Tim Santel: Fighting Wildlife Crime & Busting Traffickers

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In this thrilling episode of Adventure Diaries, host Chris Watson sits down with Timothy Santel.  From Tim's humble beginnings in the Midwest to leading some of the most impactful wildlife conservation operations in history, Tim shares his incredible journey over 32 years with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

Discover the secrets behind Operation Crash—a groundbreaking investigation that dismantled global rhino horn trafficking networks—and Operation Snowplow, which exposed the dark underworld of big cat poaching in the United States. Tim's stories are not just about catching the bad guys but also about the deep passion and commitment it takes to protect the world's most vulnerable species.

Tim also shares insights into his post-retirement work with Focus Conservation, a nonprofit dedicated to mentoring and supporting wildlife crime units across Africa. This episode is a must-listen for anyone passionate about wildlife, conservation, and the relentless fight against poaching.

Key Takeaways:

• Timothy Santel dedicated over 32 years to wildlife conservation and law enforcement.
• He led major operations like Operation Snowplow and Operation Crash, targeting illegal wildlife trade.
• Operation Crash was a landmark case that led to numerous arrests and global legislative changes.
• Tim continues his work through Focus Conservation, mentoring wildlife rangers on the front lines.

Call to Adventure:

• Visit Chitwan National Park in Nepal:
  • Witness one-horned rhinos, tigers, and diverse wildlife.
  • Immerse yourself in local culture by staying in a nearby village.
  • Experience Nepal's first national park and its rich biodiversity.

Pay It Forward:

• Volunteer and gain experience in wildlife conservation.
• Be passionate and committed, even in unpaid roles.
• Mentorship is crucial—help guide the next generation of conservationists.
• Get involved with nonprofits like Focus Conservation to support wildlife crime units and rangers.

Links & Resources:
https://focusedconservation.org/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/timothy-santel-798206242/

Chapters

• 0:00 Shocking Wildlife Crimes in Chicago
• 0:41 Introduction to the Adventure Diaries Podcast
• 1:04 Meet Timothy Santel: Wildlife Protection Veteran
• 4:02 Tim's Early Life and Passion for Wildlife
• 8:04 From Biologist to Law Enforcement
• 9:25 The Start of a Legendary Career in Wildlife Law Enforcement
• 22:19 Operation Snowplow: Uncovering Big Cat Trafficking
• 34:40 Operation Crash: Tackling Rhino Horn Trafficking
• 48:55 Coordinating a Nationwide Operation
• 50:08 International Extraditions and Prosecutions
• 51:05 Impact of Operation Crash
• 52:21 Seizing Assets for Conservation
• 54:44 The Challenges and Rewards of Undercover Work
• 59:52 Operation Manhattan Project: A High-Stakes Takedown
• 1:05:20 The Realities of Undercover Operations
• 1:13:27 Training and Mentoring the Next Generation
• 1:14:34 The Unsung Heroes: Wildlife Rangers
• 1:21:54 Final Thoughts and Advice for Aspiring Agents

Transcript

 I mean, you're telling me that people in the Chicago area were buying tigers, lions, leopards, jaguars, uh, mountain lions, and putting them in cages and killing them, and then selling all their body parts to different people. And um, You know, and it's just sound like, okay. And so I sort of, um, was suspect and I was so suspect of this individual because, uh, you know, typically you get on there, you know, what are their motives?

Why are they coming to me? What are the motives? Are they, are they genuinely interested in helping, uh, solve, uh, this crime against wildlife or. Are they trying to get me to catch competition? 

Welcome to the Adventure Diaries Podcast, where we share tales of adventure, connection, and exploration. From the smallest of creators to the larger than life adventurers, we hope their stories inspire you to go create your own extraordinary adventures.

And now your host, Chris Watson. 

Welcome to another episode of the Adventure Diaries.  Today I'm joined by Timothy Santel. Tim is a retired wildlife protection law enforcement officer with a career spanning more than three decades with the US Fish and Wildlife Service. During his career, Tim has actively participated in conducting large scale undercover wildlife trafficking operations, some of which were among the most significant investigations in the history of the fish and wildlife.

Notable among these operations were Operation Snowplough, which exposed the brutal killing of big cats for their body parts in the USA. And Operation Crash, which led to nearly 50 prosecutions worldwide for trafficking in rhino horns and elephant ivory.  Tim's covert operations have played a vital role in raising global awareness about the issue in both domestic and international wildlife trafficking.

And since his retirement, Tim now serves as the Senior Advisor on International Wildlife Trafficking Programmes for Focused Conservation, a non profit organisation. Some of Tim's experience and stories are just jaw dropping. So for anyone that loves wildlife and the natural world. This is a must listen, so settle in and enjoy this fantastic conversation with Timothy Santel. 

Timothy Santel, welcome to the Adventure Diaries. How are you? 

I'm great. How are you, Chris? 

I'm fantastic. I'm delighted and really honored  to have you here today. And quick disclaimer for anyone listening, my voice is breaking so apologies if it's a little bit labored today. I just wanted to frame this conversation.

It's a topic I'm particularly passionate about in terms of wildlife conservation, nature in general, but  what I want to get from this call is really take him away with Maybe a little bit more informed, a little more educated, the eyes and the ears open a little bit more to what's going on in the world.

Some of the topics that may not get as much attention as they possibly should. And hopefully anyone listening or watching this in time will get the opportunity to have their eyes and ears opened a little bit further as well, and maybe get involved in whatever capacity they can. So firstly, thank you for joining us and Navigating these topics. 

Sure. Absolutely. This is something I'm very passionate about and I can talk, talk all day long about wildlife. So. 

Excellent. So it's safe to say you, you have dedicated your life pretty much to, to connect wildlife and nature conservation 32 years. I think with a us fish and wildlife agency as a special.

Law enforcement agency. That correct?  

Yeah, that's true. Over three decades of my life, I think I spent with Fish and Wildlife Service in a couple of different roles, but I just get right into my career there. I started, I, my back, just give you a little bit about my background. I grew up in the middle of the United States in the Midwest, a rural farming agricultural type community.

Small town, everybody knew everybody. And I really credit my, it was probably my dad that instilled this passion that I carry today as it relates to the outdoors. The story I was told when I guess was a little kid, my, my mom created a back, she sewed a backpack before really I could walk and my dad would put me on his back and take me out in the woods.

And, and so it doesn't surprise me. That's the route I chose to go because I started off. Basically out in the woods with my dad, but he was very by the rules and he had a real deep appreciation for, for wildlife and the critters and, and following the rules. But he was a hunter and he was a fisherman. And so you learn early on about the respect for the animals.

And, and so that transcended throughout my life, but it was really created early on and growing up in rural America, we didn't have a whole lot of money. And so we had to make our own entertainment and really the outdoors was my. Was my entertainment. It was where I could go and see birds and mammals and reptiles and all those sorts of critters.

And, and so I, I really developed a real passion for them. And this of course, predates the internet. Back in those days, you had to do a lot of reading. And so I would try to read as much as I could about animals and immerse myself in animals. But I think I've said this before, but back in the 1960s and seventies, The big highlight on TV was a television show here in the United States.

I don't know if it's where you're at, but we had a show called Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom. And it was a weekly TV show. There were two hosts for that show and they went on adventures around the world. And it was, it was a modern day safari without the hunting, but they went out and they showed you different animals from all over the globe.

And it was individual by the name of Marlon Perkins. And his sidekick was Jim Fowler. Anyway, as a young kid, Who was already really in the animals. This was my, my go to every week. I couldn't wait for that television show to go on and I would watch that show. And for somebody that was growing up in the middle of nowhere and really truthfully had not the ability to travel the world and see these kinds of animals.

I lived through that TV show. And it really brought animals from around the globe into, into my home. And so that's where I learned about animals. Uh, and I always thought, man, it would be really cool to one day to be able to go somewhere and see some of the same animals that the Marlon Perkins and Jim Fowler were taking a look at and showing us all.

And so that sort of instilled this real passion. And I thought, wow, that'd be really neat if I could do that one day. And so that just followed me. Well, then when I. I went through school, I ended up going and getting my, uh, degree in, in wildlife ecology. And so it was no, no big shock. That was the degree that I pursued. 

And unfortunately for me, I went to one of the best colleges in our universities in the United States as it relates to wildlife and ecology. And so I was fortunate enough to get a job fairly quickly out of college and started my career working with the Fish and Wildlife Service as a wildlife inspector.

And as a wildlife inspector, it's a, it's a law enforcement position within the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service. But it's your state, you're stationed at ports of entry and your whole. role as an inspector is try to interdict illegal wildlife coming into or out of the United States. And so my first gig with the Fish and Wildlife Service was this wildlife inspector, and it really put me in a, you know, I moved away from the farm.

I was in the big city and I was entering planes and dealing with international passengers and cargo ships and doing all those sorts of things that. It was fairly new to me, but my, it really, it was a game of sort of cat and mouse were trying to find, find those illegal items that were being smuggled in.

And I did that for a couple of years, got fairly good at it, made some decent cases and, but there was something missing. When I went to college, I got my degree in wildlife ecology. And as I mentioned earlier, I always thought I was going to travel the world and work with species and in a, in a biological role.

