According to court documents, 47-year-old Jesse James LeBoeuf and his longtime companion, 52-year-old Loretta Sternbach, bought the protected animal parts during visits to the Saint Lawrence Island village of Savoonga between 2010 and 2011.
The couple pleaded guilty in July, and on Tuesday Judge Timothy Burgess sentenced LeBoeuf to nine years in prison and Sternbach to 3 1/2 years, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office.
LeBoeuf and Sternbach were arrested in April after a raid at their Glennallen home. Agents found an unregistered machine gun, 19 other firearms and marijuana and coca plants, according to documents filed in court. The couple were charged with violating federal laws protecting endangered animals and with selling illegal machine guns. LeBoeuf, already a convicted felon, was charged with possessing firearms.
Though the couple were not charged for the apparent cocaine and marijuana grow operation, Judge Burgess took into consideration all of the alleged crimes and LeBoeuf's past criminal history during the Tuesday sentencing hearing, said Assistant U.S. Attorney Yvonne Lamoureux.
Blake Weshenfelder, 50, admitted to helping the couple sell the raw ivory and received a sentence of three years probation, due to Weshenfelder's limited role in the conspiracy, Lamoureux said.
In separate trips, LeBoeuf traded cigarettes, snowmachines, guns and other goods to Alaska Natives in Savoonga for 500 pounds of raw ivory and two polar bear hides, prosecutors said in April.
Only Natives living on the Alaska coast can hunt walrus, and selling the raw ivory to private collectors is illegal if the ivory has not been made into artwork.
Weshenfelder admitted in court to helping sell the ivory, and Sternbach, who is Native, wrote "gift letters" that accompanied the shipments of ivory to make them appear legitimate, Lamoureux said.
LeBoeuf and Sternbach sold the ivory and illegal machine guns to undercover agents, Lamoureux said.
"There were indications that these weren't the first machine guns they had sold," Lamoureux said.
The prosecutor declined to comment on the extent of any ivory sales outside the scope of the nine-month investigation leading up to the April arrests, nor would she discuss the possibility of upcoming charges for the village suppliers of the animal parts.
"I can only comment on the people who've been charged," she said. "That's an ongoing investigation."
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