Animal smugglers have been known to go through all sorts of lengths to sneak prized endangered animals out of Indonesia. But one man was recently caught trying to sneak reptiles out of Jakarta because his method was as primitive as his intended crime was despicable.

Soekarno-Hatta Airport’s Animals Quarantine Center on Wednesday arrested a foreigner, identified as Cheuk Wai Ho, who attempted to smuggle 15 endangered reptiles into Hong Kong on a Cathay Pacific flight.

It seems like it was a half-assed smuggling attempt as Ho tried to hide the reptiles, which consisted of several green tree pythons, an Argentine red tegu, and an Indian star tortoise, in plastic boxes that were stowed amongst his clothes inside his baggage.

Luckily, the animals were spared a long overseas flight in extremely cramped conditions as Ho didn’t even manage to smuggle them through the X-ray machine at the entrance to Terminal 2.

“Officers then opened the suspect’s baggage, and sure enough, there were more than a dozen reptiles in there,” said Zainal Abidin, head of the Animal Quarantine Center’s Monitoring and Enforcement Department, as quoted by Tempo yesterday.

Ho admitted to officers that he bought the reptiles from Pasar Pramuka in East Jakarta, which is notorious for its illegal wildlife trade.

Ho was prevented from getting on board his flight and it remains to be seen what charges he will face for his attempted wildlife trafficking.

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