01x03 - Smuggler's Inn

[bunniefuu]

[insects chirring]

[♪ "Sh-Boom
[Life Could be a Dream]"
by The Crew Cuts playing]

[singer vocalizing]

♪ Oh, life could be a dream ♪

♪ If I could take you up
in paradise up above ♪

♪ If you would tell me
I'm the only one
that you love ♪

♪ Life could be a dream,
sweetheart ♪

♪ Hello, hello again ♪

♪ Sh-boom, and hoping
we'll meet again ♪

♪ Oh, life could be a dream ♪

♪ If only all my precious plans
would come true ♪

♪ If you would let me spend
my whole life loving you ♪

♪ Life could be a dream,
sweetheart ♪

♪ Now, every time
I look at you ♪

-♪ Something is on my mind ♪
-♪ Da-da-da-da-da-da ♪

♪ If you do
what I want you to ♪

♪ Baby, we'd be so fine ♪

♪ Oh, life could be a dream ♪

♪ If I could take you up
in paradise up above ♪

♪ If you would tell me
I'm the only one
that you love ♪

♪ Life could be a dream,
sweetheart ♪

♪ Sh-boom, sh-boom ♪

♪ Ya-la-la-la-la,
la-la-la-la-la ♪

♪ Sh-boom, sh-boom ♪

♪ Ya-la-la-la-la,
la-la-la-la-la ♪

♪ Sh-boom, sh-boom ♪

♪ Life could be a dream,
sweetheart ♪

[keys jingling]

[door creaking]

[Mike Van Nostrand] You know
what I found out in life?

[sighs]

Everybody has f*cking
dirty laundry, bro.

You all have
f*cking dirty laundry,

every m*therf*cking
one of you guys.

Every f*cking person out there
has dirty laundry

in their family,
I don't care who you are.

You know, my father
would always say,

"Do as I say, not as I do."

He played around with reptiles

that he shouldn't have been
playing around with.

[snake hissing]

My father was involved
with drugs.

He got involved
in highly criminal activity.

My father just did
a lot of stupid sh*t.

I guess that carried over to me.

That's-- that's for Cody.

Okay, that's tokays.

You get to know what it is
just by feeling it.

[softly] Alright, let's see
what else we got here.

[Bryan Christy]
Back in the '80s,
Mike Van Nostrand

started Strictly Reptiles.

Low-cost, high-volume dealer.

[Mike] That's a nice one.
A little jungle pattern on it.

[Bryan] They're the biggest
import-export company

in the world for reptiles.

[Mike]
We're selling to pet stores,

private individuals,
hobbyists, dealers.

We're like the Amazon.com
of reptiles.

Amazon's probably
gonna sue me now.

[laughing]

[Bryan]
It's a family-run business.

His brother is involved.

-[dog barking]
-Coop!

[Bryan] His dad
has his own desk in the back.

[Ray Van Nostrand Sr.]
This is me selling reptiles.

[Mike] Me and my father
are complete opposites.

Everybody loves Pops.

Not everybody likes me.

[♪ upbeat music playing]

[Bryan] Mike Van Nostrand
has a very abrasive exterior.

He's loud, he's obnoxious.

f*cking listen to what
I'm telling you

and shut up, alright?

Of course, I'm in business
to make money!

How am I paying my bills?!

I'm direct, I don't hold back.
What are you, f*cking nuts?

Sometimes I need to learn
to, like, shut the f*ck up.

[on phone] Eric, I thought
I f*cking told you,

can't come by my f*cking shop
unannounced, okay?

-Y-Yeah, but I--
-I don't f*cking like
that f*cking bullshit.

We went over this.
We'll go over it again.

God, you guys ask the stupidest
f*cking questions in the world.

[Ray Van Nostrand Jr.]
My brother Mike
has a great heart,

but he has this side to him

where he has to be in
control of the situation.

And that's how he's been
his whole life.

[Elaine Van Nostrand]
He was an interesting kid.

He was born with this tongue

connected to the bottom
of his mouth.

They had to cut it.

He was tongue-tied,
he was actually tongue-tied.

And it was an omen
because he loved to talk.

From the minute he started,
he never shut up.

He was always focused.

He never got into drugs.

He's very smart.

He can do figures in his head
like you wouldn't believe.

And he was going to become
an accountant.

[Michelle Van Nostrand]
I don't know where
he ever decided on that.

Could you imagine... [chuckles]
Mike being an accountant

having to go in a shirt and tie
every day, and slacks?

No.

When Mike and I first met,

he had just started
at the community college.

[Eric Goode speaking]

I think, what,
six, eight months?

-And then--
-[Mike] Seven.

[chuckles]

[Ray Jr.]
When my dad went to prison,

we lost everything--
our house, all our money.

Everything went to lawyers.

I was a commercial fisherman
at the time.

[Mike] My brother was
in the Keys on a fishing boat.

So, it was just me
to take care of my mom

and my little brother, Alex.

When you're 18 years old

and your father
gets in trouble...

you have to grow up quick.

[Mike] I asked my dad, you know,
what are we gonna do?

