GardenBanter.co.uk - View Single Post

15-11-2005, 09:26 PM

wrote:
Hey All!

Workinng on a Case Study of Illegal Orchid Smugglings for a school
project. Anyone have any first hand experiences with this? I would be
interested to hear anyones experiences in dealing with underground
Orchids. Confidentiality is assured. Would be up for either email
correspondence and/or a quick telephone chat.

I'm in Canada - but you could be wherever!
Drop me a line at fergusonwoods AT hotmail DOT com if you're
interested!

Thanks!

What sort of school project? High School? College? Law School? This
topic could become a life's work and/or book. I'm not a smuggler, nor
do I play one on TV, but depending on how 'in' to this you want to get
there's a bunch of stuff online. If your project is a 5 page high
school paper that's one thing. If its a law dgree that's another...

If you are researching a short paper search for US Department of Justice
information on the case for Michael Kovach, Selby Gardens and
Phragmipedium kovachii. There may be some info still available online
from the Miami area newspapers and/or the Sarasota, Fl newspapers (you
have to search to get the newspaper's name, sorry). Sarasota is the town
Selby gardens is located in.

If you want something more in depth with innuendo try searching the
archives of the "Orchid Guide Digest" (google it). You'll have to
figure out their search engine and spend a bunch of time tracing
threads, but it can be done. There will be comments from people who
attended the trial of Pepe Portillo, as well as George Norris (who
should be getting out of jail soon.) You could google Pepe Portillo,
and George Norris in conjunction with the word 'smuggle' or 'orchid'
too. See what turns up.