Caviar Smuggler Pleads Guilty

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TO NATIONAL AND ENVIRONMENTAL EDITORS:

Caviar Smuggler Pleads Guilty

Wildlife inspectors found 1,700 pounds in mislabeled containers

NEW YORK, NEW YORK, Mar. 30 -/E-Wire/-- Grigori Oudovenko, age 39, has pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court, Eastern District of New York, for attempting to smuggle $2.5 million worth of caviar into the United States, according to Tom Healy, special agent in charge of law enforcement for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in the Northeast.

"This was the single largest seizure of caviar -- 1,700 pounds -- since trade controls went into effect three years ago," Healy said.

A Russian citizen, Oudovenko is president of MNA Atlantic, a caviar exporting firm with offices in St. Petersburg and Moscow in Russia and in New York City.

The osetra caviar and sevruga caviar, less expensive than the more well known beluga caviar, were in a container with dried fish and labeled to match the rest of the shipment, according to Healy. Service special agents and inspectors discovered the illegal shipment in July 2000 at the Port of Newark, N.J.

Oudovenko faces a maximum of five years in prison and a $250,000 fine for violating the Lacey Act, which protects wildlife through enforcement of state laws and international treaty obligations. Sentencing is scheduled for July.

In a related investigation, a shipment of 380 pounds of caviar was intercepted at New York's JFK Airport in January. The caviar was sent from MNA Atlantic to an American company. This was labeled as osetra caviar and sevruga caviar, but DNA testing revealed that most of the shipment was the world's most expensive variety from beluga sturgeon.

Declines in sturgeon fish populations prompted member nations of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species to initiate trade controls in 1998. Companies dealing in caviar must obtain export permits certifying that the fish were taken legally and that trade represents no threat to the survival of wild populations. Permits must correctly identify the fish species and the country where the fish were caught.

The three Caspian Sea sturgeon species that yield beluga, osetra and sevruga caviars are increasingly rare in the wild. Commercial fishing, environmental degradation and the damming of rivers have reduced populations of these fish.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is the principal federal agency responsible for conserving, protecting and enhancing fish, wildlife and plants and their habitats for the continuing benefit of the American people. The Service manages the 93-million-acre National Wildlife Refuge System, which encompasses more than 530 national wildlife refuges, thousands of small wetlands and other special management areas. It also operates 66 national fish hatcheries, 64 fishery resource offices and 78 ecological services field stations. The agency enforces federal wildlife laws, administers the Endangered Species Act, manages migratory bird populations, restores nationally significant fisheries, conserves and restores wildlife habitat such as wetlands, and helps foreign governments with their conservation efforts. It also oversees the Federal Aid program that distributes hundreds of millions of dollars in excise taxes on fishing and hunting equipment to state fish and wildlife agencies.

U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

Edward Grace, [REDACTED-PHONE], ext. 232, or Diana Weaver,

[REDACTED-PHONE], both of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

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