He goes, "You can always make
money in the reptile business."

Mike kinda took off with that.

[Mike]
I worked out of the garage
and knew a few of his contacts.

My dad told me, "Just find out
who's bringing in what,

"and go down there
and pick out the nicest stuff

and pay 'em and sell it."

And that's what I did.

I wasn't gonna f*ck
with the ill*gal stuff.

We had ball pythons,
bearded dragons,

green tree pythons.

It was mostly
just pet shop stuff.

I think Mike
was more interested,

to be honest,
in the money part of it

than he was in the reptiles.

[Bryan] He's an accountant.
He likes the numbers.

He likes the business.

He likes inventory.

He likes all those
cost-accounting things

that he learned in school.
He's able to implement.

And the business
begins to take off.

[Mike]
And then, my brother came in.

[Ray Jr.] It was fun.

We were building the business.

[Mike] One day, we were trying
to come up with a company name,

and it just came out.
Strictly Reptiles.

[Alfred Ojeda] Mike was always
against the drugs.

So, he decided to call it,
"Strictly Reptiles,"

so there wouldn't be
any confusion

about what they were dealing in.

[Bryan]
Ray trafficked reptiles,

trafficked drugs and g*ns,
and it ruined his family.

And Mike, I do believe
he was committed

to doing this above board.

[g*nsh*t]

[g*nsh*t]

[Eric Goode]
Why do you have a g*n?

[Jeanne Brodsky]
Why do I have a g*n?

Um, I live in South Florida.

I'm a woman,
and I'm in the reptile business.

[Eric] When did Strictly
really start making money?

I think Strictly Reptiles

started making money
when they got me.

I met the Van Nostrand family
all the way back at Pet Farm.

I was the number one
salesperson.

So, there was an employee
at Pet Farm who said,

"Jeanne, you ought to go work
for Strictly Reptiles."

I called up Michael and I said,

"I can make you a lot of money.

I could bring you
a lot of business."

He said, "Come on by
and we'll talk."

With my experience,
I brought them

a lot of customers, suppliers.

I became the office manager.

He didn't have
any women around.

The animal business,
the reptile business,

it really is a man's world.

Mike was rough

'cause it takes roughness
to run a business.

But as a salesperson,

I didn't mind talking to people
and selling things.

He could be mean.
I could be nice.

So, we had a real good
partnership.

It was a beautiful time.

I worked for Michael
for over 30 years.

That's the longest relationship
I ever had with a man.

Okay, if you want to think,
"Oh, were we ever intimate?"

No. And why?

Because the plumbing is wrong,
as he would say.

I'm not interested
in that plumbing.

I don't do d*ck.

In the beginning, we bought
animals, legal animals.

Frogs,

pythons, tarantulas.

But the biggest thing
that Mike saw

were the iguanas.

[Bryan] By the time
Mike got in the business,

every pet shop in America
wanted green iguanas.

[Jeanne] You saw 'em in movies
like Cheech and Chong.

[both] Whoa!

-[Jeanne] And Terminator.
-Pugsley still loves me,

don't you, baby?

[Jeanne]
Anybody could have 'em.

They were easy.

[Mike] But Suriname
was the only place

that you could get any kind of
quantity of baby iguanas from.

Those were iguanas that
were coming out of the wild,

so there wasn't many.

[Bryan] One of his first
innovations is to stop buying

wild-caught green iguanas
from Suriname.

[speaking Spanish]

[Bryan] And he convinces
a guy in El Salvador

to transform his cricket ranch

into a green iguana ranch,

and he buys them directly.

[speaking Spanish]

[Jeanne] He was producing
beautiful green iguanas,

and Strictly could get them
by the thousands every week.

[♪ "Mony Mony" in Spanish
by Las Moskas playing]

[Jeanne] Everybody was trying to
get ahold of Strictly Reptiles

to order iguanas.

[♪ "Mony Mony" in Spanish
continues playing]

There was plenty
of legal money to make.

[Bryan] He's importing


They brought 'em in for a buck
and sold 'em for 10.

[Mike] Get it in, get it out,
make your money,

bring in the next shipment.

All legitimate, all legal.

♪ Money, money, money, money ♪

♪ Money, money, money,
money, money ♪

-♪ Mony-mony ♪
-♪ Sí! ♪

-♪ Mony-mony ♪
-♪ Yeah! ♪

-♪ Mony-mony ♪
-♪ Yeah! ♪

-♪ Mony-mony ♪
-♪ Yeah! ♪

-♪ Mony-mony ♪
-♪ Yeah! ♪

-♪ Mony-mony ♪
-♪ Ooh! ♪

[Bryan] During the 1990s,

almost half of the total amount
of green iguanas

coming into the United States

came from Strictly Reptiles.

♪ Money, money, money ♪

♪ Money, money, money, money ♪

[Bryan]
Mike saw, we could make
a factory out of this.

[♪ music stops abruptly]

[Jeanne] He bought
a 10,000-square-foot building.

He customized it, and then
we moved to that building.

[Bryan] The scale of it
is extraordinary.

It's a former
Frito-Lay warehouse.

