Zoo employee Valerie Norquay displays one of iguanas brought illegally from Mexico. (Marcel Cretain, QMI Agency)

WINNIPEG - A Winnipeg man has been fined $1,500 after airport customs officers caught him smuggling two baby iguanas from Mexico.

Elmyn Henry, 34, pleaded guilty to smuggling and importing an animal without a permit.

While not yet endangered, importation of the animals is regulated to prevent that from happening, Jeremy Aikerstream told court Monday.

"These are animals that are subject to extreme concerns on an international level," Aikerstream said. "We have to send a message that bringing back wild animals is not appropriate. We have to be respectful of animals."

Court heard Henry and his girlfriend were flying back home from a vacation in Mazatlan in March 2009 when Henry's girlfriend told flight staff she was vomiting and nauseous and requested a wheelchair for her arrival in Winnipeg.

Suspicious the couple might be smuggling drugs, flight staff alerted airport customs officers. While inspecting the couple's luggage, one of the officers noticed a hat peaking out from the side of the woman's wheelchair.

"The officer placed the hat on the counter and a little green head poked out of the top," Aikerstream said, noting the woman immediately identified Henry as being the owner of the hat.

"Interestingly, (the woman) suddenly seemed to forget being ill at that point, so it looks like she was effectively trying to conceal these things," Aikerstream said.

The Crown stayed a smuggling charge against the woman after Henry accepted sole responsibility for the incident.

Henry said he paid $50 apiece for the animals, which he bought on the beach a day before returning to Canada.

Henry had been drinking and was still suffering from "party fever" when he made the rash decision to purchase the animals, said defence lawyer Don Mokriy.

"This was a knee-jerk response to an offer that was made," Mokriy said. "It was very unsophisticated."

Shortly after their arrival, the iguanas found a new home at the Assiniboine Park Zoo tropical house.

The animals spend most of their time "eating and sunning themselves," said zoo curator Bob Wrigley.

The animals will be approximately five feet tall when fully grown.

dean.pritchard@sunmedia.ca