HDB has a list of approved animals you can keep within your home and none of it includes tarantulas (big, scary spiders).
Unfortunately, one man in Singapore didn’t get the memo and was hauled to court for having these spiders in his flat.
48-year-old Andrew Chan Joo Seong was charged with keeping four tarantulas in his Punggol HDB flat.
Two of them are Greenbottle blue tarantula, which is known to be from Venezuela, and a Brazillian Black Tarantula.
Both of them are classified as wild animals under Singapore’s Wild Animals and Birds Act.
Which means, you can’t keep them as pets because they could transmit diseases to humans and domestic animals among many other reasons.
Now, if it was just about him keeping a tarantula as a pet and scaring a neighbour half to death, he wouldn’t be in half the trouble he is in now.
Endangered Species
The other two tarantulas in his possession happen to be the Mexican red rump and a Mexican golden rum.
Both endangered species and protected under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna or Flora (Cites).
Yes, more.
Caught Trying To Import Eight Other Spiders
According to Today, Chan was also accused of trying to import eight other spiders into Singapore illegally.
It wasn’t revealed how his parcels were detected but they were seized at the parcel post section at SingPost Centre on 19 Sep 2018.
One of the parcels contained two Mexican fireleg tarantulas, a species which is also under Cites.
Intends To Plead Guilty
In total, Chan faces 11 charges under the Endangered Species (Import and Export) Act and the Wild Animals and Birds Act.
For keeping or importing an endangered species, he could be jailed for up to two years, fined up to $50,000, or both for each species.
The total fine cannot exceed $500,000.
For illegally keeping or importing wild animals, he could be fined up to $1,000 for each animal.
Chan says that he intends to plead guilty and will return to court on 16 Sep 2020.
Back in Mar 2020, a 24-year-old university student was fined $17,000 for keeping 20 tarantulas in an HDB flat and importing 23 more through parcels.
Interested in what else you cannot keep in your HDB flats? You might want to check this article out:
Would you be jailed for being half-naked in public? Well, the answer will shock you. Seriously. Watch this to the end and you'll understand:
