Opinion ID: 692069
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Facts Relating to the Alligator Snapping Turtles

Text: 4 An Alabama regulation makes it unlawful to take, capture, kill, possess, sell or trade alligator snapping turtles without a permit. Ala.Admin.Code r. 220-2-.92 (1990). On July 11, 1990, an undercover agent working for the Department of the Interior telephoned Guthrie and offered to sell him a forty-five pound alligator snapping turtle. Guthrie declined to buy the proffered turtle because, as he explained later, it was only good for butcher meat. However, Guthrie told the agent that a man named Arthur Ipson would buy turtles that size. 5 Two days later, the agent sold the alligator snapping turtle to Ipson for fifty cents a pound. Ipson told the agent that he sometimes would sell turtles weighing over 120 pounds to Guthrie at two dollars a pound, and that Guthrie had contacts in Japan to whom Guthrie would sell turtles for up to $5,000 each. 6 On July 28, an agent came to Guthrie's house to offer him additional alligator snapping turtles. In that conversation, Guthrie outlined his arrangement to sell turtles weighing at least 165 pounds to buyers in Japan. He also described how he created false paper trails in order to buy alligator snapping turtles. Guthrie told the agent that because sale of these turtles is illegal in Alabama, the agent should sell them to Wayne LaFluer 1 at LaFluer Seafood and Fish Market (LaFluer Seafood) in Ville Platte, Louisiana. Wayne LaFluer would then sell the turtles to Guthrie in Louisiana, so that all documentation would reflect Louisiana as the place of original sale; such sales are legal in Louisiana. In describing this arrangement, Guthrie proclaimed: [The] law is not stopping me, it's just inconveniencing me. 7 On August 17, 1990, the undercover agents went to the address Guthrie had given for LaFluer Seafood in Ville Platte, Louisiana, to sell alligator snapping turtles. At LaFluer Seafood, the agents told a James Carol LaFluer that the alligator snapping turtles came from Alabama, where they were banned from capture. Nevertheless, James Carol LaFluer bought the illegal turtles. He confirmed to the agents that Wayne LaFluer usually bought turtles for resale to Guthrie, who would then sell the large turtles to his contacts in Japan. 8