STEALING ENDANGERED TURTLE EGG FROM FLORIDA BEACH LANDS 2 IN FEDERAL PRISON

Two Florida men were yoked for poaching almost 100 federally-protected sea turtle eggs.

Bruce Wayne Bivins and Carl Lawrence Cobb, both of Riviera Beach, will serve federal prison terms after pleading guilty to various poaching charges.

Florida Fish and Wildlife investigators reportedly caught Bivins and Cobb while conducting a surveillance operation in May 2020.

Officials saw Cobb, who was already on federal probation after a January 2018 conviction, driving a green Ford Truck near the beach. 

Cobb was seen dropping Bivins off at a beach. Investigators saw Bivins digging in a nest in the sand with a stick, and filling a dark-colored bag. Bivins reportedly got back into Cobb’s vehicle.

According to court records, investigators stopped the two men, and determined that the dark-colored bag contained 93 freshly harvested, federally- and state-protected Loggerhead Sea Turtle eggs.

Bivins, 65, was sentenced to a seven-month term followed by one year of supervised release for his role in violating the Endangered Species Act, a federal law designed, in part, to protect imperiled species.

Cobb, 65, charged as a co-conspirator, was sentenced to a nine-month term followed by one year of supervised release for violating the Endangered Species Act.

The eggs were recovered and relocated by marine biologists, officials said.