2 Sentenced to 9 Years for poaching elephants in Zimbabwe

Author(s)

Eyewitness News

Date Published

HARARE:  Two men have been sentenced to nine years in jail each for poisoning elephants in Zimbabwe.

The sentences were imposed by a magistrate in Hwange in the west of the country.

Trevor Lane from conservation group The Bhejane Trust says a third suspect is believed to have escaped to Bulawayo, but he’s confident he’ll be caught too.

The two poachers were arrested earlier this month in Dete, western Zimbabwe, after National Parks investigators posed as ivory buyers.

They admitted to killing five elephants in June on the boundary of Hwange National Park, using oranges injected with cyanide.

The two were sentenced to nine years in jail each.

The use of cyanide as a poaching method has resurfaced in Zimbabwe, with at least 10 elephants killed this way in just the last month.

http://ewn.co.za/2017/07/17/2-sentenced-to-9-years-for-poisoning-elephants-in-zimbabwe