[Jeanne] He had the vision
of the business.

One room would be for frogs,

one room would be
for tarantulas.

[Bryan]
There was a big venomous room

that would rattle
as you walked in...

-[snake rattling]
-...with a big cage

that housed king cobras,

and they would hood up
as you walked in.

He had aluminum feed bins with
hundreds of baby tortoises,

hundreds of lizards
and scorpions,

and he becomes a wholesaler.

People packing shipments,

picking up
the individual animals

that pet shops have ordered,
and putting them in deli cups.

What Henry Ford did
for the automobile,

Mike Van Nostrand
did for the reptile industry.

Mike was making money
on a scale

that no one in the industry
had seen before,

and he was doing it legally.

But it wasn't long before
his dad got out of prison.

And that changed everything.

[tone beeping]

[♪ gentle music playing]

[announcer]
The Fish and Wildlife Service

has about 250 agents
and inspectors

that investigate
violations of federal laws.

[birds chirping]

As one of the smallest
federal agencies

in the government,
we have one of the biggest

and most interesting jobs,

the conservation
of this nation's fish

and wildlife resources.

[croaking softly]

[Eddie McKissick]
Back in the early '90s,

I was a bartender
at the Hyatt Regency.

One day, my father called me.

He says,
"Hey, there's this program

"with the U.S. government.

Would you be interested in it?"

-[g*nshots]
-So, I packed up everything,

and went to a federal
law enforcement

training center in Georgia.

[instructor]
Two rounds! In four seconds!

[Eddie]
Took a basic police course.

-[whistle blowing]
-[g*nshots]

[instructor speaking]

[Eddie laughing]

-I did well.
-Hey, Mom.

And I became an agent in Miami.

When I first got to Miami,
the staffing was short.

There was only four inspectors,

and I was the new guy
on the team.

Twelve o'clock at night,
I'll get a call

from a U.S. customs inspector

and say, "Hey, I got
bird-eating spiders.

"I got cobras.

I got some kind of snake."

[Eddie speaking]

And I'm not a reptile person!
I hate snakes!

I tried to inspect
every box I could.

I learned really quick,
you can't do it...

if you want a life.

Because the number
of shipments

that were coming in
was just overwhelming.

Miami was number one
for intercontinental smuggling

of wildlife
into the United States.

Because you got stuff that
comes up from South America.

You got stuff that comes
over from Europe.

You got stuff that
comes in from Africa.

South Florida is the best place

for the ill*gal
reptile business.

[reptile hissing]

[birdsong]

[Ray Sr.] Look at that.

-[Mike] Uh-oh.
-[Ray Sr.] There's Mike.
Mike's young there.

[Mike] Yeah, I'm young and fat,
as always.

Who's that guy?

[Ray Sr.] Wow. Time flies.

[Mike] Pops called one day
and told my mother

he was getting out.

And I was like, "Oh, f*ck."

[laughing]

[Eric speaking]

'Cause my mother
had a boyfriend.

[Elaine] When he got arrested,

our marriage started
to disintegrate.

He wasn't really very nice
to me most of the time.

And I just decided that
he wasn't good for me anymore.

I know my boys were--
were very upset...

when he came out
that I-- I wasn't there.

But it was the right thing.

[Ray Jr.] She had met someone.

Mike didn't like that.

I remember Mike
keying the guy's car.

-[Eric chuckles]
-[laughing]

Yeah, he did.

Guy's brand-new car,
Mike keyed it.

f*ck that m*therf*cker and...

[imitating scratching]

Ah, that was funny. Good stuff.

[Eric speaking]

Yes, my mom's
still with the guy.

[engine revving]

That's-- that's Mike.

He would do anything
for my dad.

[Mike] Pops got out when
I was 20, 21 years old maybe.

He bought a townhouse
right around the corner

from my mom's house.

You know, his mind was clear.

You know, prison will do that
to you if you're a drug addict.

It'll clean you up real quick.

[Eric] Was it ever a question
that your dad

would work at Strictly
after he got out of prison?

No, as soon as Pops
was coming back,

Pops was coming to Strictly.

No discussion about it.
What, kidding me or what?

One day he's in prison,

the next day
he's selling reptiles.

[Ray Sr.]
Hillsboro Inlet Marina.

The boat that we,
I guess chartered.

[Mike] No, you bought that boat.

-Really?
-You sold everything you owned

-to buy that boat. [laughing]
-Yeah, I was br-- I was broke.

You liq-- you liquidated every
one of your personal belongings

-'cause you wanted
that boat so bad.
-[Ray Sr.] Yeah.

[Mike] My father didn't care
how much money

he had in his pocket.

He would spend it all
in one day.

Me, I didn't like
to be without money.

I was very reserved
in buying stuff,

and this is where me
and my dad would clash.

I wouldn't wanna buy it,
I wouldn't wanna buy it,

I wouldn't wanna buy it.

And my dad would be like,
"Buy it, buy it, buy it.

Just buy it, and we'll sell it,
we'll sell it."

The problem was, I seen people
take advantage of my dad.

"Aw, come on, Ray, can't you
give me a better deal?

