant
at sentencing the second time around. And that
multiple offenses raises your number on that
sentencing guidelines. And I always felt like
the warning for people is that first time, the
first offender in a federal system is likely
going to get cut some breaks, but don't show
up again. Because that's when judges will really
turn on you, right? Right. And one thing that
federal judges I mean, a lot of work goes into
the sentencing process. The probation office
before sentencing prepares a detailed report
for the judge about both the crime, but just
as important, the defendant's background and,
you know, did they have a rough childhood, their
kind of personal history. And a lot of times
the defendant has a... kind of sympathetic things,
reasons in their past why a judge might give
them a break the first time around. The second
time around, that's out the window and they tend
to receive very heavy sentences. Interesting.
Very true. What about like proof issues? Do you
think in wildlife crimes or wildlife prosecutions,
do you guys have unique proof problems or proof
issues that you might not have in other types
of criminal activity? I think we... One of the
challenges for judges is how to line up a wildlife
crime sentence with other types of crimes. It's
not really a drug offense. There's usually no
guns. It's a very unique type of offense. And
I think the way that we normally approach that
is to tell them it's fraud. This is fraud like
anything else. It's lying on paperwork. The government
has a responsibility to make sure packages and
the ports are safe. If we don't know what's in
containers, can't do that job. The other piece
is it's about the money. You know, it's always
about profit and money. So I think those convincing
a judge that these types of cases are important
is a challenge for us sometimes. Oftentimes with
the jury. they know they get it right off the
bat. We've had a number of trials involving birds
and other things that are smuggled. A jury gets
it. Somebody put a live animal in a package and
called it a kid's toy or plumbing equipment.
I mean, they understand that. This person is
making money by selling live animals. They knew
what they were doing was wrong because we'll
always have emails or text messages where the
person's saying, I'm going to falsely declare
this stuff, basically. You know, we know they
have the intent and a jury I think gets it right
away. So when we go to trial in wildlife crimes
We I would say almost a hundred percent of the
time get convictions I i'm having a hard time
coming up with a wildlife crime trial where we
had an acquittal Yeah, I don't remember one during
my career at all. Yeah, and i've been doing this
for 17 years now and I don't remember one either.
Yeah So a jury I think gets it but then when
it comes time for sentencing a judge is a different
different kind of person to convince Which is
different challenges for us And you know, one
of the things Mark was mentioning for proof for
trials, when you're dealing with felonies, you
got to show some kind of bad faith, some sort
of mental intent to violate the law. The smuggling
statute, for instance, requires that. So we're
not always going to have a confession, but there's
other ways that we can show that so -and -so
knew that they were violating the law. And false
declarations, the way they lied about paperwork.
Or the way that things are, we catch smugglers
in the way they package. You were involved on
a coral investigation, which was a major investigation
that we did. And in that case, the defendant
companies, they were importing protected corals,
along with importing corals that were legal.
The legal ones would be at the top of these plastic
bags in the salt water. Then there'd be some
newspaper. And below that, you had the protected
corals that were being hidden. Or we've seen
suitcases for like Asian songbirds or whatever.
where they're in the suitcase, suddenly there's
a layer, there's clothing at the top, then there's
a layer of a foil or something like that, and
then below that we've got. the contraband, the
smuggled animals. Yeah, the method itself is
kind of a... The method tells you they know that
they're breaking the law. Why go through that
trouble? Yeah, and we're not prosecuting record
-keeping offenses. They're importing a wa -mei
and they call it a shamathrush, which is an Asian
songbird thing. These aren't technical offenses.
They're smuggling, calling it something completely
different. We had a case involving cobras that
were smuggled in Pringles jars. Live cobras in
Pringles jars. I mean, can you imagine if a wildlife
inspector who didn't know there was a cobra in
there, opened up what he thought was a food container
and he got bit by a baby cobra. Yeah. I mean,
it could have been lethal. It could have been.
Sometimes it could be pretty serious. And you
should also be pointed out is very often these
animals don't or a good number of the animals
don't survive. Right. You know, the smuggling.
Yeah. We had one guy who was trying to smuggle
tortoises out of the country. He used a fake
name and just his luck. The fake name he used
was a name that was, you know, caused this thing
to be inspected, but at first it was just put
it, so it wasn't allowed to go out, and the package
was just put into the dead male category or whatever.
It was just sitting there, and after a while,
someone smelled something funny from the package.