And so an opportunity came up for me to work as an endangered species biologist for the Fish and Wildlife Service. And so I actually left law enforcement after a couple of years and took a position as an endangered species biologist, uh, working, uh, in the field. Um, and I thought that's the route I wanted to take.

And. Unfortunately, or fortunately, I guess it depends on how you look at it. Um, for me, uh, what became very apparent was as a biologist,  I, it seemed like I didn't have the ability to, to affect change or do things to right wrongs that I saw, and it made me contemplate my future. And I thought when I see somebody doing something wrong, as it relates to wildlife or the natural environment, I want to be able to do something about it.

And as a biologist, all I could do was. Make a phone call write a letter make some recommendations and hope somebody took action And so I decided that you know what? I need to get back in the law enforcement because as a law enforcement officer when you see something going wrong Under your authority, you can sometimes affect change and try to make a difference that way.

And so it's for me personally, it was the route I decided to go. So I  pursued law enforcement or decided to go back into law enforcement for Fish and Wildlife. And so I was selected as a one of 10. Special agents for the Fish and Wildlife Service back in 1992, and I entered the Federal Law Enforcement Academy here in the United States, and that really was the start of my career as a criminal investigator for the Fish and Wildlife Service, and that same career expanded three decades, and of course, over the three decades, I moved from a lower level field agent and worked my way up the ladder to the point where when I retired, I was the special agent in charge of the special investigations unit for the countries under the Fish and Wildlife Service.

And when I retired, I had a team of about 10  elite covert agents that were assigned to the unit. And we worked some of the largest and most complex International wildlife trafficking investigations around the globe. We worked with other foreign counterparts, and it was a group that I fortunately was able to grow and, and develop and mentor and actually participate with.

And we were a pretty tight knit team, but we did some really, some pretty big cases. In fact, we probably did some of the biggest and most well known investigations in the Fish and Wildlife Service history. And so I was very proud of that. I led that group for about 10. 10 or so years before my retirement.

And so that to get back to your original question, yeah, my, my career was over over a three decade long span, but it really started from early on my love and my passion for wildlife. 

Yeah. And then it's coming across Tim. There's a, there's a lot to unpack and we'll, we'll step, step through that. So going all the way back to your upbringings then in the Midwest, what were your wildlife encounters like there?

Sure. Forgive me, what was on your, your backyard or your countryside? What kind of animals did you get to witness locally before getting into the trade?  

Yeah, obviously I've been fortunate to travel the globe and see a lot of cool things. In the United States, I grew up in the Midwest and so we're somewhat limited in what we have there.

We had the typical deer and bird species and waterfowl, upland game, both sorts of animals. And, and that's why a kid like me was enthralled with watching a TV show that showed you lions and tigers and rhinos and hippos and things. And cause I thought, well, that's something that I'll never get a chance to see or witness myself.

And we didn't have the sort of the means to go off and travel out West to the, to the national parks and seeing all the cool, the elk and then, and the grizzlies and all the really cool things that the United States has a lot of cool animals too, as I've gotten to witness over the years. But early on. I just saw the common things, but I think for me, it was an appreciation that all the, all these animals had played some role, whether it was a bird or a reptile or a rabbit or everything had a, had a role.

And I was always interested in what role that animal had in, in, in that particular ecosystem. And that's the species that I came across as a kid. 

Yeah. See, when you were studying at college, did you have a specific discipline when you were doing wildlife ecology or is it a very broad subject? Does it cover many different species and parts of the environment?

Yeah, at least the way it worked back then was your bachelor's degree or your initial degree was more general because it included identifications of how to identify species, but it also was more general. Incorporated theories, management, disease, how to, the populations falling, how, what are the things that may contribute to that, and what can you do to maybe help increase population.

So it was a lot of population dynamics and those sorts of things. And then you start getting a niche or a specialization when you get older. Get your advanced degrees, whether they were, maybe you got an advanced degree in waterfowl, or whitetail deer, or bear management, both sorts of things. In the undergraduate capacity, it was more, more broad and not species specific.

Okay. And when you started working then, was there any sort of defining moment that made you think, this is, I want to move into law enforcement. There's something here that I want to tackle. Was there any sort of situation or case that you came across that was that spark?  

I'll tell you, as I said, I originally thought I was going to be a biologist and I, there was something that happened when I was a kid that sort of pushed me towards law enforcement.

I'm not, I don't even know if I've really ever told this story before, but, uh, I recall coming home from school one day and we lived out in the country and, and the woods was in my backyard basically. So I could walk out the back of my house and within a few hundred yards I'd be in, in my, my territory.

And so I came home one day from school and it was a, I think it was a spring day. And yeah, And I specifically recall being outside and I could hear somebody shooting a gun on our property. And I thought that, first of all, that really irritated the heck out of me. And I'm like, well, I'm going to find out what's going on down there.

And so I went to the woods and I looked and I hunted, trying to figure out where this was coming from. And lo and behold, I actually witnessed someone. Poaching ducks off of our, our wetland in the middle of the spring, I had a number of ducks hanging in a tree and he was shooting them and I confronted him, I'm just a kid, but I confronted him and  of course, there's not much I could do other than be mad about it.

And so I went home. And I got to thinking about it and it just made me really, you know, what,  uh, those are the kinds of people that I want to, that I want to catch one day. And that really pushed me in that direction. And then once I got hired by the office of law enforcement with the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service, once you started catching bad guys, it's, it, it just really is something that gets in your blood and you really, you want to keep, you want to catch the next one.

See, in, in terms of, So thanks, Tim, for sharing that. Firstly, it's interesting to see that even these things, these seeds in the back of the bucket about how they can cultivate over time and transpires that you picked up this as a career.  So in terms of like your career progression in the US, I'm interested to understand, is there much Interstate or within the U.

S. Is there much like wildlife trafficking trade within the U. S. or is a lot of this imported from maybe the South, South America, Central America or further afield such as Asia and Africa?  

Yeah, really there's a, we have a, we have our own issues with the illegal wildlife trade within the confines of the United States.

And those are more or less for the lack of a better term, a lot of it's illegal hunting and those sorts of things where. You know, individuals from one in the United States, obviously you move from one state to the next, there's different laws in each state, similar to Europe, if you're traveling from one country to the next here, it'd be one state to the next.

And so what may be legal here may not be legal there and so forth and so on. It's a lot of, you know, the Fish and Wildlife Service actually created the, their law enforcement folks. were created, uh, those positions were created in the turn of the century, like in around 1900. There was a law that came into effect called the Lacey Act.

And the Lacey Act was, was a law that was really, and this was like around 1900, was put into place to deal with illegal hunting going across state lines. And a lot of it had to do with, back in the early turn of the century, Market hunting was a huge problem in the United States, particularly as it related to waterfowl and some big game species, where some of the larger cities, there would be these organized groups would go and kill hundreds, if not thousands of ducks and geese and deer and all sorts of things, and then sell them in the market, and they were actually going from maybe one state to the next, and so they were crossing state lines, and so there was this interstate commerce involved, and our Congress was Actually, it was Congressman Lacey who, that's the name of the Lacey Act, proposed this law that prohibited certain activities related to wildlife and wildlife trafficking going across state lines.

And then eventually that transcended into going across the border, international trafficking. But the original law was created in 1900 and it dealt with local species here within the United States. But when you work for the Fish and Wildlife Service, you're a federal officer so you're national and so you're Territory is much larger, it's the whole United States, but also under that authority, you're also responsible for, I don't know, probably a dozen to 12, 12 to 20 plus different statutes that relate to international wildlife, either treaties or laws.

That you're also, uh, asked to enforce and that dealt with wildlife coming into the United States as well as going out. And so as a federal officer working for the Fish and Wildlife Service, not only were you concerned about what was occurring here in the United States, but your responsibilities. Uh, encompass all the wildlife in the world that was being trafficked across not only state lines, but international borders.

Yeah, that must be incredibly complex to navigate. Have you ever came across any situation where political red tape has stopped you getting a result?  

Oh yeah, yeah. I mean, I  A lot actually, and that was the thing when I was yelling on, you think you come out of the Academy and you got your gun and your badge and you're going to save the world and save the planet and, and you're, and it doesn't take too long for you to get a dose of reality that you're not as big as you think you are.

And, and when politics and those sorts of things start having impact, you start realizing where your place is. And so you start working around. Trying to figure out how you're going to deal with that. And so, there was of course I had that, dealt with some of that throughout my career. But, and, and I'm sure we'll talk about that a little later here, but as I continue to work cases internationally, then you start working, you start dealing with corruption and corrupt governments and working investigations where you're You need to really, uh, vet the people you're working with and who you're working with and, and all that sort of a thing.

And that became very challenging because that's one thing if they're here in the United States and you have the opportunity to, to have some control or, or say, or authority, but when you're working with other government agencies, other organizations, informants, people in different parts of the world, and you're thousands of miles away.

There was a lot of trust that you had to have to work with these folks. That became real challenging. And at times  it became a problem, but at the end of the day, we always worried about officer safety, not only the safety of my officers, but the safety of our people working internationally, our people working with us.

