Man who bred world’s biggest rhino herd charged with horn smuggling
John Hume, the South African who bred the world’s biggest rhino herd, has been arrested on charges of smuggling of the endangered animals’ horns.
Hume was charged on Tuesday, his daughter-in-law Tammy confirmed. In total six people were arrested to face charges of fraud, theft, and contravention of the National Environmental Management: Biodiversity Act, with additional charges of racketeering and money laundering under consideration, the country’s environment department said, without identifying them.
“The syndicate is linked to a fraudulent scheme involving 964 rhino horns, worth millions of rands, destined for illegal markets in Southeast Asia,” the department said in a statement. “The suspects allegedly defrauded the Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment by securing permits under false pretenses to buy and sell rhino horns domestically, while funneling them into illegal international markets.”
In Southeast Asia ground rhino horn is believed, erroneously, to cure ailments including cancer.
Hume, over a period of more than a decade, bred a herd of about 2,000 white rhinos, or an eighth of the global population, at a ranch near Klerksdorp, which lies 96 miles southwest of Johannesburg.
He sold the ranch and rhinos to African Parks, a billionaire-backed conservation nonprofit, in 2023 after years of unsuccessfully campaigning for the legalization of international trade in the animals’ horns. He argued that this would cut poaching as rhinos can regrow their horns after having them cut off. While they can be traded within South Africa there is no demand.
The arrests followed a seven-year investigation by a wildlife trafficking unit of the police. Tammy Hume declined to comment further.
Netwerk24 reported Hume’s arrest earlier and said the state wouldn’t oppose bail for the suspects.
South Africa is home to about 80% of the world’s rhinos and has lost hundreds of the animals annually to poachers for at least the last 15 years.