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Man Who Stuffed Parakeets in His Pants Faces Smuggling Charge (NYT)
| Mainlining the $ecret Truth of the Univer$e | 11/15/25 |
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Date: November 15th, 2025 3:34 PM Author: Mainlining the $ecret Truth of the Univer$e (One Year Performance 1978-1979 (Cage Piece) (Awfully coy u are)) https://www.nytimes.com/2025/11/15/us/parakeets-smuggling-in-pants.html?smid=nytcore-android-share
The man was found with the heavily sedated birds in his underwear as he crossed the border from Mexico in late October, federal prosecutors said.
When Jesse Agus Martinez crossed the border from Mexico into Southern California in late October, he said he had nothing on him.
Then a U.S. Customs and Border Protection officer noticed a bulge in Mr. Martinez’s pants.
Mr. Martinez, 35, was indicted on a federal smuggling charge on Friday, weeks after he was found with two heavily sedated orange-fronted parakeets in his trousers, the U.S. attorney’s office for the Southern District of California said in a news release.
If convicted, he faces potential penalties of a fine of up to $250,000 and a maximum of 20 years in prison.
The birds, which are a protected species that are native to Mexico, were found on or about Oct. 23 “apparently unconscious but breathing” in two sacks, according to federal prosecutors.
Mr. Martinez, a U.S. citizen residing in Mexico who was caught in September trying to bring a parrot into the country, “claimed several times” that the bulge was his penis, according to court records, but when customs officers patted him down, he told them he had birds in his groin area.
A U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service inspector identified the birds as protected parakeets, and they were placed in a cage with food and water, according to court records.
A lawyer listed in court documents for Mr. Martinez did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Saturday. The U.S. attorney’s office declined to comment. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which is investigating the matter, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Orange-fronted parakeets, whose scientific name is Eupsittula canicularis, are listed as “vulnerable” on the Red List of Threatened Species of the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources, the most comprehensive global catalog of the status of animal and plant species.
The pet trade poses the greatest threat to the birds, according to the group, which notes that, between 1998 and 2008, more than 8,000 birds were legally captured, making it the second-most sought-out parrot species in Mexico.
The country banned the parrot trade in 2008, but “illegal capturing is still ongoing in Mexico, albeit decreasing in recent years.” The birds are also threated by habitat loss and degradation, according to the group.
Mr. Martinez, who said he hid the birds because he did not have the correct paperwork to bring them into the United States, claimed that the birds were his pets, which he got from his uncle in Mexico, and that he planned to “keep them in a shoe box in his van,” according to court records.
He said he tried to bring a bird into the country in September, but he was caught by customs officers and it was confiscated. Court records said he had a parrot concealed in a towel under his arm and that, according to C.P.B. documents, it was “subsequently euthanized.”
Imported wildlife must be quarantined before it can be introduced to the country, the U.S. attorney’s office said, noting that many animals have diseases, like bird flu, that can infect humans or other animals.
The birds found on Mr. Martinez were taken to the Animal Import Center of the U.S. Department of Agriculture in Rock Tavern, N.Y., for quarantine, according to court records, where they were “reported to be doing well.”
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