As well as of course the wildlife, but you always had, you always were concerned and had to be thinking about. about corruption and how if someone was to divulge what you're doing, how that had a potential safety risk to the people that you were working with. 

Yeah. And  in doing my research, Tim, I think two notable operations that kind of came to light where it was Operation Snowplow and Operation Crash.

I think Snowplow was, was that relating to big cats, illegal killing, skinning, crushing,  It's horrendous. And then crash was to do with the rhino horn trading and the ivory trade. But so are you okay talking us through those two operations in terms of how they came to be and what kind of results and impact you got from them? 

Sure. Actually, as I said, I, when I started my career, I did a lot of, I guess that now looking back, we're probably a little lower tier types of investigations, but you've got to start somewhere and you learn and you start learning and developing a specialty and a niche. And I, Was fairly good at what I was doing.

And I started to develop a pretty decent reputation amongst my peers. And I kept wanting to,  anyone that knew me and worked with me knew that I was always that option that was trying to think out of the box. I, you know, if he told me, no, you're never going to catch that guy, I'm going to try to figure out how we're going to catch that guy.

And so I was always up for those kinds of challenges and trying to. Not just take all the easy cases, but try to work something that was very difficult because I had this mindset that if you don't try, you know, you're not, you're definitely not going to catch them. And if you try and you don't catch them, nothing, no big, no loss.

You at least you tried. And I, and I encouraged my, the people that worked under me for all those years. They often heard me encourage them to work those really difficult cases that nobody else wanted to work or didn't think you could succeed. And so when I was working about 10 years into my career, I had an op, I actually got a, an anonymous phone call from someone that, Reported to me that there was this group of individuals based out of Chicago, Illinois, who were interested in killing big cats.

And of course, when you're in the role that I was, you take a lot of these kinds of calls and more times than not, they don't turn out to be. Either legitimate or accurate or the information is just not very good. And so I, when I got the call, I was a little suspect, like I typically would have been, and I, you know, but I was polite and I took the call and I took the information and when I hung up, I thought, yeah, no way this sound like this was crazy talk, I mean, you're telling me that people in the Chicago area were buying, Tigers, lions, leopards, jaguars, mountain lions, and putting them in cages and killing them, and then selling all their body parts to different people.

And, does this sound okay?  I was suspect, and I was so suspect of this individual, because typically, you get on their, what are their motives? Why are they coming to me? What are their motives? Are they, Are they genuinely interested in helping solve this crime against wildlife, or are they trying to get me to catch competition and take them out of the way, which makes their life a little easier?

Do they have an axe to grind? So you have all these other, these sort of, what's their motivation for, for calling me in the first place? And so, In order to figure that out, I did something I don't think I've ever done before, is I made this person meet me at the, at the prosecutor's office. And I held my first interview with this person within the walls of the prosecutor's office.

And I thought, if they're willing to meet me there, And they're willing to talk to me at the prosecutor's office and give me information. That'll tell me a lot. And so this individual actually met me there, was nervous, scared, all the above, but proceeded to just give me lots of information that just seemed like unbelievable.

This can't happen. And I thought, I'm going to give them the benefit of the doubt because they came and met me. I'm going to see. And so I said, next time you get some information that looks like this activity is going to happen where they're actually going to kill some cats.  Call me and let me know about it. 

And lo and behold, I did get a call and the call was, Hey, there's some individuals coming down from Chicago and they're driving down to Southern Missouri and they're going to be killing four, four tigers in a cage. And I'm like, yeah, and the U S. In the us Yeah. Jesus. And so I'm like, okay. And so of course I asked for more information and the information was a little sketchy, but it was like, they're gonna be driving this and they're gonna be pulling a, a boy, a trailer that ha it's a, a Boy scout trailer.

And that was, that was pretty specific. And so I thought, well, let's see what happens here. So I actually put a, a surveillance team together and we traveled down to that part of Missouri. And we set up on different vantage points along the highway and looking for this vehicle in this Boy Scout trailer to come by  it did.

I saw it. I was like, Oh, there it is. And so we followed and we did a surveillance and we actually did a surveillance and watched it go to the location that I told they were going to go. It was they were going to a ranch. And these tigers were actually four tigers that were sold basically out the back door of a zoo or some sort of animal park.

And these guys from Chicago were going to kill them and then part them out. And when that happened, that was like, okay, maybe this person really is in on to some information. And that really was the genesis of Operation Snowplow. And from that point forward, I believed and worked with this individual who was very instrumental in our success with that case.

But back in that day, we were a two person operation. It was me and the partner. We had  this, whatever it was, no internet. We didn't, we didn't have a lot of technology. We didn't have cell phones, all those little  technological disadvantages. And we still were able to, to get involved, but we worked as this group under in an undercover capacity.

And so we actually worked as in a different variety of roles. But one of the roles was as a hired hand or helpers.  Who were present during these killings. We knew where the killings were going to occur and we got hired to be there. And so while we were there, we were able to witness the killings. And so my partner would be there and he would actually, he would be there to help them drag the cats out of the trailers, help them hold them when they were skinning them, doing all, all the grunt work.

I was actually the guy videotaping all this stuff. And so that's how it worked in the, in, it was just a, basically a two man operation and I'll never forget. But I became, I had a friend who worked for the FBI and he introduced me to a tech agent. And this was really my first exposure to. Uh, all are really cool gadgets that the FBI was using.

And when I was talking to them about this case that I was working, killing tigers, it was suggested that we start putting cameras inside these trailers and we could capture these killings on camera. And I did that. I got it. I actually borrowed a camera from the FBI and put it in a trailer. And we were able to capture some of these killings where the bad guys were killing the cats.

And so anyway, Fast forward, that was a, a snowplow. We ended up, it was a very stressful case because as you can imagine, we were under a lot of pressure about all the killings happening and there was a concern that we all shared and particularly my office and the, and the prosecutors were at what point does this become too much and we start turning off the public. 

There's eventual support of this because we've allowed tigers and leopards and jaguars and things to be killed and there was a kind of happy medium about that. I was 

going to ask that, Tim, how was that received? Because that's firstly twofold. How did you deal with that personally witnessing that? And surely that must have left a bit of a mental scar, was that? 

Yeah, it was tough. It was tough. And I guess. You know, I'll mention it here is, you know, when we're talking about niches and specialties and things, I became, that case gave me the reputation for working covertly, working undercover. So basically for the last 20 years of my career, I was basically working a lot of undercover stuff.

And 

when you work undercover, you see all that stuff firsthand, you see the killings. And you have to play this part where you can't let that stuff bother you. And so here we are, we're watching a beautiful tiger. I'll never forget. There was a tiger cub. They actually killed that. There was a truckload of tigers that came out of Wisconsin and they killed them all, but one.

And there was a, it was a baby cub. And even these as ruthless and as bad as these guys were, they didn't have the guts to kill that baby tiger. And so they let it live. But then a week later. They called up and said, you know what? Hey, we got somebody wants that we're going to kill it. So they changed their mind.

And so I had to put a camera and so I had this tiger cub and I watched him kill that tiger cub. And so when you see that kind of stuff, you can't let it, you can't let it affect you. And so when you're working on the cover, particularly in that arena, it's different, it's tough. You can't let your emotions take over. 

You always have to be thinking and anticipating what's going to happen next and how you're going to react. And because when you're working undercover, the idea is you got to make them believe you are who you say you are, because if you don't, you run a risk to not only the case, but specifically to yourself or to your partners from a safety standpoint.

But yeah, I saw, unfortunately, I saw a lot of things get killed over the years. I 

was going to say, yeah, so those, that specific case then with those tigers, cause I've seen a few documentaries about in Asia, you know, what they do with tigers and tiger weighing and yeah. What was the motive behind that in the U S? 

Did you find out what they were doing with the parts? Was it a kind of cultural thing, a religious thing, or? 

I think it was opportunistic. The kind of the ringleaders of this were quasi  taxidermists who had a clientele. They had individuals that were interested in skins or mounts for their trophy rooms, but then they also had clients that were involved.

Look, this is what they did. They could buy a tiger. The thing about these big cats in captivity is. They're cool when they're little, but when they get big, not only dangerous, but they're expensive to keep. And after, after, and they live a long time. And so after a while, you're like, okay, I'm going to get rid of this thing.

And so you can sell it so that you could buy a tiger fairly cheap. When I always, I would always say you could buy a thousand dollar tiger. And parted out  for 10, 000. And so it was worth a lot more dead than alive. And so these taxidermists who through their contacts and clients. Started thinking to themselves, heck, we can make a bunch of money here.

All we have to do is buy a bunch of these ex zoo, circus, backyard, menagerie animals, kill them, part them out, and we'll tenfold our money back. And so that's what it was based on. It wasn't based on really anything else, but our tigers that were killed in lions and leopards, everything that crew, the hides were sold,  the meat was sold to a meat market in Chicago, the bones, the gallbladders, the skulls, The clause, uh, all those parts had different values to them and could be sold to different groups.

Of course, Chinese traditional Chinese medicine utilize a lot of, of these kinds of things in their medicines. And if you found, and if you found the right buyers.  I think through the course of that 18 month investigation, I believe there was about  70 or so animals that were killed. Tigers, lions, leopards and so forth.