It opened up and one of the tortoises already
rotted away. Or with birds coming in, not all
of them survive it, because these are being put
in the luggage compartment of an airliner. It's
freezing temperatures up there. You know, it's
no surprise that a lot of them will die in the
process. Yeah, we used to say, you know, smugglers,
if they needed to bring in 100 birds, reptiles,
whatever it was, they actually needed to bring
in 200 because they could count on about a 50
% mortality rate because of the way they have
to hide things. It's very cruel to the animal,
right? Keeping it from making noise, so they'll
often tape its mouth shut or tape something in
its mouth so that restricts breathing. Yeah,
it's not a... Pretty thing. I think for me as
an investigator, one of the biggest proof issues
I always had to tackle was your victims and your
witnesses can't give you a statement. Our victims
cannot come testify in court. They can't give
a statement about what happened to them. And
so that's a challenge in terms of developing
evidence against people, for sure. How about
this? We discussed this, you've been really lucky
to have this dedicated environmental crimes unit.
What are the benefits of having that unit? Like,
what do you see as the benefits for counter wildlife
trafficking, protection of wildlife, enforcement
of wildlife laws? How does having a dedicated
unit at the US Attorney's Office for the Central
District really benefit that or help that? I
mean, in a bunch of ways. I think one of the
most important ways is these are complicated
statutes that we're dealing with. Often the judges
in our cases have never dealt with the statutes
that we're charging. And some of the statutes
are very complicated, like the Lacey Act. And
so it helps to have prosecutors who have charged
these cases repeatedly and who have some kind
of institutional knowledge about which statutes
apply, and the, you know, the pluses and minuses
of charging a kind of maybe an obscure statute
that, I mean, sometimes the statutes have never
been charged before. There's no background law
on them. And so because we've all been in the
section for, I mean, I'm the newest prosecutor
and I've been in the section for about nine years.
But you really develop some expertise, which
wouldn't be the case if you were a prosecutor
who said, for example, is doing mostly, you know,
Drug or gang or gun cases and just got handed
a wildlife case. So I think that's a One of the
biggest benefits in my opinion and Matt, I think
the the other thing is when new prosecutors come
to the section There's a steep learning curve.
There's a Lacey act endangered species act site
ease all these things And the interesting thing
is the bad guys know these rules like the back
of their hand. That's right. They know the code
of federal regulations and the weights and the
types of species. They've got all this stuff
dialed and they've been working around it for
years. A new lawyer comes to the section and
they're like, what is this? We're giving them
books on regulations and training and stuff.
And it takes time to ramp up. And I think when
you have institutional knowledge like these two
guys in the section who've been there for a decade
and well over a decade, you know, that kind of
a specialization is important because we can
work cases efficiently. We're not having to build
the plane while we're flying it. We've already
built the plane and we just take off and go.
So, you know, we want to keep pace with the criminals
who are way ahead on the regulations. And I think
specialization is crucial to that for us. Yeah,
you know, from the investigator side, I have
to agree because if you're working in a district
that does not have an environmental crimes unit,
prosecutors who haven't done it, It's the agent's
job to kind of educate the prosecutor about Lacey
Act or with all the statutes. And we cannot get
into this now because we'll be here for another
hour and a half. But the Lacey Act really gets
complicated when you get in to start talking
about the triggering event. I just saw Mark.
He just put his head down and shook his head
because. I avoid the Lacey Act my entire career.
It's like a less. How many conversations have
we had, agent to prosecutor? Where's the triggering
event right? Oh my gosh and a lot of times in
order to just so listeners know in order for
the Lacey act to apply some some event has to
occur and that's what we call the triggering
event and often there's disagreement between
agent and prosecutor about whether the triggering
event happened or what it was and Sometimes there's
disagreement between two prosecutors about what
it is It's it can it takes time to dial in on
that and so yeah having a dedicated unit people
with institutional memory and experience is super
important. Yeah, and the bad guys know that the
Lacey Act is complicated. Yes. And if they drive
something to a certain place and send it out
of a certain facility, they can kind of get around
certain rules and things like that. So yeah,
they're ahead on that. Right, right. What about
just kind of thinking overall during your careers?
What kind of contributions do you feel the U
.S. Attorney's Office for the Central District
has made to protecting wildlife and plants native
to this country, as well as wildlife and plants
around the world? Yeah, I mean, I think across
administrations, we have different priorities
with different U .S. Attorneys. Our current U
.S. Attorney has been very supportive of dog
fighting cases, international cases involving,
you know, targets bringing in fighting dogs to
the district and selling them and you know fighting
dogs can be tens of thousands of dollars and
it's a very gruesome sport. You know we've had
other U .S. attorneys focused on different aspects
like international trafficking of large things
like elephant tusks and rhino horns. We've done
big rhino horn prosecutions under those administrations
so I think every U .S. attorney has different
priorities and our job as prosecutors is to make
sure that we're putting our resources into whatever
that US attorney wants to prioritize. Right.
You know, we there's not 50 of us in the section.
We have to specialize and we have to prioritize
and we want to do cases where there's, you know,
repeat offenders, a lot of intent. You know,
we're not prosecuting borderline cases here.
