Valley Center

An Orange County woman was sentenced Monday to 90 days in jail for conspiring, while she lived in Valley Center, to violate a law prohibiting smuggling of Amazon parrots into the United States.

Teresa Mooney, 26, was placed on three years’ probation by U.S. District Court Judge Judith Keep, who could have sentenced her to five years in federal prison.

Keep sentenced her to 18 months but suspended the sentence except for the three months she will actually serve in jail. Her attorney, Mark Adams, had asked that she be sentenced to the 17 days already spent in jail.

Adams said Mooney and her husband, Eugene Carrier, 37, lost their ranch in Valley Center because of financial problems. It was a commercial bird distribution center located on West Lilac.

Carrier, who pleaded guilty to conspiracy and purchase of prohibited wildlife, could receive 10 years in prison when he is sentenced Feb. 8, 1988.

Mooney pleaded guilty Aug. 11 to conspiracy to violate the Lacey Act, which makes it illegal to transport, sell or purchase protected wildlife.

A third co-defendant, Robert Wylde, 62, of Valley Center, was ordered Oct. 5 to perform 50 hours of community service under terms of three years’ probation.

Wylde pleaded guilty to two misdemeanor counts of transporting protected wildlife that had been smuggled into the United States. He could have received two years in jail.

The case involves the smuggling of more than 300 yellow-naped Amazon parrots into the country from Mexico between October, 1985, and last April. The parrots are protected under an international treaty.