Viktor Tsimbal, president of Miami-based Beluga Caviar, pleaded guilty to a smuggling conspiracy in which he paid couriers to bring suitcases filled with caviar into the US in violation of wildlife protection laws.

Tsimbal is said to have smuggled more beluga caviar out of Russia in 1999 than the nation's entire export quota for the year.

"Caspian Sea sturgeon may have been around since the age of dinosaurs but the appetite of smugglers for profit has the potential to extinguish them from the earth," said Tom Sansonetti, assistant attorney-general of the Justice Department's Environment and Natural Resources Division, according to the Financial Times.

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