All for the body parts. 

That's tragic really. It's even more tragic than it's done for like trophy hunting. Trophies to a degree. Tragic. Really is.  

Yeah, it gets to the point where it was a little hilarious because some of these guys would actually dress up in a safari outfit, uh, after they killed it in a cage, drag it out into the, to the woods and then pose with pictures to make it look like they did some big 

What an absolute bunch of losers.

Some big hunts. Yeah. That's  Tragic. Absolute losers. If there's anybody that knows anybody that has one of these in their house or lodge or whatever, you are a loser.  Ugh. Tragic. Anyway. 

Yeah. It wasn't good. In the end, we were successful. We prosecuted 17. And we made In that case, was Catapulted my career for the most part that case got global attention.

They got a lot of media attention every day. We had a trial and every day that trial was on the front page of the Chicago tribute. And so there was a lot of interest and you know, the way the United States works when there's that kind of thing happening, then all of a sudden you start getting politicians interest.

People are interested in some politicians are interested and that actually helped. Pass some legislation passed and it just, one thing led to the next. And as I said, it gave me confidence that I could work on the cover. I can work these big cases. I finally proved to myself that, uh, that I could do this kind of thing.

And I just kept that going. And that really, you know, Carried on for the next 20 years of my, the last 20 years of my career, where I worked cases like that one after another, uh,  led into a bunch of different undercover cases. 

I was going to say, Tim, so after that, you were very much in the mix there in the front line with that.

As your experience and career continued, did you start to have people working for you undercover covert operations? And how did that,  and how did that training and passing on of knowledge and insights, how did that develop? Was that something you had to pass down? Did you have to pick your team? How does it, how did that, all that come together? 

Yeah. So when actually it was before, uh, before I even finished the prosecution of snowplow, I was, I was promoted. To a supervisory role in which I was responsible for the law enforcement programs in three different states. And so I had, and I also supervise a fairly large contingent of employees in Chicago who are wildlife inspectors like myself in my early days.

Who are monitoring trade. And so I went from working undercover and doing all this stuff to now being a, a supervisor and manager of a large number of people. But I still had these other responsibilities and that's really where my love, I, I really love doing the field work and, but I, I also realized the importance of leadership and mentoring and guiding and the, the, the, the agents and the inspectors that worked for me.

I really try to encourage and help them and provide as much advice and mentorship as I could so they could do similar things and I actually had a number of really good. agents working for me that did big undercover cases like I had done and it was really cool to see some of those cases moving forward involving some large reptile undercover reptile cases and a bunch of other things where they were very successful and so obviously very prideful of that and so I did this for quite some time and then it was in 2011 and I was still in that role you But I was working as a supervisor, but I was also working as an undercover officer and I had, I wore a couple different hats and they got a little complicated  once in a while because they wanted you to be a boss and they, and yet I wanted to be a field guy.

And so there was always these sort of struggles. But into the Fish and Wildlife Service, we've got a new, uh, Chief of Law Enforcement for the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service, an individual by the name of Bill Woody. And Bill, Mr. Woody was our new Chief. And one of his approaches shortly after becoming the Chief was, uh, he wanted to go around the country and introduce himself and meet people.

Employees and so he would schedule meetings and so forth with different parts of the country. And I specifically met with him. I believe it was in, actually, it was probably in the fall of 2010,  maybe I had a meeting with my team of all my agents, inspectors in Chicago, and he met me there at the meeting and, and sat in on our meeting, but he pulled me aside after the meeting and we had a private conversation and it was in that conversation when he talked about, and again, he was brand new.

And so he had done a little. Uh, digging on me to see what I've done and who I am. And during that conversation, he asked if I'd be interested in  leading a really large, complex investigation, specifically on rhino horn trafficking.  And of course, um, I admit, I'll admittedly, I, I knew very little about rhino horn trafficking.

I, uh, I mean, I knew what rhinos were, but as far as rhinos in the Midwest and in the United States, it wasn't something that we dealt with on a daily On a fairly regular basis. But of course, when the new chief asked you to take on a task like that, I was, yeah, immediately I agreed to, to do it and I did it and through our discussions, we came to this agreement that I would be able to create this team of agents that would help me work this, this rhino horn investigation.

And so that was a start of me working, which led ultimately led to operation crash, but A funny story is that shortly after I agreed to take that on, I start reaching out and, and asking, trying to ask people for information on rhino horns and learn about the trade. And if you look at the statistical data around the two, particularly in Africa, that started the, really the uptick.

Of rhino poaching specifically in South Africa, where we started seeing the numbers of rhinos being poached in our, in Kruger and some of the other national parks. It was, it all started in the late 2009, 2010. I think I've got 9, 

000%. I think when I was researching, it went up by 9, 000%. 

Yeah, it was incredible.

And it kind of coincided with when I got asked to undertake this. So when I started looking for Intelligence, information. Okay, I've been asked to do this case. I need to know what's going on out there. And so I put it out there to a few people that I was working this. And so I started also, so the funny story that I was going to tell you is  one of the things I did throughout the years is I used to give platelets, blood platelets for cancer patients.

And it's a fairly lengthy process. It's about a four hour process where you have to sit. For four hours, and they take your blood out and they strip your blood of platelets. And then they put the blood back in your body and so forth. And I've always been told that the platelets are considered they're like yellow gold.

That's what really helps cancer patients survive during their treatments. And so I just felt it was something I wanted to do. And so I would do that from time to time, get platelets. And there was a January, it was in January of 2011. I was actually laying in a chair, giving platelets at the platelet center.

And I got a phone call and of course my arms, I have needles in both arms, but I proceeded to answer the phone and it was an agent that was aware that I was Leading this rhino horn case and this agent said hey, I know you're leading this rhino horn case But I wanted to share some information that I got today.

I got a call from Europol and apparently There is group of from Rathkeel, Ireland Known as the RAF Kill Rovers. That's an organized crime family, that our group, a syndicate group, that the information suggested that they were involved in rattle horn trafficking. And specifically the information that came to my, my partner there was.

That two individuals were flying to the United States that day and specifically to broker some deals on rhino horns in the United States.  And so I said, okay, I said, where are they? Where, you know, what can you give me more information? So these are their names and this is the flight and they're going to be landing in St.

Louis, Missouri.  I was about three hours from St. Louis, Missouri. But I did have two agents, uh, that worked for me that were in St. Louis. And so I, I hung up the call phone and I, I called my agents and I said, Hey, I'm giving platelets. I'm about 3 or 3 plus hours away, but this is what we need to do. We need to run a surveillance.

We got these guys coming in from Ireland and alleged, I don't have a whole lot of information, but we believe they're going to be involved in rhino horn. Trafficking here in the United States. So we need to set up a surveillance. And so my two guys took that and ran with it. And, and so of course, between me giving platelets and then running home and packing a bag and taking off and driving three hours during that time period,  I was advised that sure enough, two guys from Ireland landed here they are and we had them under surveillance and we, we surveilled them from the time they got off the plane till they went and got a rental car.

And, uh, my team was following them. And so I.  Figured out where they were and ended up joining the surveillance. Lo and behold, it was, we had a terrible winter storm hit that day. So while we're on, while we're doing the surveillance, we're involved in a snow storm and the roads were bad. They're pretty hazardous and our bad guys ended up going off and getting a hotel for the night.

And so now we're sitting in a parking lot all night because you don't know when they're going to leave and you don't want to miss them and so. We're running around the clock waiting for that car to leave the parking lot so we can resume our surveillance. And so that's what we did through the night.

And these guys, it became apparent while we were doing the surveillance that they were fairly versed on counter surveillance. Uh, they weren't your run of the mill average bad guys that we were used to working. These guys did a lot of maneuvers, trying to determine if they were being followed and so forth.

But we ended up following a couple hour drive away from St. Louis. And they ended up going to Macon, Missouri. And there was actually  an animal auction house there in Macon, Missouri. Without all the movies, the garage door goes open, the car goes inside, the garage door shuts, and now we have all these buildings and the vehicles in there, and we don't know what's going on.

So we're sitting on the perimeter doing surveillance on, on these two guys from Ireland, and we still don't really know what's happening, and we don't know why they're there, but we're developing information, we're developing intelligence, and to get to the counter surveillance, another one of the things that I recall now as I'm speaking to you is, I remember the garage door after a couple hours came up and the car left And they left in a direction that made no sense, but they were going down a very like a two lane highway and  My senses in me said they're trying to see if they're being followed and so We, we actually were pretty, I backed the team off and we actually just sat and stayed and let them go.

And they went for a short distance and we know through the course of the investigation that they actually were, they turned around and sat on the highway waiting to see if anybody was following them when they felt comfortable that nobody was following them. They drove back to that auction house. The door goes open the car goes in and the door goes back down And you know what we can surmise from that is they were making a dry run to see if they were going to get Pulled over by the police And so since nobody pulled them over they felt that okay, we're in the clear And so then they took off later that night and they drove back to st.

Louis and um, yeah, I followed we followed uh into uh They stopped off at a bank, and I actually remember following them inside the bank and milled around like I was a customer in this bank and watching them do their thing. And they actually met with one of the people, one of the managers of that bank, and they had some conversations.

