A Malaysian man who sold a dozen black rhino and white rhino horns to a confidential source was sentenced to a year and a half in a U.S. prison Tuesday, federal prosecutors in New York said. Teo Boon Ching, known as the “Godfather,” had pleaded guilty to a count of conspiracy to commit wildlife trafficking, the U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan said in a statement.

“As long as you have cash, I can give you the goods in 1-2 days,” Ching, 58, told the confidential source during a meeting in Malaysia in 2019, according to prosecutors.

The Malaysia meetings lasted for two days, and during that time, Ching described himself as a “middleman” who buys rhino horns poached by co-conspirators in Africa and ships them to customers around the world, according to prosecutors. Ching also sent the source photos of rhino horns that were for sale.

Later that year, authorities directed the source to buy 12 rhino horns from Ching, which were delivered to the source in a suitcase. A U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service lab confirmed two of the horns were from a black rhino, which the World Wildlife Fund considers to be critically endangered, and the other 10 horns were from white rhinos, which are not considered to be endangered but are instead “near threatened,” according to the group.

Ching was arrested in Thailand in 2022 and eventually extradited to the U.S. According to prosecutors, he conspired to traffic approximately 480 pounds of poached rhino horns worth about $2.1 million.

  • Vode An
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    1 year ago

    destroying nature is a universal crime. Who gives a shit so long as they get stopped.

    • shalafi@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Agreed! Who gives a shit about any laws anywhere as long as we feel we’re doing the moral thing!

      • Vode An
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        1 year ago

        Yes actually. Law is meant to serve just ends not be viewed as justice itself.

        • Nahvi@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          It is important to be keep watch for government excess, even if we happen to agree with that specific example.

          The trouble with fighting for human freedom is that one spends most of one’s time defending scoundrels. For it is against scoundrels that oppressive laws are first aimed, and oppression must be stopped at the beginning if it is to be stopped at all. ― H.L. Mencken