Stevens Point, Wis. – Being in a room with risky wildlife smugglers who are about to be arrested and ultimately jailed is not for the dim of heart. For Tim Santel, it was business as usual.
Santel, 58, a 1987 graduate of UW-Stevens Point in wildlife ecology, led the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s (USFWS) Special Investigations Unit, a nationwide task force focused on the largest and most intricate wildlife criminal investigations nature.
He retired in 2020 and now lives in rural Kentucky, but continues to work as a consultant, training law enforcement officers around the world.
Santel began his 33-year career as a microbiologist with the U.S. Department of Agriculture and then became a wildlife inspector for the USFWS in Massachusetts. When illegal wildlife operate raised a red flag, he became an agent with the USFWS Office of Law Enforcement to work as special agent in charge of the elite Special Investigations Unit.
He recalls classes conducted by prof. Christine Thomas, retired dean of the UW-Stevens Point College of Natural Resources, the slow UW-SP dean Dan Trainer, and prof. Ray Anderson. Other UW-Stevens Point classmates also became USFWS agents or worked for other natural resources agencies.
“I went there assuming I was going to be a wildlife biologist,” Santel said.
However, he discovered that he could correct some of the mistakes he saw while working in law enforcement.
“I grew up on a farm in Illinois. My dad was an avid sportsman and hunter. He was extremely ethical and we always did everything by the book,” he said.
Santel always wanted to work outdoors and try to make a difference.
“I have children and they love spending time outdoors as much as I do,” he said. “I’ve seen wetlands being drained and animals being killed, so I’m just trying to do what I can and hope I make a difference.”
High profile special cases
Santel’s Special Investigations Unit has been involved in several high-profile cases: Operation Crash, Operation Snow Plow, Operation Manhattan, and Operation Apex.
The results of six years of Operation Crash? More than 42 people have been convicted of illegally trading rhino horns, resulting in more than $7 million in fines and restitution and more than 500 months in federal prison.
Operation Crash (crash is a group of rhinos) involved investigations into several types of criminal behavior, including: trafficking in raw rhino horns; smuggling of works of art made from rhinoceros horn and ivory; illegal trade in current rhino horns and ivory carvings sold as antiques, and investigations into illegal hunting and poaching, including the sale of outfitting services for the illegal fishing of rhinos. The charges included conspiracy, smuggling, money laundering, mail fraud, tax evasion and false documents.
In one case, Santel (undercover) met with Zhifei Li, one of China’s largest rhino horn smugglers, who had come to the United States ostensibly to seek medical attention.
Li bought illegal rhino horns from Santel at a Miami Beach hotel for $59,000, and after being arrested in the hotel parking lot and found guilty in federal court, he was sentenced to 70 months in prison and forfeiting $3.5 million.
Another case, Operation Snowplow, involved the illegal killing and sale of tigers, leopards, lions and other huge cats killed for their skins, meat and skulls. The case involved the investigation of eight tigers from Wisconsin that were killed in a trailer while shark finning was being done in connection with drug trafficking in the Chicago area. and money laundering.
This 18-month investigation resulted in federal charges against 17 defendants in six states – Missouri, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Florida, Michigan and Illinois.
Tigers are listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act. While federal regulations allow the ownership of captive-bred tigers, they stipulate that activities involving their operate must be intended to facilitate the reproduction or survival of the species. It is against the law to kill animals for profit or to sell their skins, parts or meat in interstate commerce.
The results of Operation Snow Plow and Crash led to the creation of the Captive Wildlife Safety Act and the Presidential Task Force on Wildlife Trade. The work opened society’s eyes to the problems of wildlife trade.
President Barrack Obama and President Donald Trump issued executive orders protecting wildlife, and the USFWS began sending diplomats around the world to work on wildlife issues. Many states have started banning the sale of rhinos and ivory. The white rhino was added to the federal Endangered Species List along with the black rhino because the difference between them was very petite, allowing people to avoid prosecution.