With this manager and so once they left my team resumed the surveillance on him But I stayed there at that bank and I proceeded to interview This bank manager to find out what they were involved in Of course, there wasn't a whole lot of information they were willing to share with me But one of the things I I  was able to determine through their banking records Was the fact that they were dealing with a uh individual and a chinese a national out of new york city You And so now I had a name of a Chinese national in New York city that I knew that they were dealing with through their bank account.

And so the next day they actually got on a plane and flew to New York city and we got on the plane with them and flew to New York city with them and resumed our surveillance there. But the reason I mentioned all that is that was like the key evidence that I had. That helped us  create Operation Crash.

That was the genesis of Operation Crash because  when I found that Chinese national's name and information, we were able to put that person into our system. And we were actually alerted a few days later, that individual was departing New York City, a JFK and flying to Hong Kong. And so we were able to make contact at the airport prior to the takeoff of that flight.

And. Inspect that individual's luggage. And sure enough, we found a rhino horn and elephant ivory that he was smuggling from New York city to JFK. So now,  you know, now I'm thinking, okay, I got these Irish guys that showed up and they're connected to this Chinese guy. And now this Chinese national is flying back to Hong Kong and he's got a rhino.

And so things started clicking. And so when we did a search warrant, We arrested this individual and we did a search warrant of his home.  We found more evidence and that evidence brought us to more people. And then that one thing spiraled. And so before you know it, operation crash was up and running and I, I needed, I needed more people.

I needed more help. And so I started bringing in some of the best.  agents there were joined our team, our operation crash team. And so at one point, I think we had about 40 separate investigations going on under the umbrella of operation crash. So when you talk about operation crash, you're actually talking about upwards of maybe 40 different investigations.

And in cases.  It was a laundry list of things, from raw horn, to abation cups, to auction houses, to smuggling, to hunters killing rhinos. It was a hodgepodge of different things, but 

It's amazing to think how that started, Tim. Just thinking of those decisions that were made along the way, where you might have made slightly different decisions.

different decision or follow the car and not follow the car. And then you may have not  untangled this web of international,  uh, illicit trades. It's incredible. Yeah. 

You hit, I have a phrase that I commonly say is life is filled with T intersections and you've got to make a right or a left. And depending on which direction you go can have a different outcome.

And for me, You put yourself in the best position to, to, to have the right outcomes. And so when you do that, you make those decisions, you stand by them. They don't always work out. And I've certainly had my share of failures along the way, but you're right. Hey, I'm laying on the gurney giving platelets. If I didn't answer that phone that day, if I didn't decide to drive three hours down, if we didn't follow the car, if I didn't see him going in the bank, if I didn't see the The name on the check, you know, from it's 

the conversation with the person in the bank, even hanging back to have the conversation.

It's those little, no doubt, experience built instincts and stuff. But yeah, what was it? So what was the extent of the outcome of crash, you know, in terms of convictions and impacts and what they've done for the impact on the trade. Sure. 

It was, it was, it became, it was huge. It's probably, if not the, it's got to be at the top of the largest investigations done by Fish and Wildlife Service.

We had over a hundred something officers involved in the arrest and takedowns and searches on the day. And this was done across the United States. And so I had to try to organize this in a variety of venues, a variety of states.  And put this all together and it was a team effort. It was myself and about six, seven, eight different agents.

And that was it. We had a, we had some very good prosecutors and we had support. And again, the fact that the chief trusted me. So to run this case the way it needed to be run gave me the opportunity to bring people into the team. I had the financial means to be able to travel and do the kind of case that we That needed to be done and everything like that contributed to the to the overall success, but it was a huge deal I think in the end it's probably still There's still some lingering prosecutions that happen because I just, I retired in December of 2020, but up until my retirement, I think we charged 54 individuals and we got, I think at that time it was around 42 convictions.

And there were still some lingering prosecutions that had, had happened. I had to take place and I'm hoping some of them have in the last was 

that 

international? 

Was that international? Yeah. Wow. 

Well, yeah, I think that was one of the things too that we done in crash that hadn't been done Hardly at all ever is we started reaching out and grabbing bad guys overseas And extraditing them back to the united states.

And in fact, I talked about the wrath kill rovers We did, I did, we did a bunch of investigations on the rovers and I think all, I think we arrested  five, six, seven different Irish members of the Rathkill rovers and extradited them back to the United States for prosecution here. And they were all convicted and sentenced here to terms of imprisonment here in the United States.

And of course, we did the same thing with some of the other individuals that were involved in Africa and Southeast Asia, made those arrests and, and brought them back to the United States. And so that,  as we started to show that we could do these kinds of cases, it really opened up the conversation.  You, we see today as it relates to wildlife trafficking, wildlife trafficking, wasn't really a buzzword that was thrown around very often when I was doing these cases, but as obviously, as they receive attention,  people became really interested in wildlife trafficking and so many things happen as a result of.

The crash case, whether they be legislative changes, Rhin O Horn and ivory bans in the United States. We did an ivory crush. We did a Rhin O Horn burn. We, we encouraged other countries to do the same. Um, then we started seeing, uh, some of the ambassador, U. S. ambassadors in these countries. Particularly in, in countries where these wildlife crimes were happening, they started showing a real interest in fish and wildlife agents and the work that we were doing.

And so they wanted attachés in their embassies and that sort of helped catapult the attaché program that is in place now for the Fish and Wildlife Service. I believe there's probably 10 to 12 attachés now that weren't there when we started Operation Crash. We, like I said, we've affected the law changes and so forth.

That was very rewarding. I think some of the, some of the proud thing, I've had a lot of proud moments during those cases. But one of the things is when, when we did these takedowns, we would seize large amounts of cash, uh, gold, all kinds of different jewelry, cars, luxury cars, those sorts of things. And as I mentioned early on, I always like to think out of the box.

So I was thinking, how can we turn this bad into something good?  And in, in, in deliberating with our prosecutors and with the courts, and in many cases, even with the bad guys through plea agreements, a lot of this money and proceeds were forfeited restitution was  as restitution or fines. And so we would earmark some of those fines and restitutions for.

Uh, conservation projects through various conservation funds. I think, I think we seized about seven to 8 million in cash and gold. And some of that money was earmarked for specifically for rhino conservation. And one of the neat stories that, that I like to tell is there was a big chunk of this money. We sold all these gold bars that we ended up seizing from the bad guys.

Because they traded in gold because it was easier to hide their money when you're dealing in gold and cash as opposed to creating a paper trail and their efforts not to get caught. A lot of the bad guys would deal in cash currency or in gold to minimize their risk of getting caught through the banking system.

But when we ended up seizing gold bars. We sold that gold and used those proceeds for a conservation fund for rhinos. And one of the cool things is some of that money went to a, to Kenya and in Kenya, they use that money to purchase some land where they were going to help save the black rhino. And I believe the year after they bought land with that money, a baby black rhino was born on, on this land.

And it's those kinds of stories that give you some sense of appreciation and comfort that you're. You've been doing the right thing and you're following your passion. And because it would have been really, it'd been a lot easier on me and my team and even the prosecutors that we would just. let that money go to the general fund and let them use it for whatever purpose they felt. 

We wanted to try to do some good. And so there was a number of situations where monies like that were earmarked for different conservation projects. And so that was, uh, rewarding certainly.  

Was Operation Crash the highlight of your career? Has that been the most rewarding? Would you see?  

Yes and no. Yes. Um, I mean, it certainly was the most challenging.

It was the first time when I was put in charge of Some extremely, um, stressful, complex, we might have a couple,  20 to 30 of these things going on all at the same time and some of them are undercover and so all the different nuances and so there was a lot happening and it was really the first time I was able to showcase my abilities as a supervisor, as a leader, as a mentor, as a boss.

And the rally, and so from that standpoint, yeah, it was probably one of the most rewarding times of my career. Probably the one case that may stand out above all others is After the success of CRASH, I was made the special agent in charge of the special investigations unit to where I went beyond CRASH to work other cases.

And so now I had this team of agents. These were the best and the brightest working for Fish and Wildlife that were now assigned to work in our unit. And one of the things I would encourage my team to do is we would sit around a table and we would brainstorm. And I actually asked each one to come to the meeting and do a presentation on what kind of case they would like for us to all to work and we were working as a team.

And so they would give a pitch and each one would go around with different types of cases to work. And one of my agents was very interested in working, um, the, the, the organized crime. Factions in Southeast Asia that were involved in rhino horn trafficking. And, and so we started looking into that. We started realizing there was a connection between Asia and, and Africa.

And so we determined we were going to start some sort of cases. working transnational criminal syndicates operating between Asia and Africa. And about that time, the, there was one of our new attachés that got assigned to Tanzania. He was, became aware through his contacts there in Tanzania. He became aware that an individual was arrested in Nanda, who is considered to be a major rhino horn trafficker and ivory trafficker in Eastern Africa.

His name was Mwazakroma. And so Mwazakroma, and so when they reached out to our attache, when they arrested Mwazakroma and some of his, his cohorts, they seized a number of, of cell phones.  And it's one of the things that we were able to do was to retrieve intelligence and information after post arrest.

