Former rugby league player Martin Kennedy has been spared jail time for illegally importing and exporting wildlife, including alligator snapping turtles.

The career of the former Sydney Roosters and Brisbane Broncos prop ended when he was banned for almost three years by an anti-doping tribunal in 2016.

Martin Kennedy leaves the Downing Centre courts in Sydney on Friday after being sentenced for illegally trading wildlife. Credit:AAP

Kennedy, 30, pleaded guilty last year to six offences including attempting to export shingleback lizards to Sweden, importing alligator snapping turtles and neotropical stingrays from Thailand and illegally possessing two pythons at his Sydney home.

Judge Sean Grant sentenced Kennedy in the NSW District Court on Friday to three years imprisonment, to be served in the community by way of an intensive correction order.