Can't you give me
a better deal?"

You know, Pops would
give him a better deal.

I was nice, okay? I was nice.

You know what I'm saying?

I don't try to rip people off
and stuff like that,

and you know, "Ha ha ha,
I got this guy for that."

That's not me.

[Mike] I started listening
to his phone conversations

and what he was buying,

and if he was selling it
for the wrong price.

I started getting more involved

and forcing him
out of the control part of it.

But then there were times
I would have to go to him

for advice, say, "Hey,
what do you think about this?

What do you think about that?"

His knowledge and my money
management kinda worked.

And timing in the industry.

[heavy rumble]

[rain falling]

Do you feel that?

[loud rumble]

[roaring]

[reporter] Dinosaurs are
coming back to life today

in the new movie Jurassic Park.

[lizard screeching]

Jurassic Park comes out,
and it's, boom.

[kids screaming]

[Tommy Crutchfield]
Jurassic Park made
everyone wanna have

their own dinosaur
in their house.

[Stan Chiras] Yeah, do you know
who those are?

Yeah, they were here before you.

[Dr. Patrick Burchfield]
Every kid wanted to have
a pet bearded dragon

or an iguana,
something that looks like

something out of Jurassic Park.

[dinosaurs bellowing]

Dinosaurs are
definitely taking off.

-[roaring]
-Some would say that dinosaurs

are so popular,
they never really died out.

Mikey Van Nostrand had
a corner on the market there.

Anything that you
could get large quantities of

and that the pet shop
people wanted.

[Mike] We were selling


Milk snakes, emerald swifts,
tokay geckos.

Chameleons, red-eared sliders.

We were selling
hundreds of thousands

of baby ball pythons.

[snake hissing]

[croaking]

Strictly Reptiles
was a well-oiled machine.

Mike was the orchestrator.

My dad, with the connections.

Jeanne was the moneymaker.

Her forte is getting people
to pay for things.

I was the runner.

Picking things up,
dropping things off.

[Jeanne] Had the right manpower,
the right wisdom,

the right ingredients.

We're gonna make a fortune
with this place.

[Mike] You know, I'd bring in


and a $50,000 shipment would be
gone within, like, three hours.

We were doing
millions of dollars in business.

It was almost unheard of
at the time.

He was the biggest reptile
importer in the United States.

[Ray Sr.] What about
the Mexican Racer?

No, do not open that.

That thing'll be all--

That thing will be
all over the place.

[people chattering]

-Well, get ready to grab it.
-No, don't open it.

-Let me just see.
-Don't open it.

-What is this, this one?
-No, don't-- don't mess with it.

[crew]
Oh, he's going with the...

Oh, that's a beauty.

[Mike]
Pops was always a risk taker.

He liked different
and rare stuff.

If they were available
and you could buy 'em,

he would buy 'em,
and he didn't really consider

the repercussion of it.

He didn't feel that it
was really an ill*gal activity.

He thought that the law
was stupid

and people should have 'em.

So, there was an employee there

working in the reptile room,
Dale Marantz.

[straw slurping loudly]

[Dale Marantz]
Ray Sr. Van Nostrand hired me.

Mike Van Nostrand
never liked me.

We never really got along.

[Mike] He wasn't a good worker.

He would go to topless bars when
he was supposed to be at work.

I was a regular, I guess,
at, uh, the Booby Trap.

I just went for the two-fers.

Two-for-one drinks,
two-for-one lap dances.

That was my lunchtime.
[laughing]

[Jeanne] But he was good
at what he was doing.

[Eric speaking]

Arranging ill*gal shipments
to come in.

So every time
a shipment would come in,

Ray would ask for more and more.

"Get more red tegus.

Get some more of those
Argentine boas."

All of the ill*gal stuff.

I knew about it,
I knew it was going on,

but I mean, you know.

It's my father,
what am I gonna do about it?

When people would walk in,
they wouldn't ask for Mike.

If you wanted to sell
something ill*gal,

you walk in the front door
and you say, "Is Ray here?"

[Dale] Senior was the one
who got excitement

out of going after
the impossible.

But Mike, of course,
followed in his steps.

[Ray Jr.] We were doing
a lot of business.

It was seven days a week,


Took a-- a toll on Mike.

[Bryan] At that point,

he's running a factory,
basically.

And factories are boring.
And Mike is not boring.

Everything starts one day
at Strictly Reptiles.

In walks a guy
who supplied his father.

The guy opens a suitcase,

and in it are hundreds
of rare radiated tortoises.

Mike can't believe
this guy had the guts

to come through customs
with a suitcase

full of these ill*gal animals
worth tons of money.

Mike was a multimillionaire
from legal reptiles.

He could have just stayed
on the right side of the law.

But he's also a Van Nostrand.

And the pirate blood

runs very deep
in the Van Nostrand family.

And he was able to sell them
for a lot of money.

That was the dopamine hit
for him.

That was fun.

[Eric speaking]

Bro, ye-- I don't know.

Smuggle some f*cking turtles

and sell 'em for ten
or fifteen thousand dollars

and have the guy hand you
a stack full of cash,

and then you'll feel the rush.

