LOS ANGELES – A San Gabriel man who attempted to smuggle nearly four dozen turtles from Southern California to Hong Kong has been sentenced to federal prison.
Kwong Wa Cheung, 36, was sentenced Tuesday to two months in federal prison after he pleaded guilty in August to one count of disabling wildlife intended for foreign commerce, said officials.
Following the completion of the prison term, authorities said Cheung will be on supervised release for two years, during which time he will serve two months in a halfway house and perform 500 hours of community service at an animal shelter.
U.S. District Judge John F. Walter, who also ordered the defendant to pay a $12,000 fine.
The turtles being smuggled were 26 Eastern Box turtles and 20 African Spurred tortoises. Both species are protected under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora, according to officials.
When Cheung attempted to smuggle the 46 turtles and tortoises to Hong Kong, he brought three boxes containing the animals to a U.S. Postal Service facility in San Gabriel. Cheung used a fake name and address on the packages, and declared that the content of the packages were “Toys (Acces Model).”
The fake name that Cheung used aroused suspicion, and the Postal Service refused to ship the packages, authorities said.
Because he used a fake name, officials said the Postal Service could not locate Cheung and it began processing the undelivered packages for shipment to a “dead mail” facility in Georgia.
But, after several days, at least one of the packages began to emit a strong odor because one of the now-dead turtles was already decomposing.
When a Postal Inspector opened one of the packages, he found the reptiles packaged in athletic socks. Subsequent investigation allowed authorities to link Cheung to the mislabeled packages.