And that information was shared with my unit, between the Ugandans and my unit. And it became clear at that point that Mwaza Kroma was someone that we, that was the person we were trying, we were, we were trying to figure out who we needed to take a run at and Mwaza Kroma was the individual that That came on our radar and a lot of it was prompted by the fact that the Ugandans and our attache had this relationship and that developed a relationship with my team and again, right place, right time and having these making some decent decisions put us in the right place.

But they came to us with with this. This treasure trove of Intel and we started working it and we worked that as an undercover operation. And one of the decisions we, you know, through the information, we believe that not only were, was a syndicate involved in trafficking, uh, rhino horns and elephant ivory, but we felt that they were also trafficking in narcotics.

And so we decided, and much like. And which you're probably aware, but a lot of these transnational crimes, we call it convergence. There's a convergence of crimes. Just because they're dealing today in Pangolin scales doesn't mean tomorrow they not may not be involved in arms trafficking or human trafficking or narcotics.

And there's a lot of overlap. Uh, bad guys are bad guys and they just want to, they're opportunistic. And so it's about making money. And it's just what happens. A lot of times traffic, people involved in trafficking wildlife are also involved in these other. Uh, crimes and so. I 

think I seen it Tim, it was like 23 billion dollars I think it's valued at,  this wildlife trafficking at Civmarket isn't it?

Huge. Yeah, the number, there's a lot of anecdotal information that goes, gets thrown around out there. It's a large number and it's up there with the same, uh, statistics that you see for narcotics and human trafficking and arms and those sorts of things. But it doesn't get the same fanfare. It doesn't get the same attention.

It is  certainly the momentum's moving that direction. But, but for the most part, it really, there are vast differences between trafficking humans from, from Bumbia or Bogota or someplace like that. As, or killing a wildlife. There are some huge differences, but. There's a lot of overlap because money's money is really what's driving a lot of this.

But anyway, we decided that because we felt that they were also involved in narcotics trafficking, that I would try to link up with our counterparts with the Drug Enforcement Administration, the DEA. And so the DEA had a presence in Africa. They had a presence in these countries that we knew the Croma and his syndicate were operating.

And so we decided to make this a joint U. S. Special Wallet Service, DEA operation. And so we called it Operation Manhattan Project  and excuse me, the, the Croma syndicate was the, the people we were most interested in, not only for rhino horns, but also for  trafficking and then what turned out to be heroin.

And so  through that,  and this all sort of relates to where I am today. The person assigned in Kenya at the time was a DEA agent by the name of Wim Brown. Wim Brown was stationed in Kenya for about three years. Wim is one, was one of the most  Uh, he was a very good DEA agent, made some very notable and high profile arrest, uh, throughout his career.

And and so he was there in Kenya. And so Wim decided that he would, him and his team would link up with us and we'd work Mwaza Kroma together. And so we worked Mwaza and you know, early on, I said, I'd like to work those cases where people say, there's no way you're going to be able to catch this guy. Um, and that was a challenge that, uh, we were told about Mwaza Kroma.

Kroma was a Liberian living in Uganda, which would seem like impunity. He had been arrested. Uh, he had still was running his syndicate three years after he was arrested and not brought to justice and just left to do his thing. And so that was a challenge. We knew we were going to have to be careful. We had to be concerned about people finding out what we were doing.

And so we had a very tight.  that we worked with in Uganda, and we worked with some very awesome Ugandans that helped us, including the people involved in the prosecution there, but we had to keep it tight knit because we could not risk that any information getting out. And so that was very challenging.

And so, when we, to get back to your comment about that investigation stands out for me only from the standpoint that. This was a real life sort of Jason Bourne movie for me. It was, it was a international, uh, it was intrigued. It was corruption. It was, uh, a lot of bad guys doing bad things. Um, and then, so it got to a point where we decided, okay, it's time to, to take this down and what we did through our undercover, we orchestrated a huge buy of, I think, three tons.

We agreed to buy three tons of elephant ivory from a syndicate and we were going to make this buy in In senegal, I believe it was and then we were also going to buy heroin in kenya And so we orchestrated this takedown for say Where we try to do it all at the same time. And so I had agents in Senegal and agents in Kenya had agents in Uganda.

And I would and so myself and a couple agents flew over there, met at the embassy, met with our counterparts, met with the State Department. And spent days trying to put this operation together with the, of course, the support of Uganda as well as the U. S. Embassy there. And that was very, it was, like I said, it was a Bourne like movie because the day we were going to take it down, Croma Even though we had him under surveillance for three straight days, the day we're gonna take him down, he wasn't there.

And so that sort of put us in a panic mode because we didn't know where he was and what he was doing. But long story short is that he was, he had caught wind, unfortunately, like I was concerned. He caught wind that we were there. And so in his effort to escape our attempts to, to, to capture him, he ab actually voluntarily went to court. 

To turn himself in for those crimes three years earlier and asked to be, uh, this is what I've been told. I wasn't actually there at the time, but I was, I was led to believe that he was actually there in court, um, under the premise that he might get sentenced for that crime and thus prevent us from being able to grab him.

Um, anyway, the Ugandans ended up, uh, this was a Ugandan operation. We were there in an, quote, an advisory role. And the Ugandans, because he was not from Uganda, they had the ability to expel him out of the country.  And the president of Uganda expelled Mwaza Kroma from the country. And so the Ugandans actually apprehended Mwaza Kroma and brought him to the airport and put him on a plane destined for the United States.

And so  myself and three or four other agents. We got on the plane with Chroma, and we flew to New York City with Moazza Chroma in the plane. And when we landed there, obviously he was arrested in the United States because he was charged for, for the crimes that we uncovered during the investigation. That 

is a movie script in its own right.

That's a documentary slash movie script.  

As you can imagine, there's so many decisions, so many things, we could talk for hours about. Nuances of trying to put that together and get him out to the airport and all the roadblocks that we came across, people trying to stop us. And it really wasn't until we were wheels into the air that I really think this was going to happen because up until that time, I kept thinking in the back of the mind, something bad's going to happen here.

But anyway, he came to the United States, was arrested, pled guilty and was sentenced and, uh, and so were his cohorts and they were all extradited. Back to the United States. That was a, probably one of the highlights of my, my career, as far as that particular case. But we have, we had a list, there's a laundry list of cases and they all didn't always have to be big to be, to be important.

Some of them were small cases, but for a variety of reasons, we're really important either because of the message or the person we caught, or maybe a law was changed as a result. Did you 

ever feel under threat or in danger at any point through your operations?  

Yeah, there were certainly situations where that happened.

It was just, it came with the territory and I just, for whatever reason, undercover, that was my sort of niche. That was the world I really liked to be in. I was, uh, Apparently I was fairly good at lying or making people believe I was somebody that I wasn't. And so were the people that I surrounded myself with.

And so we had a core group that liked to do that, but with that, it wasn't for everybody. And with that, you had to understand the challenges. You had to understand the danger. You, and so you always had to make sure that this was right for you. I, I participated in a lot of trainings. I still do today and including undercover.

And there's people that believe they want to work on the cover and then they soon realize that, oops, this is not for me because you got to be able to react. You got to be able to handle stress. You got to be able to think 2 or 3 questions down the road because when you when they finally ask you the question you were anticipating.

You already have the answer that, because if they don't believe you, it could be bad news for you. It could be bad news for your partners. It could be bad news for the operation. And it's really critical that you know what you're doing and you feel comfortable doing it. 

Yeah.  Was there ever a point where you, you thought. 

Enough's enough. I can't do this or continue 

that. Well,  not necessarily myself. I did, I had situations where I got a little, a little dicey and including when you have weapons and cause you're always, we're dealing with people that are armed or dealing with people that a lot of times you're in remote locations.

I worked undercover in Alaska and me and my partner, we were with two bad guys and we went off in a, in a fishing vessel hours from really the nearest Town in the middle of nowhere, no phone service. We had a satellite phone. That was our emergency phone. If something went bad, but I was so now we're on a boat and we're on a boat with bad guys who had the opportunity to rifle through your things, look at your stuff.

You always had to be on guard 24 seven. A lot of times when you work undercover you work and then you go to your hotel room or you go home or you do Something so you have a you have an opportunity to catch your breath and the distance yourself from the bad guys But during that particular operation, I me and my partner we lived on that boat with these guys for several days And it was 24 7 Um, I really was concerned about them because we wore body wires and we had recordings and I was worried about that kind of thing.

And so I actually kept, it seems a little silly now, but I actually decided that I was going to wear a, an athletic cup.  And I stored all my undercover tapes in my athletic cup. Cause I figured there's no way they're getting there to find them. And so that's what we had to do because I didn't want to risk the operation or our safety.

But. When you talked about, was there any one of those moments, not necessarily for myself, but I actually had a large undercover investigation going on that I brought in a couple of agents to work for me in an undercover capacity. So I, I ran the operation, but I had agents that were in the field. And so I was responsible for them.

And, uh, on one particular day, they were in another country, they were in Canada, and they called me in a frantic because  they were confident that the bad guys knew who they were. And they were weighing, should we get pulled out? Should we leave? Should we stay? So I had to talk them through this. And it was very nerve wracking trying to deal with that.

