1,000 stuffed animals under investigation in Spain

Spain’s Civil Guard says it is investigating a businessman in the eastern Valencia region who owned a private taxidermy collection with more than 1,000 stuffed animals, including just over 400 from protected species and at least one specimen of a North African oryx, already extinct.
The collection would fetch $31.5 million on the black market, the Civil Guard said Sunday in a statement, adding that its owner could be charged with trafficking and other crimes against the environment. It said the finding was the largest of protected stuffed specimens in Spain. Investigating agents found the stuffed animals in two warehouses extending over 50,000 square meters on the eastern coastal city of Valencia. Of the 1,090 stuffed animals found, 405 belonged to specimens protected by the CITES convention on wildlife protection. The agents also recorded stuffed specimens of cheetah, leopard, lion, lynx, polar bear, snow panther and white rhinoceros, among others, as well as 198 large ivory tusks from elephants. The Civil Guard said it would investigate whether any documents exist justifying the ownership of the collection.