Swiss stockbroker, Mexican chef jailed in New Zealand for hunting, possessing protected lizards
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A Swiss and a Mexican men were sentenced to 18 weeks in a New Zealand prison on Monday for hunting and possessing protected native lizards.
Thomas Benjamin Price, 31, a stockbroker from Gallen, Switzerland, and Gustavo Eduardo Toledo-Albarran, 28, a chef from Carranza, Mexico, originally received a term of six months in jail, but District Court Judge Raoul Neave reduced their sentence to 18 weeks because they had pleaded guilty to charges under New Zealand's Wildlife Act.
Judge Neave likened their crimes to ivory smuggling.
The two men arrived in New Zealand in early February and traveled to Otago Peninsula on South Island, where Toledo-Albarran spent five days looking for the reptiles.
Price admitted possessing the lizards and Toledo-Albarran admitted illegally hunting them. They gave the reptiles to an engineer from Uganda, Manfred Walter Bachmann, so he could smuggle them out of the country.
Bachmann, originally from Germany, was detained with 13 adult lizards and three young reptiles in the southern city of Christchurch on Feb. 16. He was given a jail term of 15 weeks and will face deportation on release.
Pattaya City Time
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