‘Finch-smuggling kingpin’ sentenced for bird trafficking

An admitted bird smuggler dubbed “one of New York’s finch-smuggling kingpins” got his wings clipped Thursday, when he was sentenced in Brooklyn federal court to just over a year in prison.

Imsaf Ali, 62, was ordered to serve 366 days behind bars after he was stopped at John F. Kennedy Airport in January 2022 while trying to get finches from Guyana past customs for birdsong competitions.

He pleaded guilty to conspiring to import wildlife illegally last summer.

Ali was also arrested in 2018 for carrying finches through JFK using hair curlers stuffed in his socks. In that case, he was sentenced to two years’ probation and fined $7,800.

In a video shared with the court this month, Ali vowed that his latest run-in with the law would be his last.

“I’m going to stay away from the birds,” he said.

“Because it’s trouble.”

Ali’s lawyer, Christine Delince, said after sentencing that she was disappointed with the court’s decision. 

Delince had previously argued for leniency toward her client, who she said had a cultural affinity for finches stemming from his childhood in Guyana.

Ali’s passion for his feathered friends, she explained, had seen him through years of personal difficulties.

“His actions were not just about money,” she wrote in Jan. 26 memo.

“[The birds] are a part of him and a part of his culture.”

Songbird competitions have been a popular amusement in the Caribbean for hundreds of years. Finches and other types of birds are judged on factors such as how many times they chirp.

The activity is so highly sought-after that some birds command thousands of dollars, leading to wildlife trafficking that authorities in the US and Latin America struggle to clamp down on.

In their own memo, prosecutors, however, called for “significant” prison time, calling Ali “one of New York’s finch-smuggling kingpins.”

With Post wires