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VA: charges filled in motel case
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by tigers9 on July 14, 2008
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Pics on the link
http://www.nbc4.com/news/16879975/detail.html
nbc4.com
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Charges Filed Against Owner Of Venomous Snakes Found At MotelSuspect Forced To Remove Snakes From Arlington County Home Following Ban
POSTED: 3:23 pm EDT July 14, 2008
UPDATED: 4:08 pm EDT July 14, 2008
FAIRFAX, Va. -- Investigators have identified and charged the owner of 17 snakes, including 12 venomous snakes, that were found Thursday night in a room at a Fairfax motel, according to the city of Fairfax Police Department.
Peter T. Nguyen, 39, met an Animal Control officer Saturday and was served with seven summonses for keeping the snakes as pets, a class three misdemeanor.
Related: Images From Scene
A suspicious odor coming from one of the rooms at the Hy-Way Motel in the 9600 block of Fairfax Boulevard was reported to police at about 9:30 p.m. Thursday. Officers found the snakes confined in containers. The renter, later identified to be Nguyen, was not present.
The room was secured overnight, and the snakes were removed Friday morning and taken to an exotic-animal zoo.
The venomous snakes included African puff adders, cottonmouths, rhinoceros vipers, albino cottonmouths, speckled rattlesnakes and a black-headed python. They were in plastic containers stowed inside vinyl bags. The housekeeping staff did not know the snakes were there.
Police said Nguyen did not stay in the room, apparently spending $70 a night to use it for snake storage.
Nguyen was forced to remove the snakes from his Arlington County home because of a ban on venomous reptiles that was enacted on June 15. In the spring, fearful neighbors complained about Nguyen's snakes to the county board. Neighbors blamed Nguyen for a series of snake sightings in the area.
About two years ago, Larry Koskinen stepped on a venomous rattlesnake in his garage. Barb Misra spotted a five-foot snake in her garden. Earlier this year, a 4-year-old almost ran over an exotic serpent on the sidewalk with her doll stroller.
Nguyen denied those snakes came from his house.
But a March incident in which a plumber showed up at Nguyen's house to fix a broken hot tub and found containers of dead snakes on the porch convinced county officials to move swiftly to enact the ban.
"This is not one of the harder votes that I've had to make," board member Jay Fisette said after the vote.
Nguyen has 30 days to get his poisonous snakes out of the county.
"This isn't about snakes," said Koskinen, a father of three, who lives next door to Nguyen. "This is about protecting our children. That my neighbor has something from Mexico or Africa that could kill my child violates the social compact in a profound way."
Two of the loose snakes were found next door to Nguyen's house and one was found in a yard that backs up to his. Still, Nguyen insists it would be "an impossibility of physics" for the snakes to have been his. He said he doesn't collect those species. The snakes he does collect are kept in the kind of plastic containers used in labs to hold rodents, secured from the outside with bolts.
On March 11, a plumber went unannounced to Nguyen's house to fix the leaky hot tub. When he spied 20 or so dead snakes in containers nearby, he called 911. Within minutes, police cars and an animal control van arrived. Nguyen said he refused to let the officers in; he hadn't done anything wrong. He said he explained that he had taken the dead snakes out of the freezer, at a researcher's request, to begin to "skeletonize" them.
Officers milled around Nguyen's property for more than five hours and peered through the windows of the garage with a scope.
Under Arlington County code, it was previously illegal only to "display, exhibit, handle, or use any poisonous or dangerous reptile in such a manner as to endanger the life or health of any person."
Stay with News4 and nbc4.com for more information.
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RE: VA: charges filled in motel case
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by Adamanteus70 on July 14, 2008
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Well I guess the albino cottonmouths may have actually been the Luecistic Cottonmouths he bought from me last year. I am not sure what he was thinking storing venomous snakes in a unoccupied hotel room.
More bad news for the responsible keepers across the nation.
Very sad...
Paul
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RE: VA: charges filled in motel case
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by atwageman on July 15, 2008
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I'm sure before this is all over, yet another wierd twist to the story will develope.
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RE: VA: charges filled in motel case
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by jared on July 15, 2008
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Yes Joe it is. He had at least 5 luecy fls, parviocula, the 'black head' was a ringed python as well as some incredible Bitis artiens somalica (how often do u see those). I wonder where the animals will go now,
Jared
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RE: VA: charges filled in motel case
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by Phobos on July 17, 2008
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I'm good friends with Peter and feel bad about his plight, however parking hot snakes at a Hotel shows a serious lack of good judgment. The snakes are safe and in good hands, whether he can win their release is not known.
On the lighter side of the situations,this is one of the actual summons he received from Fairfax City. You won't believe it unless you see it with your own eye.
http://img112.imageshack.us/img112/7078/badmoodgm3.jpg
Al
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RE: VA: charges filled in motel case
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by atwageman on July 17, 2008
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Just when I think I've seen and heard it all. Garter snakes. This whole scenario is turning out to be a episode of the Benny Hill Show on crack.
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RE: VA: charges filled in motel case
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by EK on July 17, 2008
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I would laugh if this wasn't a sign of the future of herpetoculture. In 10 years we will all be fighting for the right to keep corn snakes. What happened to this country? So sad...........
First they came after the venomous snake keepers and I didn't keep venomous snakes so I didn't speak up.
Then they came after the boid owners and I didn't keep boids so I didn't speak up.
Then they came after the garter snake owners and I didn't keep garter snakes so I didn't speak up.
Then when they came after the Typhlops owners, there was no one left to speak up for me.......
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RE: VA: charges filled in motel case
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by Phobos on July 17, 2008
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Well not to get political on a snakes forum but it's the folks left to center and the environmental wackos that are working to taking our freedoms away.
Al
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