We're prosecuting cases where the target we know
is guilty because they have the criminal intent
to do the thing that we're accusing them of doing.
They've done it many, many times. you know, high
dollar value, we're taking folks off the street
that are at the pinnacle of their game, whether
it's rhino horns or butterflies or Asian songbirds,
those are the impact cases we want to do in this
district. And I think it's just a matter of aligning
our resources with the US Attorney's priorities
and kind of getting the job done. Yeah, you know,
I think it's that's it's critically important
for investigators and agents to understand what
the current US Attorney's priorities are too,
because The number one question, I think, see
if you guys agree with this, the number one question
an agent can answer when they come into your
office is, here's my case, here's why it's important,
right? Because you're going to ask, why is this
important? Why do I care today about butterflies?
Why do I care about seabirds, right? The agent
needs to be able to articulate to you guys, how
does this mesh with US attorney's priorities
for this district, right? Yeah, 100%. And it
could be, for example, I didn't know but in the
Asian songbird community, you can have really
high value songbirds that are traded for counterfeit
currency, which is then traded for narcotics
and the narcotics are then traded for firearms.
And that may be a high priority for your particular
US attorney. And you have this circle of contraband
that's exchanged depending, you know, you could
trade a wildlife part for a gun and we have a
lot of wildlife traffickers that have firearms.
So transnational crime is a big problem that
we're trying to focus on and wildlife smuggling
is central to that because it is a piece that
is used in that by criminals to exchange for
other things to accomplish their crimes. You
know what I think is a great example of that
is zoonotic disease. Oh interesting. Yeah because
you mentioned songbirds and you know in my mind
the thing I'm my friends always tease me about
it because I'm scared to death that bird flu
is going to get into this country in a form.
that is easily transmitted to humans at a 30
% mortality rate. And if it happens, it's going
to come from wild birds. And wild bird smuggling
is a potential corridor for that. Yeah, 100%.
I'll tell you what else is interesting. I remember
years ago, I had a lizard smuggling case where
lizards were being brought in, I believe, from
Australia. Well, because it came in from overseas,
and we caught the guy, and he pled, and so forth.
But the lizards couldn't be returned back to
the natural habitat. They had to be kept in a
special place because they may have some kind
of virus or something in their biology that could
be extremely harmful to the native lizards here.
So they could not go back. There's a whole other
topic for a podcast, too, about repatriation
of live animals and how difficult that is. Yeah.
And there's an international trade component,
too. So timber cases, for example. You can have
protected wood species. that other countries
are kind of, they're called anti -dumping cases
where they're taking this hardwood and selling
it very cheaply in the United States and out
competing local folks for the same wood. And
those are the types of cases that's essentially
a fraud case, but it impacts international trade
because you're dealing with massive quantities
of this wood that's being sold at pennies and
then it's used for furniture or guitars, for
example, or whatever the case may be. there's
a big kind of international trade aspect to it
that we could go into for a long, long time.
If we start adding timber and plants into our
calculation, it gets big. Dennis, I think you
and I did a Rosewood case involving guitar. Mark
was in on that one, too. I think you were in
on that, too. That's what I was thinking about,
trying to export it overseas. We did a controlled
delivery search warrant or something like that.
So I could talk to you guys all day, in part
because I know you so well and it's so natural
just to, you know. Talk shop with you guys. I
love it. It's it's been a pleasure to have you
on the show We're running out of time before
we sign off though I'll just give you go one
at a time You know your closing thoughts anything
you want the public to know about what you do
or the cases you've handled or anything I'll
just one thing we haven't talked about is just
all of the work we do It's not exactly wildlife
focused. It's more environmental, like oil spills,
forest fires, that sort of thing. We do a lot
of those cases. And in those cases, there's a
lot of human victims, but there's also wildlife
victims as well. So that's another important
subject matter that we focus on a lot. And I
think the public understands that we're enforcing
criminal laws against wrongdoers, corporate wrongdoers,
individual wrongdoers in Southern California
for kind of disaster type events that also have
a terrible impact on the environment. So it's
another very rewarding element of what we do.
That's a great point. And there's a public safety,
public health issues get tangled up in this as
well, right? Great. You just expound a little
bit on what Matt was saying and our we're a relatively
small section But our variety of cases and investigations
is by far the largest we do everything from unsafe
drugs unsafe air travel oil spills forest fires
hazardous waste hazardous materials water pollution
You name it where and these are and some of these
are extremely complicated statutes, especially
because of the regulations, right? So it's so
important for us to maintain our section and
to have the institutional knowledge because,
you know, I remember the first hazardous waste
case that I did. I was thinking, oh, waste is
just, you know, something you're just throwing
away. And I remember Mark was about to go to
trial. I think I got this case about 30 days
or something before the trial date. And Mark
says, look, Dennis. You better start taking a
look at these regulations. A waste is not what
you think it is. And it turns out a waste is
something that's being stored with the intent
of disposing it later, whatever, or just being
stored in lieu, actually, in lieu of disposal.
