CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas — A Southeast Texas woman pleaded guilty Oct. 24 to smuggling chickens into the United States from countries where poultry populations are affected by a highly contagious and often deadly disease. Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) Houston, the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the U.S. Marshals Service conducted the investigation that led to the conviction.
Jennifer Mayo, a 46-year-old resident of Aransas Pass, pleaded guilty in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas to smuggling 60 Dong Tao chickens into the United States from Vietnam and Cambodia.
“Safeguarding American agriculture from biological threats is vital to our national security,” said HSI Houston acting Special Agent in Charge Robert Kurtz. “HSI is committed to working alongside our partners to prevent wildlife smuggling and the illegal importation of plants or animals that might be carrying invasive pests or diseases that could threaten our food supply.”
Vietnam and Cambodia are currently listed by the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, the U.S. agency responsible for protecting U.S. agriculture from invasive pests and diseases, as regions affected with highly pathogenic avian influenza. APHIS has also not cleared Vietnam or Cambodia as being free from Virulent Newcastle disease, a highly contagious and fatal viral disease of birds and poultry that attacks their respiratory, nervous and digestive systems and is hard to detect.
In the United States, it is illegal to import poultry from regions affected by highly pathogenic avian influenza or regions where Virulent Newcastle disease exist in commercial poultry populations, unless specific conditions are met.
The investigation uncovered that Mayo illegally smuggled 60 Dong Tao chicken eggs into the United States from Vietnam and Cambodia in August 2023 and attempted to hatch them at her home in Ingleside.
Mayo initially reported to law enforcement that all the animals that hatched had died. However, authorities conducted subsequent checks which revealed there were multiple live Dong Tao chickens on her property. Dong Tao chickens are a rare, expensive breed of chicken typical to southeast Asia. Originally from the village of Dong Tao in Vietnam, these chickens have very large legs as their identifying feature.
Mayo is scheduled to be sentenced Jan. 23, 2025. At that time, she faces up to 20 years in prison and up to $250,000 in fines.
Mayo was permitted to remain on bond pending that hearing.
Assistant U.S. Attorneys Liesel Roscher and Tyler Foster are prosecuting the case.
For more news and information on HSI’s efforts to aggressively investigate wildlife trafficking and smuggling in Southeast Texas follow us on X, formerly known as Twitter, at @HSIHouston.