Continued: 2 Minnesotans accused in sale of endangered species parts

In a clash of culture, profit and international law, two east-metro women are accused of smuggling into Minnesota and selling at a Hmong marketplace in St. Paul a host of products derived from various protected wildlife, including elephant, leopard, leaf monkey and weasel.

Along with the allegations involving a menagerie of Asian species, Monday's federal indictment also charges that Pa Lor, age unknown, of Oakdale, and Tia Lee Yang, 36, of Lake Elmo, conspired to distribute anabolic steroids.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service "has become increasingly concerned about international trade in raw endangered wildlife products," said Patrick Lund, the service's resident agent in charge of the St. Paul office. "The market, which is fueled by traditional Asian medicinal and cultural needs, is having a devastating effect on some of the world's most critically endangered wildlife."

Those needs, as Lund termed them, are coming from older-generation Hmong living in the United States, said Chupheng Lee of the Lao Family Community of Minnesota.

Lee, who is vice president of the Lao group, said Hmong elders brought with them from their homeland practices of using medicines that include animal parts, but they are unaware that they are encouraging illegal smuggling.

"My mother [age 70], for example, gets Western medicine," Lee said, but if she doesn't get well, "she goes back to her traditional medicine." He said these medicines are available at "any Asian marketplace" in the Twin Cities.

'They don't know it's illegal'

Lee said elders need to be educated about the conflict between their culture and the law. "They don't know it's illegal. We need to introduce the western medicine to them, and then we go from there."

Cheu Lee, owner of the Hmong Times in St. Paul, said he has seen monkey hands, rhino horn and "all kinds of stuff" sold in Minnesota. He said the items are sold openly in markets in the area. "They don't know anything about endangered animals," he said. "If they knew, they wouldn't sell it."

According to the indictment against Lor and Yang:

Lor arrived at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport in October 2005 after a trip to Laos and failed to declare any animal or wildlife items with customs and produced no permits that would allow her to import certain wildlife.

An inspection of her bags turned up nearly 1,400 pieces from wildlife. They included two Asian elephant teeth, 17 serow horns from a goat-like or antelope-like animal, two sets of serow horns attached to skull plates and 51 pieces of douc langur, an endangered species of monkey.

"That is a large seizure," said Sandy Cleva, spokeswoman for the service's law enforcement division headquarters in Arlington, Va. "That's definitely commercial."

Cleva said smuggling operations such as these, driven largely by profiteers, "keep us busy. We usually seize more than $10 million [in illegal wildlife shipments] each year, and we believe our interdictions are just scratching the surface."

The demand is growing

While the number of federal inspectors and agents dedicated to enforcement has stayed roughly the same for the past several years, Cleva said, "those communities are growing in the United States that drive the market. It's a great challenge for us." Since 2004 in Minnesota, there have been six federal cases filed involving wildlife protection.

Undercover buys in St. Paul

In November 2005 and June 2006, undercover officers bought several wildlife items from Lor at a booth in the International Marketplace, a cluster of Hmong shops on Como Avenue just north of the State Capitol. The booth was leased by Yang.

In August 2006, authorities searched the booth and recovered products from black-striped weasel, gibbon, leaf monkey, small-clawed otter, four-eyed turtle and reticulated python.

During congressional testimony in March, wildlife smuggling investigator Steve Galster said "wildlife criminals are running roughshod over authorities in many countries."

A multibillion-dollar industry

Galster, who helps train wildlife enforcement authorities overseas through State Department-sponsored programs, added that wildlife crime has become a "multibillion-dollar, organized, trans-national" industry that is "unraveling globally important ecosystems. It is driven by global demand for exotic pets and food, medicines and ornaments."

He said that while demand is significant in China, the United States "is one of the biggest consumers of wildlife in the world.

"American criminals and -- unwittingly -- American consumers are behind some very significant illegal wildlife shipments into the United States from Indonesia, Thailand and other countries."

Paul Walsh • 612-673-4482