And as it turns out that we learned later, the bad guys did get tipped off that they were going to be worked undercover.  And they thought my undercover guys were the undercover guys, but my undercover guys did such a good job  that  they said, Hey, these guys, that's somebody that's going to be somebody else.

And so they succeeded in convincing them that they weren't on the cover. But there was that moment there where we had to make some decisions. Just, they decided to stay and stick it out and see. If they could convince them and they ultimately succeeded and the case went on and we were very successful as a result, but there was that, that split second where I got the call.

And they're in Canada, and they weren't sure 

what was going on. That's what I was touching on at the start of this, like, when I was talking about being a little bit more educated, because people can see on the surface, wildlife trafficking, the stats, the adverts that are on TVs, the commercials, but it's this that goes on behind the scenes.

It's that people are actually putting their lives  on the line to try and bring down some of these syndicates. It's, it's, uh, and it's not a TV show, it's actually happening. It's  Have you ever lost anyone in the field,  friends, colleagues? 

Not during my time. We've historically, we've lost some agents or my peers from over the decades, but not during my time period per se, not from a situation like that.

But to mention that, yeah, I try to remain very positive about these efforts, efforts to take on wildlife traffickers. And I try not to be cynical because. I know there's a lot of people that want to do a lot of good things. And, but I find myself filled with cynicism sometimes just from the standpoint that.

We have a lot of keyboard warriors out there that they sit behind the keyboard and they want to save the world and they know they got every answer. They're throwing out the regurgitating, you know, the same stat 50 times that they heard or read something from somebody else that regurgitated it. And none of them have been out there laying in the weeds with a gun pointed at you or accused of being an undercover officer or had to make life or death decisions.

And so it becomes real easy to sit behind your keyboard and talking about wildlife trafficking and what needs to be done to stop this. Look, we all share the same passion, but it's just hard when to, when you're in those scenarios to, I just, I find myself sometimes seeing and reading these things on the internet and, To me, it's like, there is a lot, there is 

a lot of virtue signaling with us that there absolutely is because people want to attach themselves to things to be seen to be doing the right thing a lot of the time, which just isn't the case.

So I totally get that  because I mean it's an industry in its own right. Some of this advertising and marketing that goes with a lot of that and it's, I mean it's pretty, I mean there's a lot of really dodgy charities out there as well, which  that's for another show and another time. Yeah, 

I mean, you're right.

I think it's just, it's today, it's the, it's social media. It's everyone wants to be out there and seen and heard. And look, I wholeheartedly believe majority of these people have the best intentions in the world. And, and maybe their only  connection to, to follow their passion. It's through social media and regurgitating some of this stuff or whatever.

But, but I can, I think the guys and the gals, the men and women that go out there and risk their lives on the front lines every day, I do a lot of training. I think the first time I ever got involved in training was in 2000. And it was really during the same time period I was doing Operation Snowplow.

And I got asked to lead the country.  Wildlife trafficking course in Africa that was being sponsored by the United States Fish and Wildlife Service. And it was at the ILEA or the International Law Enforcement Academy in Gaborone, Botswana. And I was asked to create a curriculum and bring on some agents and go over there and teach, uh, wildlife rangers how to work investigations, crime scenes, and all, all those sorts of things.

And that was my first, again, we're getting back to our original comments. I was just, I was a  farm boy from the Midwest and I never really went anywhere. And here I am in, in, in year 2000, I'm sent over to Africa to teach wildlife rangers how to catch bad guys. And it was that moment that I really became aware of the significance of Of the men and women on the front lines the the wildlife rangers and how What struck me the most and I carry this to the day is they do they put their lives on the line every day for virtually little pay  little appreciation Little training little technology little equipment Uh, they have, they basically, when you, and when I, when you get to know these people, they're just like you and I, they care about the same things.

They have the same family problems at home. They have the same passion about animals. The same, all of us, they're just no different, but that a lot of them just don't have the same opportunities as I was fortunate and blessed to be, to have. And so when you go over there, you really have a con, I have a connection with those people.

With the wildlife rangers on the front lines. And I don't think they get enough credit. We lose wildlife rangers all the time to poachers and, and others. And they just don't get the credit. And they are the real heroes, the unsung heroes of this effort to fight wildlife trafficking, and they just don't get the credit.

And that's why I still do that to this day, because  I get more out of it. Then I feel like I get, I take away a lot more than I give. I go there, I leave there. reinvigorated. I have just as much or more passion as I went there with, and I feel like, man, if they can do it and you think about it, these guys, they take off and they're in the bush for four days or weeks or months tracking, and they got to worry about getting not only shot by poachers. 

Even or killed by something extremely dangerous out there,  making very little money, they got families at home that depend on them. There's the dynamics of the Rangers. I have a really love and affinity for them and what they do and they for whatever will be. The reason I continue to even post retirement, do the things that I do, I want to do is everything I can to help those Rangers out.

That's fantastic.  On a bit of a side note, I had a guest on an earlier episode. So Dr. Niall McCann, and he is the director of,  What is known as the National Park Rescue, which is looking after  some parks in Africa. So I think it's Zimbabwe where they're established, and they've got a bit of a similar model where they're investing into the Rangers, into the education, so much so that they've given, their commercial model whereby they're incentivizing the rangers in the community, giving them life changing opportunities.

Poaching's down like 90 percent, lion populations are up like 40 percent, I think. And it's just incredible, just that time investment in those people. And the education training, giving them access to some technology and stuff. It's, yeah, it's great. 

Yeah. It's well worth the effort. I've been doing this training now since 2000.

I've been to Africa, Europe, Asia. I've done this, the Rangers in Botswana  are the same as the, they have the same love as the Rangers taught in Nepal or in Vietnam or Budapest or wherever. They all care about the same stuff. And it's, it's a, it's a pretty tight knit group and.  I, again, I just, I think, I think those people, that's where the highlight, those are the real heroes.

Those are the ones that are helping protect some of these animals. And when you go over there and you get to see these animals in the wild, it just, it goes full circle and it gets me back to my childhood days of dreaming about that. What was, 

what was your favorite animal when you were a child?  Oh, gosh, I  

probably had to be probably a primates, probably a chip or gorilla.

I grew up outside of St. Louis, Missouri, and St. Louis has one of the best zoos in the United States. And so as a family, that was like our big treat. We would go to the zoo all the time. And I used to really be fascinated by the, by the primates. And yeah, probably at that time, since then I've been lucky enough to have interacted with.

So many different animals around the world. I don't know if I could pick a favorite these days. Rhino is obviously one that I have a close affinity for due to crash. Of course, the tiger with operation snow plow and elephants with the chroma case. And I, I don't know. I want, I,  They all have a special place and I don't know if I have one favorite. 

It's difficult to choose. It's difficult to choose. Mine's a coincidence. When I was a kid, it was a gorilla, a silverback gorilla, because it was printed on the back of the milk cartons when we were in primary school. So everyone used to fight over, there was like 18 kids in our class and there was only like four with the gorilla on the back of it.

So whoever got the gorilla was like top of the class. 

Oh, that is very cool, but it 

changed. It's no longer a gorilla. My favorite is an orca. These days I have a right thing for saving orcas and in the wild.  

Really, I'll tell you what, that's a whole nother topic is the marine world. Before I left the, my unit, one of the big investigations we kicked off was a case called Operation Apex, and it was an undercover investigation, That's centered around shark finning and, and involved the Mexican cartel and Chinese organized crime and money laundering and narcotics and all that stuff.

As I just, like I said before, a lot of stuff's all inter interrelated. And so when you have the Chinese and the Mexicans working hand in hand together. And then we're utilizing shark fins to move money and narcotics and those sorts of things. I, you don't really think about sharks as a, as an animal that you grow an affection for, but once you learn about sharks and their place in the ocean and their role in that ecosystem, you have a real, Respect for them.

And of course, they're not a sexy, iconic animal like some of these others per se, but extremely important and certainly need our help as well. Yeah, 

and it's the fact that these sharks get finned  and then they're just thrown to left and left to drown. It's horrendous, really. But yeah, there's such an important part of keeping a biodiverse ocean.

So, yeah. Absolutely.  Excellent. This has been, this has been fantastic, Tim. I think I could talk, literally talk to you for hours. I could, I might want to do a follow up at some point when my voice is a little bit better because there's  so much I want to still scratch away and we've been on for quite a while already.

So, yeah. 

I told you from the get go, once I get rolling on this stuff,  it's in my blood. It's something that I love to do. I can talk about it and really I want to inspire. I'm at the end here. And so I'm still hanging around trying to help people out, trying to do my part. And so I'm still involved in training.

I'm working with a nonprofit called Focus Conservation, which is a whole nother awesome organization that does. Great work in Africa with, with a variety of WALA crime units there. I'm involved in training officers around the globe. And so it's my way of paying it forward a little bit, but I'm, I can talk, uh, anytime, any place, it's just got to name it.

Fantastic. If there's anyone listening that may want to consider a career and tackling these issues, What would you say to that? What kind of advice would you give to someone that wants to explore this a little bit further and make an impactful contribution to wildlife?  

Don't be afraid to, to fail. Don't give up.

