Animal-related drug smuggling has a large financial incentive. Smith estimates the profitability of wildlife smuggling at $5 billion a year (with many animals being worth more, ounce for ounce, than cocaine) while the World Wildlife Fund places the estimate at $20 billion annually. Combining the two forms of trafficking increases the already huge profits of the multibillion-dollar drug trade. According to Craig van Note, executive vice president of Monitor, an international ecological consortium, "Police agencies around the world are facing the fact that the drug smuggling goes hand-in-hand with wildlife smuggling and vice versa." The USFWS recognizes that smugglers often trade illegal drugs for endangered animals in cashless transfers.
The macabre list of examples of intermingled wildlife/drug smuggling provides a frightening insight into the creative and cruel mind of the smuggler: heroin hidden in snakes, snails, or elephant tusks, cannabis stuffed into antelope heads, cocaine surreptitiously inserted into gutted parrot carcasses, and heroin-filled pouches implanted into the stomachs of large, expensive goldfish. Domestic animals are also used as unsuspecting drug couriers. In December 1994, a debilitated English sheepdog named Cokey arrived from Colombia at New York's John F. Kennedy Airport with ten cocaine-filled balloons surgically implanted into her abdomen.
Two particularly egregious cases highlight how scheming smugglers continually develop innovative ways to use animals to transport drugs. In one case, dubbed Operation Cocaine Constrictor, more than 300 boa constrictors from Colombia were implanted with cocaine-filled condoms inserted into their rectums (which were then sewn shut), causing the deaths of all but 63 of the creatures. It may very well have been the assumption that few wildlife inspectors would want to closely examine a shipment of snakes that lead the smugglers to devise such a cruel ploy.
In 1993, Operation Fishnet focused on a case in which liquid cocaine was carefully mixed into clear outer bags that were placed around inner bags containing valuable tropical fish. The shipments from Colombia were scrutinized only after some leaking bags emitted a strange odor, while others had a curious sediment buildup on the bottom of the bags. Bizarre cases like these point not only to the use of legal wildlife shipments to transport contraband, but also highlight the overwhelming need to increase funding for the Division of Law Enforcement in the USFWS. There is a "Catch-22" in the current inspection system in which the Drug Enforcement Administration has the funds and expertise to pursue drug smugglers but has no reason to inspect wildlife shipments, while the USFWS, with heightened expertise in wildlife inspection, is woefully underfunded and understaffed and cannot possibly inspect all imported shipments, especially in cities like Miami that become hubs for the importation of wildlife and drugs from Central and South America.
Latin America, known for its abundance of drug traffickers as well as magnificent wildlife, poses a double problem. The Washington Times reports that as leaders of the long-empowered Colombian Cali cartel are arrested, "drug agents now fear that newly powerful Mexican gangs may seize control of cocaine traffic" into the United States. This is further acknowledged in the startling "Crime Against Nature" report issued by the Endangered Species Project. The authors note, "Mexico's role as a major supplier for birds and reptiles is being increasingly characterized by the involvement of drug dealers."
The issue is compounded by the use of legal trade avenues, such as commercial fishing, to transport illegal drugs. This is especially important with trade between Mexico and the United States increasing in the post-NAFTA era, putting wildlife at greater risk because of more open borders with less control, making inspection and confiscation more difficult (September/ October 1993, pp. 12-13).
The link between drug smuggling
and wildlife exploitation transcends the direct, physical use
of animals to transport drugs. Jorge Hank Rhon, son of Mexico's
former Minister of Agriculture, has been implicated in smuggling
both drugs and wildlife. The New York Times reported in
May 1995 that Rhon had been stopped at the Mexico City airport,
where items made from ocelot fur and elephant ivory were found
in his luggage. The Times stated that Rhon, a Tijuana racetrack
owner, has been linked with drug traffickers in news reports but
has never been charged with a related crime.Cartels and Traffickers
The drug/wildlife smuggling trade is highly organized, powerful, and influential, and even has alleged ties to the Mafia. Investigative journalist Alexander Cockburn reports in the periodical Counterpunch that "[t]he Italian Mafia controls the Italian fishing business. Its boats and the canneries associated with them are the prime conduit for drug smuggling from Palermo and other Italian ports to the rest of Europe and the U.S."
The publication also reports that "investigations by the U.S. Drug Enforcement [Administration] and U.S. Customs Service have disclosed how fishing fleets and canneries south from Mexico, through Costa Rica, to Venezuela, Colombia and Peru have been deeply involved in drug smuggling." This is echoed by the Los Angeles Times, which stated that the Cali drug cartel uses regional fishing fleets "to smuggle both drugs and animals through the Caribbean to the United States and Europe."
"The Mexico Report," issued by Legal Research International in September, asserts: "It is no coincidence that since the tuna industry was privatized in the late 1980s under Mexican President Carlos Salinas, most of the industry has fallen under the control of Mexico's most violent and notorious drug traffickers. Raul Salinas, the disgraced older brother of the former Mexican leader, is said to control one of the largest tuna canneries on the Pacific coast of Mexico." Furthermore, on September 19 the Mexican newspaper La Jornada revealed that two drug kingpins, Mexican Manuel Rodriguez and Colombian Jose Castrillon, were partners in a tuna fishing company.
Stories linking tuna boat owners to drug smuggling rings are especially noteworthy because legislation introduced in Congress would eviscerate dolphin protection, forcing a return to the days of fishing-related dolphin slaughter. If the next Congress passes legislation similar to H.R.2823 (which passed) and S. 1420 (which the Senate never voted on), foreign fishing fleets (including those in Mexico) again will be able to chase dolphins with noisy speedboats and helicopters, encircle them in mile-long purse-seine nets, and even kill them, yet still label the tuna "dolphin safe" on the U.S. market.
This legislation would implement an international agreement known as the Panama Declaration, which would gut tuna embargo provisions of the U.S. Marine Mammal Protection Act, allow the sale of "dolphin unsafe" tuna in the United States, and corrupt the definition of "dolphin safe" (Vol. 16, No. 2, p. 8). Not surprisingly, signatories to this non-binding agreement (negotiated by the U.S. State Department, five environmental groups, and 11 other countries) include Panama, Mexico, Colombia, Costa Rica, and Venezuela. The irony is glaring.
Whether drug smugglers physically use wildlife to transport their illegal products or consolidate their shady business practices, the link between wildlife and drug smuggling must be exposed. For as long as it continues, smugglers will profit by exploiting both their victims and the worldwide system that cannot yet stop them.
Adam M. Roberts is a Research Associate, Animal Welfare Institute