[Jeanne] It seemed like
a very vanilla crime.

It was just bending
the laws a little bit.

If you bring the animal in
knowingly, illegally,

you violated the law.

[Jeanne] So, if somebody
came in with a suitcase-load

of tortoises
or protected snakes,

it didn't matter, as long as
you don't ask, you don't tell.

[Mike] Nobody would say,

"Oh, I just smuggled this in.
Do you wanna buy it?"

No, it would be, "Hey, I got
a pair of woma pythons.

You want to buy 'em?"
"Sure. How much are they?"

"Fifteen thousand for the pair."
"Okay!"

"Here's your invoice," shoo!

[Hank Molt] There was guys
around the world

that had good, rare,
smuggled animals.

They knew how to get it
into Florida.

Strictly Reptiles became their
first choice to sell it...

'cause they knew
they'd get paid

and Strictly was able
to move it.

[Jeanne] There's so many
people coming in.

I had worked out
a corporation rate...

down the street at a hotel.

We called it Smugglers Inn.

[♪ upbeat music playing]

[Mike] There were guys
that I dealt with that show up

in the middle of the night
with a suitcase

with 300 poison arrow frogs
from Nicaragua.

"Hey, I'm here from Peru,
I got all kinds of turtles."

So, it was exciting.

[♪ upbeat music
continues playing]

[tires screeching]

[Jeanne]
There could be a suitcase
full of ill*gal lizards.

Could be iguanas
from these islands

that never shipped
their precious animals.

It could be these rare

endangered snakes
from Indonesia.

We had it all.

[♪ upbeat music
continues playing]

Strictly Reptiles
was bringing in a lot of things

for the first time ever
on U.S. soil.

Rainbow boas, Argentine boas,

Paraguayan cherry heads.

If the animal was brought in,
they would pay for it.

[♪ upbeat music
continues playing]

-[buttons clacking]
-[receipt machine clicking]

[Jeanne]
You're getting the money

and you're wrapped up
in the excitement.

And then, it becomes routine.

[Ray Jr.] Mike and my dad
worked till 11 o'clock,

seven days a week.

And when people
were walking in with suitcases,

I started to ask questions.

And it got to the point where
I was asking too many questions

so they kind of avoided me.

I was kind of like the mushroom.

They kept me in the dark
and fed me sh*t.

[plane engine roaring]

[tires screeching]

-You're gonna turn it sideways.
-[Ray Sr.] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Ray Jr.] All that ill*gal sh*t
that they were bringing in,

that was never me, man.

I just-- if you can't have it
and it's against the law,

you know, it's just never
worth it for me.

I've never been
that kind of a, a risk taker.

Seeing my dad get in trouble
when I was a kid,

all the money, the lawyers,
the government,

everything that went down,
you know.

[Mike] Ray was always
against the dealing

of the ill*gal stuff.

But for me and my dad,
it made it fun.

Getting all that crazy sh*t
that nobody had.

[Ray Jr.] It was like a drug,
man, they had to have it.

G.H.I., gotta have it.

Once I start seeing
what's going on,

I'm like, hey,
you're f*cking up.

You're the biggest.
They're gonna come after you.

[Mike] Ray's the guy in the
back of your head going...

[whispering] "Don't do it.

Don't do it, don't do it."

Then, you have
your alter ego going...

[whispering]
"Yeah, you can do it.
Get away with it.

Yeah, go ahead, do it.
Yeah, yeah, yeah."

[Bryan] You know, Mike played
the system in a couple of ways.

One was don't ask, don't tell.

The other was to play the paper.

[Jeanne] Some animals
were not allowed from the wild

from countries
where they occurred.

[Bryan] There's an exception
for c*ptive bred animals.

[Jeanne] If the paperwork
would say c*ptive born

and it came through Miami
and got cleared,

the animal was washed.

The government officials
in those countries

probably made very little money,
so they accepted bribes.

[Bryan] Instead of bringing in
as many animals as he could

in his suitcases, they could
ship in volume even more.

So, Mike pioneers
a whole new era

in reptile smuggling,

and that's moving the paper.

Paper can be manipulated,
paper can be doctored.

"You mean, if I check this box
instead of this box,

"the government will approve me
bringing that in?

Yeah, I'm gonna check that box.
I've got a breeding facility."

He's not Hank Molt
grabbing things off a tree

somewhere in Papua New Guinea.

Mike doesn't leave his desk.

He becomes the largest smuggler
in the United States.

[Eddie]
A lot of the shipments that
he brought into the country

had paperwork
that we were suspicious of,

but because of
the skeleton staff...

things slipped
through the cracks.

And Mike knew this.

I would play on, you know,

Fish and Wildlife's lack
of resources, I would say.

[Eddie] At one point, there was
a shipment of Uromastyx

that Strictly Reptiles
imported.

[Ray Jr.] It's a pretty
impressive lizard.

Biggest, three feet,
I've seen 'em.

Beautiful. None of 'em
were in the United States.

[Ray Jr.] They weren't allowed
out of the country.

