New charges have been filed in what may be Argentina’s largest-ever illegal hunting and wildlife trafficking case. Key defendant Carlos Pablo Escontrela attempted to flee the country, and as a flight risk may be forced to remain behind bars in pretrial detention. Prosecutors presented new evidence in the case earlier this year that strengthened the case — and added animal abuse and illegal possession of weapons of war to the charges against Escontrela.
Arrests in the case date back a year ago. In August 2024, after a months-long investigation into Caza & Safaris Argentina, a high-end hunting outfit that targeted protected wildlife, specialized agents from the Environmental Control Brigade (BCA by its Spanish acronym) coordinated 13 raids in different parts of the country.
It was a massive effort, involving at least 70 agents in 20 vehicles. They seized more than 8,000 animal parts, mostly from protected species, and more than half of which were preserved hunting trophies. They also discovered live animals that included a puma and five peccaries. Authorities confiscated an illegal cache of 35 firearms and thousands of rounds of ammunition.
Seven men were arrested and now face a litany of charges, including criminal conspiracy, hunting of protected wildlife species, illegal provision of firearms, illegal possession of weapons of war, and animal abuse. If convicted, wildlife crimes can carry penalties of up to three years in prison.
The defendants include Escontrela and Jorge Noya, the two alleged kingpins, who are partners in a hunting company, Los Moros SRL. The others include two hunters, a taxidermist, the company’s social media manager, and a person who transported the animal parts.
Noya, who is famous on the international safari hunting circuit and also a veterinarian, is believed to head the operation. In 1979, he founded Caza & Safaris (Hunting & Safaris in English). Now with three lodges, the outfit caters heavily to international clients, particularly North Americans and Europeans. On its website, it promises to “obtain the best hunt result of each species.” It allegedly sold hunting packages costing up to $50,000 in Argentina, Brazil and Bolivia. Prosecutors say that Escontrela and Noya tried to make their hunting activities appear legitimate.
This Caza & Safaris case is the first-ever environmental case that’s been linked to organized crime in Argentina, where poaching and the illegal wildlife trade have historically been seen as low-level crime.
“Wildlife crimes are considered very minor in Argentina,” a source close to the case told Mongabay Latam, speaking on condition of anonymity. “That’s why it’s important to strengthen these investigations — not stopping at wildlife offenses alone, but also investigating and prosecuting the crimes that go hand in hand with illegal hunting.”
New charges against Escontrela
Prosecutors expressed concerned about whether Escontrela would appear in court to face trial, and petitioned the judge to detain him along with one of the accused hunters, who was a fugitive until late 2024. The prosecutor’s detention request was denied.
Mongabay Latam accessed documents detailing Escontrela’s potential flight risk. The court in December 2024 ordered him not to leave the country or travel more than 200 kilometers (about 120 miles) from his home. Escontrela repeatedly violated the ruling.
A judge did, however, authorize a trip to the United States the next month, from Jan. 3-20, 2025, with the caveat that he appear in court within 48 hours of his return to Argentina.
However, the prosecutor’s office confirmed that, instead, on the night of Jan. 8, Escontrela tried to cross the Tancredo Neves International Bridge into Brazil. His attempt to flee was foiled because he was driving in a vehicle that was slated for seizure under a court order.
In an interview with Mongabay Latam, defense lawyer Diego Lindow denied that his client had attempted to escape. Our investigation found that Escontrela claimed to misunderstand his travel restrictions. But his previous actions appear to belie that claim.
On at least two other occasions, Escontrela failed to comply with the travel restriction order. Sergio Mola, the chief prosecutor in the case, said this is evidence of Escontrela’s intention to leave the country to evade prosecution.
An additional 13 vehicles that were paid for by Caza & Safaris are also subject to confiscation: 11 linked to Escontrela and two others linked to another defendant in the case.
It’s expected that Escontrela’s prison exemption will now be revoked
Species captured to later be hunted
During the August 2024 raids, officials found a live puma cub (Puma concolor) at the Guampacha hunting ground, which is one of two owned by Escontrela; the second is in Santo Domingo municipality, in Santiago del Estero province. His partner, Noya, owns another site in Dolores, located in Buenos Aires province.
The cub was trapped inside a reeking barrel that had been used for fuel. It could barely move inside the small container, and it had no food or water. Authorities also found five collared peccaries (Pecari tajacu) in a tiny pen, also left without anything to eat or drink. Hunting both of these species is illegal.
Escontrela’s lawyer, Lindow, denied any wrongdoing. Possessing peccaries doesn’t violate the province’s wildlife laws, he claimed, though his client had previously been fined for this.
The puma, he said, had fallen into a trap placed by local people to prevent wildcats from attacking their goats, and a field worker was caring for the cub in order to later release it. Documents accessed by Mongabay Latam showed that Escontrela failed to provide proof: he’d promised to provide information from the neighbor who purportedly trapped the puma, but failed to do so.
