Man gets 13 years in prison over tiger meat

(ECNS) -- A businessman from Nanning city in Southwest China's Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region was sentenced to 13 years in prison and fined 1.55 million yuan ($249,100) for buying and eating tiger meat, NetEase reported.

On March 13, 2013, a businessman surnamed Xu, together with nine other men, drove to a forest outside Zhanjiang city, Guangdong province and witnessed a tiger being electrocuted and dismembered, its meat, bones, viscera and blood collected in two boxes and one barrel. They then went to a local hotel to consume the meat.

On April 21 and May 20 of the same year, Xu and several friends returned to Zhanjiang to buy two more tigers and watch them being butchered.

On May 31, Guangxi forest police raided Xu's home to find 21 bottles of medicinal wine alongside eight pieces of animal bones and meat that were later proven to belong to protected species, according to an evaluation by the State Forestry Bureau.

Findings also showed that there were sixteen tokay geckos, one cobra and one tiger penis, valued at 13,400 yuan ($2,178), 11,300 yuan ($1,836) and 480,000 yuan ($78,000) respectively.

Xu traded in a total of three tigers and related products worth a total of 1.44 million yuan ($231,600) along with his accomplices, the investigation found.

The court in Qinzhou city, Guangxi, found all the men guilty of illegally transporting products derived from a protected specie and sentenced Xu to 13 years in prison and a fine of 1.55 million yuan. His friends received sentences of five and a half to six years, alongside fines of 20,000 yuan to 50,000 yuan ($3,200 - $8,125) each.