[Dwayne Cunningham]
So, of course, Mike wanted 'em.

He imported


[Dwayne] And Fish and Wildlife
started asking,

"Where did this stuff
come from?"

[Jeanne] I was at Strictly.

Special agent
with U.S. Fish and Wildlife

comes through the door
with a piece of paper

and he's like, "I'm taking
these animals away from you."

And Mike,
Mike doesn't like people

just coming up and telling him
what they're gonna do,

especially with his property.

So, Mike looks
at the piece of paper

and he throws it back to him
and says, "No, you're not."

And they're like face-in-face,

and they're like
yelling at each other.

[Mike]
If they're f*cking with me,

then I just f*ck with 'em back.

[Eddie]
You gotta understand that

you're not gonna get
in this profession

to be intimidated
from someone like that.

So, we took 'em all.

[Mike]
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

has to prove that
what you got was ill*gal.

[Eddie] Well, when you got
the guy in Africa says,

"No, that--
that paperwork's good.

Those are legal animals."

And Mike, who knows whether
he paid the person in Africa

for their fraudulent paperwork.

[Mike] They looked at it

and they couldn't find anything
wrong with the shipment.

Because I wasn't able to bring
any violations against him,

I had to return them to him.

I found out from an informant
he had called me dumb.

His words,
it's not hurting me,

because you're gonna
get yours one day.

[Mike] We didn't like each other
and he did everything he could

to hinder my business.

I did everything I could
to get anything

under his nose that I could.

[Jeanne] It was just
a cat-and-mouse game.

-[lizard hissing]
-And there was lots of cheese.

And the cheese were
all those boxes of animals

coming in to Strictly Reptiles.

[engine revving]

[Eddie]
We knew that Strictly Reptiles

was doing ill*gal stuff.

We knew this.

To prove it, it's a totally
different thing.

[car zooming]

[♪ tropical music playing]

[announcer] The excellent
entertainment continues.

Please welcome
the unique comedy

of Dwayne Cunningham.

This afternoon I was watching
that front of the ship channel.

-Have you tuned in to that?
-[audience laughing]

They say that's the most popular
station on the ship, actually.

[Mike] Dwayne Cunningham
was a comedian

who my father
had known for a long time.

And one of his big things was,
is he worked on a cruise ship.

[♪ tropical music
continues playing]

[Dwayne] One day,
we were in St. Thomas.

There was like a stream
that ran down to the ocean,

just filled with iguanas.

Light bulb goes off.

I called up Ray
and I was like,

"What's the rarest lizard?"
And he said, "Cyclura."

They've never been exported
into the United States.

They were worth $2,000.

That's an expensive lizard.

Ray told him to do it.

[Dwayne]
I knew exactly where to go.

I mean, there have been books
written about, you know,

reptiles of the Caribbean.

You read that book,
it tells you they're out

on these little islands
that nobody lives on.

So, I got a boat out to a cay

from the map, like a pirate.
It's in the book.

And I'm looking around,

and I don't see a lizard.

But then, something scurries.

And there on the rocks...

are all of these iguanas.

It's like the treasure
at the end of the rainbow.

Catch 'em early in the morning,
their brains are frozen.

Bag 'em in the pillowcases.

I go back on the ship,

and then the ship
would come back to Miami.

I had about eight to ten
Cyclura in my luggage,

and they went to Ray.

[Jeanne] Rare, not allowed.

All of a sudden,
Strictly Reptiles has 'em.

And not just has 'em,
has a bunch of 'em.

We had two hobbyist
photographers at Strictly.

Ray said, "Go ahead,
take pictures of those."

One of 'em took the picture

and sold it
to Reptile Magazine.

On the cover is this ill*gal
smuggled iguana.

It was in bookstores
all over the place.

And here's Mike going,

"Oh my God, I can't believe
my dad did this!"

[Eddie] I mean, we just,
like, rolled laughing.

Did they think we would
never see this picture?

Maybe they didn't think
we-- we could read?

[Mike] And when it came out
on the magazine,

I went completely ballistic.

You don't remember,
that was one of the-- one of--

I remember the animal.

I remember it was ill*gal,
but I re...

Oh, good, I'm glad
you remember that part.

'Cause I was the one who was
gonna take the hit for it.

-[Mike laughing]
-Well, you were the one, too,

that was gonna take the hit
for a lot of it.

-I was the one who took
a hit for all of it.
-All of it.

[static crackling]

Hi, I'm John Brooks,

Special Agent for the Fish
and Wildlife Service Division

of Law Enforcement.

In this videotape,
you will see methods

commonly used to illegally
transport wildlife.

Wildlife inspectors encounter
many of the situations

portrayed in this videotape
on a daily basis.

[Bruce Weissgold] In the '90s,
Fish and Wildlife Service

was definitely
losing the battle

against wildlife trafficking.

These were ill*gal
trading networks

that were spanning the country

and spanning the globe.

Wildlife poaching
and trafficking cases

can be really, really serious.

We've seen species

whose entire wild populations

have been seriously damaged
just in wildlife trafficking.

These are serious crimes if you
care about the natural world.

