A Chinese man admitted to smuggling around 850 protected turtles and other animals worth estimated $1.4 million from the U.S. to Hong Kong, the DOJ said.

A man admitted trying to smuggle protected turtles worth more than $1 million from New York City to Hong Kong. They were shipped in boxes labeled “plastic animal toys.”

Between August 2023 and November 2024, Wei Qiang Lin exported to Hong Kong more than 200 parcels containing the turtles, according to a Justice Department statement on Monday. The boxes packed with the turtles had been labelled as "containing 'plastic animal toys', among other things", the authorities said.