United States v. Place

THOMPSON, Circuit Judge.

But still another inquiry remains ... whether Leviathan can long endure so wide a chase, and so remorseless a havoc; whether he must not at last be exterminated from the waters, and the last whale, like the last man, smoke his last pipe, and then himself evaporate in the final puff.

Herman Melville, Moby Dick.

David L. Place appeals his convictions for illegally trafficking in sperm whale teeth and narwhal tusks. Specifically, a jury found that Place’s whale-tooth dealings violated CITES, an international compact implemented in the United States via the Endangered…