Santel also participated in Operation Apex, which helped dismantle an international conspiracy to sell illegal drugs and wildlife in Florida and California. As part of this joint operation, the USFWS, the Department of Justice and the Organized Crime Task Force issued an indictment for mail fraud, wildlife trafficking,
Tense times undercover
Santel said investigators are highly trained and take many precautions knowing they are dealing with criminals associated with criminal organizations moving hundreds of thousands of dollars.
“You prepare for the worst and hope for the best,” Santel said. “Really bad people aren’t stupid enough to tell you what they’re doing, so covert operations are a must to get the evidence you need to prosecute, but you can often find yourself in risky situations. It’s not for everyone.
“An important part of working undercover is the ability to think on your feet quickly,” he said. “It’s about being credible, and you have to know what you’re doing. You have to check all the boxes, get the evidence and not be nervous while maintaining your cover.
He knew that taking this job would mean he would be away from his family for weeks.
He has worked with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police around the world investigating hunting camps, as well as across Africa in places such as Tanzania, Uganda, Kenya, Botswana and South Africa. He has worked in Hungary, the UK, Singapore, Vietnam and Thailand on wildlife smuggling, corruption and bribery crimes.
Almost 20 years ago, Santel organized Africa’s first wildlife law enforcement course for the International Law Enforcement Academy and has since trained hundreds of law enforcement personnel in dozens of countries on the international wildlife trade.
“Part of the challenge of wildlife investigations is that often our only witnesses are the ‘creatures,’” he said. “This makes it arduous, but we perform similar law enforcement activities to homicide crime scene investigations, including using a wildlife crime lab for ballistics analysis, blood tests and GOUT”.
Santel and his team received the People’s Choice Award. Samuel J. Heyman 2016 for his work on Operation Crash. This award is considered an “Emmy for Services to Government”.
Santel has received numerous awards for his work, the most recent of which is the prestigious 2021 Guy Bradley Award, which is named in honor of the first federal wildlife officer to die in the line of duty. The award is given to recognize extraordinary individuals who have made outstanding contributions to wildlife law enforcement, wildlife forensics and investigative techniques.
Bradley’s award included $2,500 that Santel donated to the Nashville Zoo, which has a sturdy commitment to conservation efforts. The zoo used the money to purchase the Motus tower, which is now used to identify migrating birds.
“In my 10 years of leading the Special Investigations Unit, I have had some of the best investigators at USFWS. They were dedicated and passionate. “I appreciate everyone who has worked for me and, like a baseball manager, when you have great players, they make you look really good,” he said.
Santel is known for thinking outside the box, and when he brought justice to violators, he asked for restitution money to be used for conservation efforts. One example was the imposition of over $380,000 in wildlife fines on Sera Wildlife Conservancy in Kenya, which established a novel sanctuary for black rhinos. In 2015, he learned that his efforts had been rewarded with the birth of Sera’s first black rhino calf. Since then, several black rhino calves have been born in this sanctuary, which is a real success.
Other wildlife penalties have been directed towards anti-poaching efforts, with money and gold seized in Operation Crash being used to assist black rhinos in Kenya and Zambia and to fight poaching in Africa and Asia.
Some of his research included rhino horns, ivory, tiger skins, shark fins and pangolin scales. They are all involved in international crime and there is a lot of money at stake. The biggest problem Santel sees with international wildlife crime is technology and social media, which have made it much easier for “bad guys” to traffic wildlife. Violators can operate the “dark web” and sell illegal wildlife around the world.
Today, Santel is also concerned about the lack of interest in hunting.
“Younger people don’t seem to realize the importance that hunting plays in wildlife management, and sometimes it’s easy to advocate for things that are actually harmful to wildlife species,” he said.
Some of his other concerns include:
• The judicial system and the lack of teeth in many laws;
• People wanting to own and protect huge, endangered wildlife species;
• The importance of fair chase and ethics in dealing with wildlife.
“Unfortunately, if something has value, people will usually kill it. They are fueled by greed,” he said.
Santel admires the many state and federal wildlife officers who have set a high standard for him, as well as the great prosecutors who are willing to take a chance on wildlife cases that are intricate and perhaps a bit unusual.
