Between January 2022 and December 2023, more than 1,800 protected turtles were pulled from Florida's waterways and shipped overseas in a coordinated black-market trafficking operation. The haul included 1,700 loggerhead musk turtles, 100 striped-neck musk turtles, and 15 striped mud turtles, all species protected under both Florida law and CITES, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, an international treaty with more than 180 signatory nations including the United States and Taiwan.

The turtles were packed into small bags inside shipping boxes with wet paper towels and frozen broccoli packs to survive transport. They were shipped through San Francisco to Taiwan using fraudulent export permits falsely claiming the animals were captive-bred. The shipments were valued at approximately $550,000. The suspect remains under investigation.

The case, uncovered by Operation Southern Hot Herps led by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, reveals more than the actions of one trafficker. It exposes a system with serious gaps. False captive-bred claims on export permits went undetected for nearly two years. Monitoring of protected turtle populations in Florida did not catch the removal of 1,800 animals until well after the fact. And wildlife trafficking investigations remain chronically underfunded despite wildlife crime being one of the largest illegal trades in the world.

Removing this many animals from wild populations in two years carries real ecological consequences. These species exist in carefully balanced relationships with Florida's waterways and wetlands. Pulling them out at this scale does not just harm the animals. It damages the ecosystems they are part of.

We are calling on federal prosecutors to pursue the maximum available penalties against whoever ran this operation, on U.S. Fish and Wildlife and U.S. Customs and Border Protection to overhaul how captive-bred export permit claims are verified, on Congress to fully fund Operation Southern Hot Herps and expand dedicated wildlife trafficking task forces nationwide, on Florida lawmakers to increase penalties for turtle poaching and invest in population monitoring for protected species, and on the U.S. State Department to press Taiwan and other destination countries to honor and enforce their CITES obligations.

More than 1,800 turtles were taken from Florida's wild in two years. Some will never return to the ecosystems they came from. Sign this petition to demand prosecution, systemic reform, and real accountability for Florida's wildlife.