For millions of years, sharks were at the top of the food chain. By spreading nutrients and absorbing carbon, they keep marine ecosystems in balance, from. But today, sharks and the ecosystems are in grave danger.

Nearly 100 million sharks are killed every year according to the United Nations and almost a third of shark species are threatened or near threatened with extinction. The declining shark population could lead to undesirable consequences in marine ecosystems, such as the collapse of commercially and ecologically important fish populations as well as contributing to global climate change.

Shark fins are targets for fishermen because they sell for a high price and serve as a symbol of status in Eastern cultures. They are used in a popular dish called shark fin soup, which has a long history of being favored by some Eastern emperors who thought it had medicinal benefits and represented a victory against powerful sharks. That belief is unfounded but has not faded.

Many fishermen practice shark finning, a brutal practice of catching a shark, pulling it onboard a boat, cutting its fins off and tossing the still-living shark back overboard. Unable to swim properly and bleeding profusely, the sharks suffocate to death or die of blood loss.

But it’s not just sharks that face a brutal fate.

Within poaching circles, it is said that a kilo of rhino horn is worth more than its weight in gold, making the animals a prime target for poachers. Rhino horn was used in traditional Eastern medicine, but increasingly common is its use as a status symbol to display success and wealth.

Poachers are now being supplied by international criminal gangs with sophisticated equipment to track and kill rhinos.

HSI Seattle Special Agent Kyle Maher knows firsthand how brutal the poachers can be when removing a rhino’s horn.

“While in Africa years ago, we came across a rhinoceros with its face sliced off,” he said.

Frequently a tranquilizer gun is used to bring the rhino down, before its horn is hacked off, leaving the rhino to wake up and bleed to death, painfully and slowly. The rare few that survive their encounters with poachers are often left with horrific gunshot, axe or machete wounds.

Maher and his colleague, HSI Special Agent Robert Patterson, recently helped bring two wildlife poachers to justice.

HSI Seattle’s Border Enforcement Security Taskforce and HSI Washington D.C.’s Global Investigations Group concluded a multi-year investigation with the arrest and 11-count indictment of two foreign nationals from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

The investigation centered on two people who previously conspired to send multiple shipments of bulk elephant ivory, pangolin scales and rhinoceros’ horn to Seattle from the DRC.

“We found them and started talking to them. We then started sending them money and they started sending us the product. They eventually accepted our invitation to come over to Seattle,” Maher said.

During the face-to-face meeting near Seattle, an HSI special agent posing as the chief buyer negotiated with the smugglers to facilitate the purchase and movement of an entire shipping container filled with wildlife-related contraband.

“We had previously been offered multiple tons of ivory if we were willing to buy in bulk. At the breakfast meeting we eventually came to an agreement to make a significant purchase,” Maher said. “And then we told them that we would take them to meet the rest of the investors. That's when Rob [Patterson] put the handcuffs on them.”

In close collaboration with the U.S. embassy in Kinshasa, HSI provided key intelligence to a DRC taskforce led by the DRC National Parks Security (Corps en charge de la sécurisation des Parcs Nationaux) who within 12 hours executed multiple raids seizing 2,067 pounds of raw and processed ivory along with 75 pounds of pangolin scales that the DRC valued at approximately $3.5 million.

Wildlife Demand

At the core of illegal wildlife trafficking is a rapidly expanding demand for a variety of products around the world: bushmeat; ingredients for traditional Eastern medicine; exotic pets; jewelry, trinkets, and accessories such as chess sets; furs for uses ranging from coats to traditional costumes; and trophies.

Wildlife trade is regulated by the United Nations' Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), which currently has 170 member countries.

The Lacey Act also protects wildlife, fish and plants that are illegally taken, possessed, transported or sold. Initially enacted in 1900, it only applied to a narrow range of plants indigenous to the United States and did not prohibit trade in plants taken in violation of foreign law. However, in 2008, the Lacey Act was amended to include a prohibition on trade in plants and plant products, such as timber and paper, harvested in violation of international law. This landmark legislation constituted the world’s first ban on trade in illegally sourced wood products.

There are many different estimates of the value of illicit wildlife trafficking worldwide. According to the Wildlife Conservation Society, unreported and unregulated fisheries trade alone are estimated to be between $4.2 billion and $9.5 billion per year. Illicit wildlife trafficking is estimated to be between $7.8 billion and $10 billion per year, and illegal timber trade is estimated as much as $7 billion per year.

Combining these numbers, all illicit wildlife trafficking, including fisheries and timber, comprise the fourth largest global illegal trade after narcotics, human trafficking and counterfeit products.

And this continues to grow as international criminal networks engaging in drugs and human trafficking get more involved to supplement their income.

“A lot of times where we start with the lower-level facilitators and shippers, you know there's this whole supply chain of organized crime,” HSI’s Harbin said.

Why Should We Care?

Wildlife trade threatens the local ecosystem and puts all species under additional pressure at a time when they are facing threats such as over-fishing, pollution, dredging, deforestation and other forms of habitat destruction.

