Famed Cryptozoologist to Prison: 14 Years

Marc van Roosmalen, as a zoologist and cryptozoologist, has used Ivan Sanderson’s and Bernard Heuvelmans’ classic cryptozoological fieldwork techniques, trusting the locals, listening to the native tales, and tracking down new animals. Now comes shocking news from his adopted Brazil that is anything but good.

According to breaking press accounts, Dutch biologist Marc van Roosmalen faces 14 years in a Brazilian prison. An apparent victim of bureaucracy, he has been convicted of failing to apply for a license for the monkey refuge at his home in the Amazon region of Brazil. He is appealing the sentence.

As Darren Naish recently noted, in opening a multi-post series on van Roosmalen’s new species discoveries, “few living people have contributed so much to the discovery and documentation of new terrestrial mammal species as Dutch primatologist Dr Marc van Roosmalen.”

According to correspondent Jeroen Dirks, van Roosmalen has been convicted of biopiracy: “It was easy to find a reason to take legal action against Van Roosmalen. He was accused of failing to apply for a permit for the monkey refuge at his home. This meant that the 28 orphaned monkeys he was keeping there were technically stolen. He was accused of monkey theft and biopiracy and sentenced to 14 years in prison.”

The 60-year-old primatologist, biologist and, yes, cryptozoologist is now behind bars in Brazil.

Loren Coleman About Loren Coleman
Loren Coleman is one of the world’s leading cryptozoologists, some say “the” leading living cryptozoologist. Certainly, he is acknowledged as the current living American researcher and writer who has most popularized cryptozoology in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Starting his fieldwork and investigations in 1960, after traveling and trekking extensively in pursuit of cryptozoological mysteries, Coleman began writing to share his experiences in 1969. An honorary member of Ivan T. Sanderson’s Society for the Investigation of the Unexplained in the 1970s, Coleman has been bestowed with similar honorary memberships of the North Idaho College Cryptozoology Club in 1983, and in subsequent years, that of the British Columbia Scientific Cryptozoology Club, CryptoSafari International, and other international organizations. He was also a Life Member and Benefactor of the International Society of Cryptozoology (now-defunct). Loren Coleman’s daily blog, as a member of the Cryptomundo Team, served as an ongoing avenue of communication for the ever-growing body of cryptozoo news from 2005 through 2013. He returned as an infrequent contributor beginning Halloween week of 2015. Coleman is the founder in 2003, and current director of the International Cryptozoology Museum in Portland, Maine.

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