It's hard. This job is hard. It's not for everybody. And it's hard to get a job in this field. That's very competitive. I used to participate in our selection process for hiring our new, our new agents. And. It would not be unusual for us to have thousands of applications for maybe 20 positions, and it's really easy to get dismayed and give up.

And so I always encourage, especially when I'm talking to high school and college age people that are interested in this field, is keep pushing and doing it. Volunteer, give your time. Get some experience, even if it's not paid, volunteer for an organization, learn. I think, unfortunately, there's a lot of people that can talk about the generations, the last couple of generations, the Z ers and X ers and everybody else and what the expectations are.

You hear these, like they come out and they want to, 

you know, 

a large, a big job and a lot of pay and this and that. And sometimes that just doesn't happen. And you gotta, if this is really what you want to do. That stuff is a lot less important. And you know, for me, I, when I got out, I volunteered, I worked for organizations for nothing for free, but I gained a reputation.

I gained experience. I had something to put on my resume. And, and so I was hired very quickly out of college after doing those internships and things like that. So I would encourage that. And follow your dreams. Like I said, if I'm a small kid or a kid like me from a small town in the middle of nowhere, can, can travel the world and be on TV and magazines and TV shows and, and stuff, podcasts, who would have thought, never in my wildest dreams, that people would care to listen to anything I have to say.

But the fact is, if you're doing things you love, You'll do it for the right reasons and people want to hear and be, show passion, be passionate about this stuff. Don't do, you're doing it for the money. Yeah. Yeah. You probably need to find something else to do. But, but if you're passionate about it and stick to it, eventually things will work out.

And like I said, Life is filled with the T intersection and if you take that turn around and go the other way, if you took the wrong turn, it's often said 

often serendipitous as well. So I like, yeah, put  the passion before profit. Excellent. 

Yes, absolutely. 

Excellent. So thanks.  I've got.  Two closing traditions on the show as we're coming up to the end, one of which is a pay it forward suggestion for you to raise awareness for a good cause, charity or project, and the other is a call to adventure.

For a pay it forward suggestion, what would you recommend to the listeners? 

Some like myself, I was lucky. I had a lot of really good mentors that showed me how to do things and paying it forward. I retired after a  very good career,  won a lot of accolades and I could have just left and gone to the sunset.

But I feel that I think I owe it to the next generation behind me. To try to help and mentor them like, like some of the older agents did for me and they took, you know, their wing. And so I still, to this day, like I said, I work for a nonprofit called Focus Conservation. I participate in training instead of enjoying the retirement life. 

I'm still working on courses and curriculums and interviews and doing those sorts of things to try to get the word out. About wildlife and wildlife trafficking. So I would encourage people to, to pay it forward like that. If you've got a skill and you've got experience, help somebody that, that is looking, might need a hand.

There might the, the next Marlon Perkins or the next Jane Goodall or any of those. Uh, they may be just waiting in the wings, needing somebody to give them some guidance and help and take the time to help those that are really, that really care about it. And so that would be my suggestion for paying it forward is just right off in the sunset, if you're still relevant and have the ability to try to help somebody.

As far as adventure. Oh my, that's a loaded question, but the first thing that pops up into mind, uh, of course, my love of animals. And I would probably say this was probably one of the most recent ones. Is when I was teaching officers in Nepal last year, after the training was over with, I got on a flight from Kathmandu and I flew to on the outskirts of Chitwan National Park, and I would highly encourage people to consider going to Chitwan National Park.

It's the very first part of a national park in Nepal. Um, it's home to some of the coolest, uh, and most diverse, uh, people. Uh, species in the world, uh, the one horned rhino, uh, I saw, I think when I was there, I think I saw six of them, three mothers and their, and calves. I saw a sloth bear, they're home to the tiger, Muntjac,  to the eagles.

I saw langurs. I saw so many cool things, but I would, what I did, if I was to recommend somebody, if somebody said, Hey, I want to go to Chitwan, how do I, I would not. Maybe I would probably I stayed on the outskirts in a, in a little small village and I actually interacted with the locals one, one cool little kind of side story is, and I don't know, understand.

I certainly didn't understand all the traditions and what was actually going on and didn't know the language. But I remember we were driving in a vehicle and some little kids pulled a rope across the road and they refused to let us cross until we  made some small donation or something, but then they came with a plate and they had pressed flowers and they make it like an ink And there's been and I really I don't want to mean any disrespect because I don't know the tradition behind it But the after we interacted with these kids They came and they put the mark on our foreheads for that day.

And I was proud to wear the, because I was part of some tradition that I wasn't, I wasn't familiar with, but you immerse yourself with the locals and get to learn. And then when you go to Chippewa, like I said, and get to see some of these incredible animals, that would be my goat. One of my Highly recommended go to adventures and if you're in the trekking, of course, you got the a lot of trekking You could do right there in in Nepal on the outskirts of Kathmandu.

Nepal would be a place that I would recommend 

Fantastic. That's excellent. That's excellent. I'm gonna go and have a little look at that afterwards on YouTube. Excellent Thank you, Tim That's been fantastic. Uh, I've thoroughly enjoyed this conversation. It's been very enlightening and thank you for all the work you've been doing.

It's, it's fantastic. It's 32 years full of adventure and impact. Quite frankly, it's incredible.  

I just, thanks for your interest and, and hearing a little bit about. And it's just not me. There's a lot of people just like me. Like I said, there were some, some older agents when I stepped in the academy and they gave their talks and I was inspired by them.

In fact, one of my wrote what he said that day back in 1992, I wrote in a, wrote down and I still live by it today, but it was basically when an animal dies, it doesn't make a sound and we're the only voice that has, and that was  a comment that he made that has stuck with me. Uh, over the last 30 something years is, uh, you've got to be the voice for these animals.

They can't, no one's listening to them. So it takes people like you and I and others to make sure we speak on their behalf. Yeah, 

exactly. And if we can use this platform for that very thing, if it takes one person to do something on the back of this, then we're all doing our job. 

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. 

So Tim, where can everyone go and find out more about your fantastic career, but also the work that you're doing at the minute in your retirement? 

Well, I guess right now, if you really want to keep up on some of the work that not only myself that I'm involved in, but also the team that I'm working with is I work with Focus Conservation. It's a nonprofit based out of, out of Africa. And we work with, we help, we're all former. Investigators. So unlike most nonprofits or NGOs, we are actually all people like myself.

And actually I told you earlier about Wim Brown, the former DEA agent in Kenya. Wim is the CEO. He created this organization. And so he has brought in intelligence officers from the UK. He's brought in former police officers from Europe and the United States. And we work together. So we're all cops. And so we come from this, from a standpoint of, we know how to catch bad guys on the, in, in the international arena, we've all done it.

And so our group works with, uh, countries in Africa to help them build crime units. And we mentor those crime units where we actually help them work Cases and we explain to them. This is what you need to do. This is what you should think about This is how you do it and so forth and we get them their cases prepared for court and so forth And so that's what we do as focus conservation and we do a lot of things We also do training, but if you want to follow the great work being done by focus  We have a website.

Of course, it's focused conservation. org You can find us on facebook instagram linkedin twitter. We are we're out there And certainly you can find myself through Focus Conservation, as well as the other former investigators. Well, they're all retired like myself that decided to pay it, pay it forward by helping and mentoring those that are coming up behind us.

Yeah, fantastic. 

And I'll get all those links listed when we publicize this and when we get it shared on all the social channels, we'll get that tagged, listed as well. And maybe at some point in future, Tim, we could maybe do a follow up, maybe invite some of your fellow agents and retirees and impact and talk about some of your impacts in the developments of focus conservation. 

Absolutely. And I'll just leave this little nugget with you. One of the roles that I play with Focus is they're by default, they're external affairs person, they're media relations person. And I I'm constantly talking with people like yourself or journalists or TV people or whatever that. And we have a lot of really fantastic investigations that are being done throughout, particularly in Africa.

And so if there's anything in particular. That you would like to maybe, I can certainly be a go between with the crime units with, for example, we seized the baby recently. We seized the baby gorilla. We've seen some baby chimpanzees and we're working with these organizations that are taking care of these, these live baby primates that are hopefully rehabilitating them to a point where.

If things work out the way we would like, they can be reintroduced into the wild. And for example, the gorilla, we've done DNA on the gorilla in hopes of knowing exactly, we think this baby gorilla was stolen from the wilds of the Congo. It actually has shot in its body, which would tell me that it was probably with its mother when the mother was killed and the baby was taken because the baby still has shot in him and we're nursing him back to health with, with assistance from this organization.

In hopes of rehabilitating. But if we know exactly  the troop or the area that this gorilla came from, 

uh, 

what a cool story it would be to reintroduce him back into his family. And so that's the kind of work that we do at Focused. And so if you have an interest in anything like that, certainly I can try to help facilitate that as well.

Absolutely. Yeah. Let's pick that up offline for sure. Cause I've got some, I've got some ideas. Excellent. Thanks. 

Thanks for tuning in to today's episode. For the show notes and further information, please visit adventurediaries. com slash podcast. And finally, we hope to have inspired you to take action and plan your next adventure big or small, because sometimes we all need a little adventure to cleanse that bitter taste of life from the soul until next time, have fun and keep paying it forward.