It also causes an imbalance in local economies, impacting local communities

Human livelihoods in rural areas across the tropical forest world are closely bound to hunting of wildlife for food and income.

Across the tropics, many more peoples whose cultures are in transition from a subsistence to a market economy depend on hunting as a fallback in times of hardship.

Loss of wildlife along newly created roads to distant markets means that a vital resource is lost.

Remote forest peoples who have few or no alternatives are driven even further into poverty.

Latin America is vulnerable to wildlife trafficking because of its biodiversity. Ecuador has about 1,600 species of birds. Although accurate data about the illegal trade in animals and plants is hard to come by, Brazil’s Institute of Environment and Natural Resources estimates that at least 12 million wild animals are poached there each year.

In Congo, wildlife declined by more than 25% in a single 3-week period after a forest was opened up by a logging company; and in forested areas in Malaysia, which had been accessible by a logging road for at least a year, no large mammals remained.

As soon as a road goes in, outside hunters and weapons also go in and wildlife flows cheaply and rapidly down to distant towns where it is either sold directly or linked to global markets through ships and planes.

“Every time they open a new road, when they start taking out the timber, that’s when most of the poaching happens within five or 10 miles of a road. So as soon as they put in a new road, they just start vacuuming everything out of the area,” says Maher.

Illegal Logging’s Impact on Climate Change

The world’s forests are being rapidly destroyed by agricultural expansion, firewood harvesting and charcoal production as well as legal and illegal logging. Because of the world’s appetite for “precious” and commercial wood, vast areas are deforested each year. The earth’s forests are home to most of the species protected by CITES. Individual countries are responsible for halting shipments of illegally sourced timber and wood products.

Worth an estimated $51–$152 billion annually, according to the U.S. Agency for International Development, the illegal timber industry threatens on many levels.

Uncontrolled logging leads to devastating fires, landslides and floods, endangering biodiversity and wreaking havoc on forest dependent communities. It is starving developing countries of money sorely needed to fund schools, hospitals and sanitation. Efforts by these countries to rein in these activities can be very challenging in the face of remote locations, weak enforcement and corruption.

The bulk of this illegal wood is exported, and most finds its way eventually onto shelves and into homes in the wealthy countries of North America, Europe and East Asia. Together, the U.S., Europe, Japan, Canada and Russia consume 74% of the timber in global trade.

HSI Special Agent Patterson says that rich countries want beautiful wood floors, but they don’t understand the devastation to the environment that the logging caused.

The rate of forest loss is greater than ever before.

“In Ghana, for example, they've lost something like 80% of their natural forest in the last 25 years,” Maher said. “And then in Cambodia, places like Andoung Bor, a protected virgin forest area was completely razed in less than 10 years between 2008 and 2017.”

Cambodia has experienced one of the highest rates of deforestation in the world, losing about 64% of its tree cover since 2011.

While the illegal importation of wood continues, there have been some high-profile cases in which companies are being taken to court to stop this illicit practice.

In 2016, Virginia-based hardwood flooring retailer Lumber Liquidators Inc. was sentenced in federal court in Norfolk, Virginia, and paid more than $13 million in criminal fines, community service and forfeited assets related to its illegal importation of hardwood flooring. Much of the wood they sold was manufactured in China from timber that had been illegally logged in far eastern Russia, the habitat of the last remaining Siberian tigers and Amur leopards in the world.

This was the first felony conviction related to the import or use of illegal timber and the largest criminal fine ever under the Lacey Act.

HSI Continues the Fight

HSI remains steadfast in its commitment to combat wildlife trafficking and the illegal trading of natural resources. Through its collaboration with interagency partners, HSI continues to work and build on the strategy’s three objectives: strengthening enforcement; reducing demand for illegally traded wildlife; and building international cooperation, commitment, and public-private partnerships.

HSI’s Harbin said that HSI is at an advantage in investigating these cases.

Through its engagement with the Presidential Task Force on Wildlife Trafficking, HSI has taken steps to coordinate with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s (FWS) Office of Law Enforcement and has worked to implement the National Strategy for Combating Wildlife Trafficking.

HSI also continues to take decisive action to dismantle organized crime syndicates, while specifically recognizing the increasing connection between the trafficking of wildlife and other natural resources and transnational crime organizations.

How You Can Join the Fight

If you suspect you have received illicit goods or believe you know of illicit goods that are being trafficked, please call HSI’s tip line at 1-877-4-HSI-TIP or contact the closest HSI field office.

A Few of Our Key Partners

U.S. Customs and Border Protection works with Homeland Security Investigations and other law enforcement partners to deter, detect and enforce laws against wildlife trafficking and other natural resource crimes through the CBP Green Trade Strategy.

NOAA Fisheries is responsible for the stewardship of the nation's ocean resources and their habitat. Under the Marine Mammal Protection Act and the Endangered Species Act, it works to recover protected marine species while allowing sustainable economic and recreational opportunities.

U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Office of Law Enforcement investigates wildlife crimes, regulates the wildlife trade, helps the public understand and obey wildlife protections laws, and works in partnership with international, federal, state, local and Tribal counterparts to conserve wildlife resources.