(8 May 2025)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Nairobi – 7 May 2025
1. Wide of Magistrate Thuku reading to Lornoy and Seppe their sentence
2. SOUNDBITE (English) Njeri Thuku, magistrate:
++STARTS ON PREVIOUS SHOT AND IS PARTIALLY OVERLAID BY SHOT 3++
"Lornoy and Seppe are sentenced to pay a fine of 1 million (Kenyan Shillings) each. In default, they will each serve twelve months in prison. Sit down."
3. Close of Belgian ant-smuggling convicts Lornoy David (left) and Seppe Lodewijckx (right)
4. Wide of four convicts in dock as magistrate reads sentencing guidelines
5. Lornoy and Seppe’s mothers reacting to sentencing
6. Kenyan ant-smuggling convict Dennis Ng’ang’a seated in dock
7. Wide of court in-session
8. Vietnamese ant-smuggling convict Duh Hung Nguyen seated in dock
9. Various of ants
10. SOUNDBITE (English) Shadrack Muya, Professor in Ecosystem biology at Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology:
++STARTS ON PREVIOUS SHOT AND IS OVERLAID BY SHOT 11++
"Whenever you bring an organism from a different environment, you are likely to do some intervention for that organism to stabilize. Until it stabilizes, then there is a likelihood that it is not going to survive there. Survival in the new environment will depend on the interventions that are likely to take place. Where it has been taken away from, there is a likelihood of an ecological disaster that may happen due to that disturbance."
11. Various of ants
12. Wide of courtroom
13. SOUNDBITE (English) Shadrack Muya, Professor in Ecosystem biology at Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology:
++STARTS ON PREVIOUS SHOT AND IS OVERLAID BY SHOT 14++
“So we should protect what we have with envy, seriously because until we can match them technologically, we never know what we have until we lose it."
14. Various of ants
STORYLINE:
Two Belgian teenagers found with 5,000 ants in Kenya were given a choice of paying a fine of $7,700 or serving 12 months in prison — the minimum penalty for the offense — for violating wildlife conservation laws.
Authorities said the ants were destined for European and Asian markets in an emerging trend of trafficking lesser-known wildlife species.
Belgian nationals Lornoy David and Seppe Lodewijckx, both 19 years-old, were arrested on April 5 with 5,000 ants at a guest house in Nakuru county, which is home to various national parks. They were charged on April 15.
Magistrate Njeri Thuku, sitting at the court in Kenya’s main airport on Wednesday, said in her ruling that despite the teenagers telling the court they were naïve and collecting the ants as a hobby, the particular species of ants they collected is valuable and they had thousands of them — not just a few.
The Kenya Wildlife Service had said the teenagers were involved in trafficking the ants to markets in Europe and Asia, and that the species included messor cephalotes, a distinctive, large and red-colored harvester ant native to East Africa.
“This is beyond a hobby. Indeed, there is a biting shortage of messor cepholates online,” Thuku said in her ruling.
The teenagers’ lawyer, Halima Nyakinyua, described the sentencing as “fair” and said her clients would not appeal.
“When the statutes prescribe a specific minimum amount, the court cannot go lower than that. So, even if we went to the court of appeal, the court is not going to revise that," she said.
In a separate but related case, two other men charged after they were found with 400 ants were also fined $7,700 each with an option of serving 12 months in prison.
Find out more about AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/HowWeWork
Twitter: https://twitter.com/AP_Archive
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/APArchives
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/APNews/
You can license this story through AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/metadata/youtube/2a8e95764f9049d0a5f39e69e2171335
Author: AP Archive
Go to Source
News post in May 13, 2025, 3:05 am.
Visit Our Sponsor’s:
News Post In – News