Provincial officials didn’t find any visible injuries or marks on the cat, disproving claims made by Escontrela and his defense team that it had been trapped. Veterinary tests determined that the animals were fit to return to their natural habitats, and they were immediately released into Las Sierras de Guasayán Reserve.
It’s believed these animals were being held at Guampacha so they could later be hunted by clients.
More evidence
Authorities found a dead puma that had been frozen at the Santo Domingo hunting ground. In a statement, Escontrela said it was a “judicial deposit” from a prior case: In Argentina, evidence is sometimes sealed and left where it’s found. But the prosecutor’s office determined that the puma’s body had no signs that would identify it as a judicial deposit.
The freezers at the Santo Domingo site also contained the bodies of other protected native species: armadillos, gray brocket deer (Mazama gouazoubira) and red-crested pochards (Netta rufina), a type of large duck. These and other taxidermied species are suspected to have been illegally hunted.
Mongabay Latam’s investigation uncovered incriminating evidence in Escontrela’s testimony. The defendant said that each hunter who came to the Santo Domingo hunting ground was allowed to bag one white-lipped peccary (Tayassu pecari) until 2019, and one puma per hunter was permitted until 2021. However, hunting of white-lipped peccaries is prohibited under a resolution by the Directorate of Wildlife and Forests. Puma hunting is only allowed if the cat has killed livestock, for which a complaint proving evidence of harm must first be filed.
A documented history
It’s not clear why Caza & Safaris wasn’t shut down years ago. Noya’s hunting grounds were raided in 2018 by federal police, who seized more than 80 wildlife byproducts. According to La Nación, these were “taxidermied specimens that lacked documentation proving their origin and ownership.”
The specimens came from species that included wild boar, warthog, red deer, axis deer, blackbuck, and even elephant. Some 3,700 shotgun shells were found, violating quantities allowed under the National Agency for Controlled Materials. No arrests were made.
La Nacion quoted concerns raised at the time by Javier García Espil, then-national director of biodiversity and water resources at the Ministry of Environment and Sustainable Development. “Poaching and illegal trade are threats to biodiversity,” he said. “We must become aware of the damage these practices cause to the natural and cultural heritage of Argentines and promote a cultural change to combat them.”
Argentina’s Wildlife Conservation Act contains criminal charges for poaching, and some of the species discovered on Noya’s property are protected under an international treaty, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, or CITES. Most hunting clients were foreigners, but it’s unclear if their trophies were shipped to them illegally.
That case was shelved until 2024.
Noya remains under house arrest on the current charges, but he’s also wanted in Bolivia, according to Noticias Ambientales. There, hestands accused of biocide and destruction of natural heritage, after allegedly hunting jaguars in San Matías National Park.
Illegal activities at Escontrela’s hunting properties
There were other inconsistencies in statements about Escontrela’s Guampacha and Santo Domingo hunting grounds. Defense lawyers claimed that in 2017, Noya and Escontrela dissolved Los Moros SRL and no longer offered hunting services.
The company was registered and renewed in 2019 and 2023, the same years that the Guampacha site was issued hunting and gun permits. However, the Santo Domingo hunting ground was never authorized for hunting activities nor allowed to store firearms. Escontrela has acknowledged that his two hunting grounds continued to operate until June 2024.
Meanwhile, illegal possession and use of guns was rampant. Examples include an unregistered semi-automatic weapon found on the premises at Guampacha as well as Escontrela’s personal arsenal: he has 26 firearms registered under his name, though his permit expired in June 2024. The other defendant — the fugitive hunter — has a permit that expired in 2017, but he continued to hunt until the day the raids began.
The prosecutor’s office identified at least four foreigners believed to have hunted on Caza & Safaris’ properties who had entered Argentina without any guns and didn’t obtain the required permits to use weapons. This points to alleged illegal provision of weapons by Caza & Safaris.
Dark discoveries at Noya’s El Pantanal hunting grounds
When enforcement authorities searched Noya’s El Pantanal site in Dolores municipality, they discovered 140 untreated animal hides, including fresh capybara hides (Hydrochoerus hydrochaeris) with pieces of flesh still on them. Hunting these large rodents, as well as pumas and peccaries, is prohibited in Santiago del Estero and Buenos Aires provinces.
Authorities also confiscated a .375-caliber rifle with its serial number filed off and reengraved. They also found a compressed air gun used to fire tranquilizer darts, and two weapons with built-in silencers, both illegal. Images published on the “Africa Hunting” online forum show a hunter holding a weapon with a silencer near the bodies of a deer and an antelope: these photos were taken at El Pantanal in March 2024.
Investigations are ongoing as authorities log thousands of confiscated objects and documentary evidence against the seven defendants. A court date has not yet been set.
Banner image: The white-lipped peccary is a protected species in Argentina. Image via Caza & Safaris’ website.
This story was first published here in Spanish on April 10, 2025.
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