Man found guilty of smuggling endangered live eels worth £53 million out of UK

Khoo was caught after Border Force officers found 200kg of European 'glass eels' hidden under chilled fish

Eel smuggler Gilbert Khoo leaves Southwark Crown Court, south London on 6 March 2020 (PA)

A seafood salesman has been given a two-year suspended jail sentence after smuggling more than £53 million worth of endangered live eels out of the UK.

Gilbert Khoo transported the rare elvers from London to Hong Kong, hidden underneath chilled fish, between 2015 and 2017, London’s Southwark Crown Court heard.

Khoo, of Chessington in southwest London, was sentenced to 24 months imprisonment on each of three counts of evasion of a prohibition on the export of goods. Each sentence was suspended for two years.

He was also found guilty of three counts of failure to notify of the movement of animals.

But no penalty was imposed on him at today’s sentencing because hearings to retrieve the proceeds of crime will take place in the future.

Khoo was caught after Border Force officers found 200kg of the European “glass eels”, which are on the verge of extinction, at Heathrow Airport, in the first seizure of its kind in the UK.

The prosecution said the crimes took place over a two-year period, and involved 16 consignments with an estimated retail value of £53,265,000 in the illegal market for them in Asia.

Khoo kept the live eels, imported from countries within the European Union, in a barn in Gloucestershire, before repackaging them to be exported to Asia.

Judge Jeffrey Pegden, queen’s counsel, who also ordered Khoo to do 240 hours of unpaid work for the community, said: “In my view you played a leading role in this country in what was a large commercial operation driven by others, the purchasers abroad, where the desire for the glass eels was

abundant.”

The judge said he had “no doubt at all” that Khoo’s criminal operation had “a significant environmental impact upon the European glass eel”, which has a 30-year life cycle.

Glass eels are threatened with extinction unless the threat against them is closely controlled, the court heard.

The judge also said he was “certain” that Khoo had an expertise both in these eels and the fish market in general.

He added that Khoo had used “sophisticated” techniques to try to avoid detection.

Press Association