A mar­ket ven­dor who was held with 81 birds in Ce­dros has been slapped with $24,500 in fines.

Akash Ram­per­sad, 23, of Pe­tit Bourg has to pay the fines with­in three months oth­er­wise he could go to prison.

Ram­per­sad plead­ed guilty to 80 of­fences of keep­ing bullfinch and pi­coplat birds in an un­der­sized cage and pos­ses­sion of a pro­tect­ed bird, a yel­low-head­ed par­rot, with­out a li­cence when he ap­peared in the Point Fortin Mag­is­trates Court.

He was joint­ly charged with Za­man Hu­sain, 20, and Cur­tis Hart, 20, both of Aranguez, but they plead­ed not guilty. Sec­ond Court Mag­is­trate Tara­matie Ram­dass grant­ed them each $10,000 own bail and ad­journed their mat­ter to May 2. The men were rep­re­sent­ed by at­tor­ney James Philbert. The court heard that around 10.30 am po­lice stopped a white car at Bonasse Vil­lage, Ce­dros, af­ter re­ceiv­ing in­for­ma­tion.

The po­lice found three oc­cu­pants in the car, in­clud­ing Ram­per­sad who was the dri­ver. The of­fi­cers al­so ob­served 20 bullfinch­es in a cage, 60 pi­coplats in an­oth­er cage and a box with a yel­low-head­ed par­rot.

They were charged by se­nior game war­den Steve Seep­er­sad. The birds were pro­duced in the court. Ram­per­sad claimed that he and his friends went to the beach where they saw a drunk man with the birds. Ram­per­sad, a bird lover, claimed he felt sor­ry for the birds and bought the birds from him.

Ram­per­sad re­leased some and de­cid­ed to take the rest home to care for them. Pros­e­cu­tor Sgt Manoolal con­formed he had no con­vic­tions or pend­ing mat­ters. The mag­is­trate fined him $500 for hav­ing the pro­tect­ed bird and $300 each on the 80 charges of hav­ing birds in an un­der­sized cage. The of­fences car­ry a max­i­mum fine of $10,000.

The birds were hand­ed over to the Em­per­or Val­ley Zoo.