KUALA TERENGGANU – An illegal logger who managed to avoid arrest for almost a year, was nabbed yesterday while trying to transport a massive log out of a forest reserve near here on his own.
The 40-year-old man, who was staying near the Bukit Bauk forest reserve, was caught red handed by the Forestry Department’s Enforcement Unit.
He was loading one of three sections of a log using a winch unto the back of a lorry when the team pounced on him.
State Forestry Department director Datuk Ahmad Fadzil Abul Malik said the man had been known to have taken logs out of several forest reserves in the state over the past year.
“The suspect will cut down trees in several locations and leave it on site for a few weeks before returning with a lorry equipped with a winch to pick up the logs.
“My men have been observing his activities and managed to neutralise his spies. On Thursday morning, we used a drone to monitor the situation and was able to catch him red-handed,” he told the New Straits Times.
The Bukit Bauk forest reserve had been gazetted as an urban jungle and has a large concentration of the highly priced camphor species.
Fadhil said early investigations showed the man had logged about 12 hectares of forest in about a year. He added that the seized logs are worth about RM20,000 in the open market.