[worker] We can't even know
what is in here.

And we're supposed to be
looking at this, every shipment.

[Bruce] At the port of entry,
the wildlife inspectors

were completely overwhelmed

by the volume of animals that
were coming into the country.

[agents speaking]

[Bruce] The U.S. Fish
and Wildlife Service

needed a different approach.

-[agent 1] Oh, sh**t.
-[agent 2 laughing]

[Bruce]
A Special Operations Unit

was created in
the headquarters office.

It was a long-term
undercover unit

that was designed to infiltrate
criminal and wildlife networks,

document ill*gal activity,

and prosecute those
who were engaged in it.

We brought a whole
different cadre of people in

with different skill sets
that allowed our investigations

to become more in-depth
and broader.

[agent] An intelligence network
of individuals

as well as governments
can be of tremendous value

in the prevention of smuggling.

[Ernest Mayer] Fish and Wildlife
started recruiting people

from other agencies.

Customs Service,
Drug Enforcement Agency,

U.S. Marshals.

Cradle the individual's head
and tuck it in

like you're running
with a football.

Deflect if I have to, strike.

All federal agents go through
criminal investigator school

where you learn
investigative techniques...

raid techniques...

a lot of law.

And we would use
that education

in long-term covert,
deep-cover investigations.

[agent] Federal agents,
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

You're under arrest for
conspiracy to smuggle wildlife.

[George Morrison]
In those days,

I believed the Branch
Special Operations

could catch every bad guy
that existed out there.

Federal agents captured
animal smugglers this week

using an unusual decoy.

[newscaster] Three men
were arrested as they prepared

to load a gorilla onto a plane.

Only it wasn't really a gorilla,

it was a federal agent
in a gorilla suit.

[Bruce] The smugglers must
have been extremely drunk,

but they bought it.

After the takedown, the agent
is still in the full suit

and sitting there
smoking a cigarette.

There's two things
that have to come together

for Special Ops
to look at a case.

One is it has to be
a major black market

that is worth spending that
time and effort and money on.

Two, we had to have
enough intelligence.

We primarily landed
on the reptile industry.

It was booming at the time.

When we started looking
at the intelligence...

a lot of things were pointing
to the Van Nostrands.

[vehicle beeping]

-What do you got?
-Uh, exotic fauna.

Last one. I think that's it.

-Alright.
-Alright, bud.

[Ray Jr.] All that ill*gal sh*t
that they were bringing in

kind of made the industry.

-It was all new.
-[snake hissing]

It was cool.

[frog croaking]

[skink clicking]

-[frog croaking]
-So, once it was here,

there was people
lined up to buy it.

[Bryan] As Mike
had more and more success,

everything got bigger.

His car got bigger.

His house got bigger.

He got bigger.

[Jeanne]
Mike was getting the cheese.

And Mike wanted more cheese.

[Mike] Anson Wong
was out of Malaysia.

Anson was dealing with Tommy.

But then, I hooked up
with him in the '90s.

You know, and Anson
had a lot of connections

around the world
for a lot of crazy stuff.

[Bryan] Anson had something
called a frilled dragon...

which is this
extraordinary animal.

Gorgeous animal.

The closest reference point

is the Dilophosaurus
in Jurassic Park.

[screeching]

The one that spreads
its collar

and spits poison.

They don't spit poison,

but otherwise
that is a frilled dragon.

[hissing]

[Mike] Nobody had 'em.
So, Dale and I, we said,

"Hey, let's stop off in Malaysia
and see Anson."

[pilot] [on PA]
Ladies and gentlemen,

welcome to Penang
International Airport.

[Mike] So, we flew into Penang,

and Anson Wong
met us at the airport.

We went to his house,
which was up on the side

of a giant mountain.

I mean, the road was--
is no wider than me.

You know, that was scary sh*t.

Talked business with him.

You know, Anson got a lot of--
got a lot of rare stuff.

But it was, you know, it was
stuff that was difficult to--

when the heat's on you,
it's diff--

difficult to mess with.

But Anson had his whole scheme.

[Bryan]
After meeting with Anson,
he flew from Malaysia

to Indonesia
to meet with André Van Meer,

who is sort of Anson's
equivalent in Indonesia.

And they set up a scheme
to start smuggling
frilled dragons.

They needed paperwork
to clean these animals.

They would route it
through Malaysia,

and then to Holland...

and doctor their paperwork
along the way.

Just as Switzerland is a center
for international banking,

Holland became a center

for international
reptile trafficking.

[Bruce] In the Netherlands
at that time,

they were running wiretaps
on André Van Meer.

[Mike] He started
asking me questions,

you know, how should he
bring 'em in, and I said...

[Mike] [on tape]
"Don't come into Miami,
try Chicago."

And I said...
[on tape] Don't worry.

If you get busted or popped,
I'll bail you out.

The Dutch police
picked up on this conspiracy

and approached
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

[Bryan] The Dutch teamed up with
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service,

and they came up with an idea

to mark shipments
of frilled dragons.

The agents would hold them
for a second in Holland,

paint them with
an invisible paint

that would show up
under a blacklight,

they'd let them
continue on to Strictly.

