Pretoria - A Vietnamese man appeared in the Hatfield court on Wednesday after the police raided his illegal abattoir in Brooklyn, an upscale suburb of Pretoria, where he had slaughtered animals such as lion and rhino.

Nguyen van Hai, in his 20s, appeared on a charge of the illegal possession of endangered species.

Van Hai was arrested after the shocking discovery was made by the Tshwane metro police when they raided his house in Nicolson Street on Tuesday.

Police said the suspect slaughtered animals like lion and rhino at his house. He is also suspected of having killed other animals in and outside the house.

Visa expired

The police confirmed on Wednesday that van Hai was illegally in the country after his visa expired quite a while ago.

Console Tleane, spokesperson for the Tshwane metro council's Department of Community Safety, said the raid was carried out after the SPCA received information of animals being slaughtered illegally at the house.

Officers found animal bones lying all over the house, while more were hidden in containers and bags. They also confiscated foreign currency of about R1m.

It is suspected that van Hai was involved in a network that smuggled animal products to the East.

Sought-after items

Animal skin, bone and especially rhino horn are sought-after items in the East, where they are used as ingredients for medicines.

Captain Colette Weilbach, police spokesperson, said the police initially thought it was an April Fool's joke when the case was reported.

"It's so bizarre, it's hard to believe."

Tleane described the house as horrifying.

"We've never seen anything like it," he said.

The police couldn't say for certain how many lion and rhino had been slaughtered at the house. Thirteen lion heads were confiscated.

Unclear where animals were killed

Tleane said they suspected van Hai had run the illegal abattoir at the house for longer than a year.

The case was postponed for further investigation. The suspect was refused bail.

The SAPS Crime Intelligence Unit, the national department of environmental affairs and the Green Scorpions are investigating the case.

The investigators will try to establish where the animals had come from, where they were killed and where the animal parts were smuggled to.

It isn't clear yet how the animals were brought to the house.

A diplomat at the Vietnamese embassy in Pretoria, Vu Moc Anh, was sent home last year after she was suspected of being involved in the smuggling of rhino horn to the East.

And some did not believe it when I said in a posting about canned lion shooting that it's easy to smuggle a lion across a South African border!

This investigation will no doubt open up some wrongdoings!

Andrew McLaren