A different kind of definition. Everything was
so technical, it drove me crazy. But the next
time I got a hazardous waste case, I was much
more up on it. So having that institutional knowledge,
having somebody there to show me what to do on
it, very complicated areas. Our judges, when
we bring our cases, they typically, and I think
this was mentioned before, they haven't seen
this kind of case before, or rarely. So they're
looking to us for exactly what do we got here?
And they rely on us to give them the straight
story and explain it in a coherent, appropriate
way. That's an excellent point. Environmental
crime encompasses a heck of a lot more than wildlife
crime. And Dennis, I will say that... If you
want to understand how complicated the law is
that you guys deal with, you only need to walk
into Dennis's office. I have never seen a more
precarious situation of an impending paper avalanche.
Not anymore. No. I've got two witnesses here.
How does my desk look? No, it's still bad. It's
been cleaned slightly, but it's no longer hazardous
waste. It's clean. Every night I clear it off.
There's not a... I'm telling you, I've sat in
his office at night while we're preparing for
trial between two, six and a half foot tall piles
of paper, wondering when they're going to collapse
on me. But I will say, if I ask you for, where's
that document? You know exactly which pile the
document is. I believe it when I see it. I'll
believe it when I see it. Every night I clear
it off. Okay, Mark closing thoughts, huh? I mean
look I feel like I have the greatest job in the
world I get to come to work with great colleagues
and work with great agents I think there's a
misnomer out there when you say you prosecute
environmental crimes that you're like, you know
hippie Greenpeace tree hugger not to disparage
any of those organizations, but that's really
not what we are You know, we're talking about
prosecuting the worst of the worst, you know
massive toxic Waste you know, these aren't technical
offenses. These are like really horrible situations
involving forest fires that have burned down
people's houses or you know had oil spills that
have killed animals and closed businesses because
people can't go to the beach so businesses go
under You know, we've worked toxic waste cases
where Houses around dumps or you know have people
that are literally throwing up every day, right?
You know, these aren't technical violations.
These are really important cases and we get to
advocate for victims and do the best cases out
there. So like I said, I feel lucky to work with
these guys that I think they said it best when
they said that our section does the widest variety
of cases in the office. And I think that's right.
But I would also add that I think we do some
of the most important cases in the office. Going
back to the case that I mentioned about the dive
boat, when you have a captain out there who takes
33 passengers out and all of them die in a fire
on the boat, That's a bad case. We're going to
get involved and prosecute that case. We've charged
the Palisades fire case, which is ongoing now.
Over 6 ,000 structures burned. We've charged
the Orange County oil spill case that impacted
all kinds of businesses and wildlife and other
things. And that's what DOJ should be doing.
The worst cases involving A lot of loss and a
lot of victims and that's kind of what we do
every day as our job. So Yeah, the tough case
appreciate you having us on to it. You were really
a tremendous agent to work with over the years.
I mean that. I learned a ton from you. You were
a seasoned agent when I was just a baby AUSA
learning the ropes. You were very patient with
me when I didn't know what the Lacey Act was,
even though I closed it and never looked at it
again after you studiously instructed me about
the multiple steps. I thought, that's interesting.
I'll deal with that. But your undercover abilities
were second to none. We still use a lot of your
cases as teaching tools for agents about how
how to identify a problem and proactively address
that problem. Not just wait until the animal
comes in through the port to know there's a problem
out there and to go out there and do something
about it. And that's what you did as an agent.
And I think it was just really great working
with you over the years. So appreciate you having
us on. Well, thank you very much. That means
everything to me. Because I was going to say
in closing, too, that I always so appreciated
the professionalism at the US Attorney's Office
and the ability to work with you guys on tough
issues and, you know, debate and argue with and
maintain our good relationships. It was always
a pleasure to try to do public good working with
you guys. And for people who do not tune in on
this YouTube channel for Nature's Secret Service,
just to give you a sense, you know, I'm talking
to three very straight lace, suit wearing, federal
prosecutors, just what you would expect to see
and who you would hope to be working the hard
cases on your behalf. So thank you for all the
work you guys do and thank you for coming on
the show. It's going to be a great episode and
I'll definitely have all three of you back together
or individually, whatever you want. Sounds good.
That's great. All right. All right. Thanks, everybody.
Thanks for tuning in. It's been a great season.
Be sure to be back for season three and watch
the website for updates about Bonus episodes,
shorts, and the premiere of season three. Thanks
everybody. Thanks for listening. Nature's Secret
Service is written and produced by me, Ed Newcomer,
and is co -produced by the DHTV team here at
California State University, Dominguez Hills.
Follow us on social media and connect with us
online at naturessecretservice .com.