[Bruce] It was a great
investigative technique.

We just had to prove
that a marked animal

was landing
in Strictly Reptile's warehouse.

[Ray Jr.] I remember waking up.

It was a Thursday morning.

[Mike] I was sitting in my chair
and I hear somebody go,

"Stay where you are!
Stay where you are!"

-[sirens whooping]
-[Eddie] We came in strong.

We came in quick.
He had no clue.

[agent] Let's go this area,
room by room.

[Ray Jr.] They come out like,
"Oh, my God!"

Like, they're in
full gear, g*ns.

"Get on the ground,
get against the wall."

-[agent 1] The safe is one?
-[agent 2] Yeah.

-The desk is the other one?
-[agent 2] Mm-hmm.

[Mike] It was like
a total f*cking joke.

It doesn't seem right, you know?
It doesn't seem right.

The government arrest Mike
during the raid.

[Eddie]
It was a pleasure to be the one

to put cuffs on the guy
that called me dumb.

After that, we walked him out.

For me, it was
a "I told you so" moment.

Like, here we go again.

Everything we worked for,
all the money we made,

all the hard work, it's gone.

[agent] Next room.

[door squeaking open]

[Eric] How did you find out
about the arrest?

Well, when they--
when they came to our house.

[Mike] No, you didn't-- No.

-So, they weren't--
-You called me that morning.

-And I-- Right.
-To tell me you were pregnant

with Nicholas.

-[laughing]
-That's right.
That was-- I rem--

Now, you--
now you remember that day.

And I says, "I had to go.
The Feds are here."

And then,
that's when she found--

That's when she found out.

I think I said,
"Call the lawyer."

[Jeanne] At that time,
when they come and they raid,

they already have answers.

What they're doing
is collecting evidence.

[Eddie] Once you get
into their paperwork,

their computer work,
you could make sure

that all the T's were crossed,

all the I's were crossed,

to show that this was
an ongoing ill*gal operation.

[♪ soft dramatic music playing]

[Bryan]
When they raided Strictly,

they got a lot of evidence.

But the biggest thing
was being able to shine

a blacklight on the animals.

To be able to mark an animal

that is in
the trafficking chain

and follow that animal

all the way
to the ill*gal buyer,

it's priceless, it's golden.

It's great evidence.

[Bryan] That made for
an airtight case against Mike.

Once I'm indicted
and I see all the charges

and I look at everything,
you know,

Endangered Species Act
violations,

conspiracy to defraud
the government,

you know, things like that,

it was basically game over.

[reporter] Federal prosecutors
have brought a case

against the so-called
"lizard king of Florida."

Michael Van Nostrand faces
up to five years in prison

and hundreds of thousands of
dollars in fines, if convicted.

[Michelle] Here I was
with two young children

and pregnant again,

not knowing if he was gonna be
going to prison for years

like they said he was.

You know, how was I gonna
raise my children?

How was his business
gonna keep going?

He was the business.

It was hard.

[Dwayne]
Mike was up against it.
I was like...

what is he going to do?

[Mike] I told Dwayne,
I said, look, you know,

I have to cut a deal
and your name's come up.

I went to jail
for 10 months.

The Van Nostrands were trying
to save themselves.

[Jeanne] Ray Senior,
Ray Junior, and myself,

none of us got indicted.

[Mike] I was doing
all the bulk of the bullshit.

Ow, you little b*stard.

So, I had to get everybody else
out of trouble.

That's family, bro.

I mean, you know, family's
gotta look out for family.

[Jeanne] But Dale Marantz
was proven guilty.

I was sentenced to 30 days
in the federal prison,

six months house arrest,

three years of probation
and programming.

[Eric speaking]

I don't think
I could get it out in words.

My reactions to confronting Mike
would go physical.

[Eric speaking]

They drop real quick
when you take out their knees.

[Mike] So, eventually,
we chopped it down

to eight months in,
eight months home confinement.

When I went to prison,
my dad drove me.

You know, I was all scared
and worried,

and he says,
"Ah, don't worry about it."

And he told me all about
the ins and outs of prison.

Dropped me off, said,
"Don't worry, it'll go fast.

You'll be alright."

Closed the door,
and that was it.

[cell door clanking]

[Bryan]
But before he went to prison,

Mike came up with an idea.

And this is not known publicly.

Mike thought,
"I can roll on Anson Wong."

And he laid out
for Fish and Wildlife

all the ill*gal dealings
he'd had with Anson.

[George]
What we learned was incredible.

I had never seen
anything like it.

At the time,
most of these reptiles

were coming from one person,
Anson Wong.

Make no mistake, you don't know
how bad of a guy he is.

-[snake hissing]
-[chameleon hissing]

You know,
it was clear that Wong

had connections beyond belief.

You name it, he could get it.

[Ernest]
By bribery, by intimidation,

he just had his finger
on the pulse of everything.

[George] So, to get him,
we set up one of the greatest

and most complex operations

in the history of the Fish
and Wildlife Service,

Operation Chameleon.

[♪ dramatic music playing]

♪♪