'I sell box turtles to rich Chinese people in New York:' Kentucky man sentenced to prison for illegally selling $140,000 of pet reptiles, nearly crashing local market

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Christopher Cool pleaded guilty to violating the Lacey Act, which prohibits the interstate sale of wildlife, in July 2020.

A Kentucky man was sentenced to 15 months in prison for illegally selling hundreds of captured box turtles into the international pet market, which nearly caused the local population in eastern part of the Bluegrass State to collapse.

Christopher Cool, 59, of McKee, Kentucky, admitted he sold around $140,000 worth of the reptiles to buyers in New York and elsewhere, with the understanding that they would be sold in Asia where they are popular as pets. “I sell box turtles to rich Chinese people in New York for a hundred bucks EACH and up,” Cool wrote to a friend around the time of his arrest in 2020, according to court documents. “And I have an endless supply of them here.”

— Prosecutors in the case “All turtles, including the box turtles, have a slow rate of maturity and taking the number of turtles that Cool did out of the wild could have resulted in a population crash for the box turtles in this area if he had not been stopped,” prosecutors wrote in a sentencing memo.

 

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I would recommend sticking to stocks ;)

They weren't pets. They were dinner.

People who harm animals in any way should be held liable both financially and physically.

Is this really what your journalist are writing about really! Your about to get unfollowed and cancel if you keep this up… cover the markets!

Clear water, bright sun, clean air Life is beautiful with these Retoken, 💓 BscRetoken

Hahahaha😂😂

Nearly crashing to local *population* not the local market lalpert1

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