Once the kidnapper is busted, the waters calm at the San Antonio Aquarium. But lurking below the surface is a bigger threat running the whole operation.Big Time is an Apple Original podcast, produced by Piece of Work Entertainment and Campside Media in association with Olive Productions. Follow and listen on Apple Podcasts.apple.co/BigTimePod
Chapter 1: What happened to Miss Helen after her rescue?
It seemed like a wildcard defense tactic, just something he said to put a positive spin on things. But as I read through the police investigation, I saw that his wife had told the investigating officer a similar story, that she believed Anthony was, quote, not trying to sell the shark. He wanted to help.
On top of that, I also learned that Jenny Spellman, the brick wall, who served as the general manager of the aquarium during the whole incident, actually stepped down from her position less than a year after the whole thing.
Chapter 2: What were the kidnapper's claims about animal rights?
They have great intentions. The ways that they do things are absolutely batshit crazy.
When I asked her about it, she told me she left over her concerns about one of the founders of the aquarium, a man named Ammon Cavino.
My eternal optimism said, hey, I can fix the Covinos. I can fix this. I've heard bad things, but I'm here now. I was only in charge to a point. You can have as many arguments and conversations and discussions with upper management as you want. But at the end of the day, they're going to make the decisions. It's their money. It's their business. It's their property.
Ammon refuses to get permits for anything. He thinks that he shouldn't have to get them, and I don't understand why you don't need permits. Building permits, that's what I dealt with. Believe me, that was a nightmare. Trying to keep a relationship with the city in order to get building permits when you're working with somebody who thinks all permits are bullshit.
As it turns out, building permits aren't the only permits that Ammon Covino has issues with.
Ammon Covino pled guilty to wildlife trafficking charges. He was sentenced to 12 months and one day in prison.
I realized that there was really nothing that I could do.
When we got into the story, we thought the shark thief was a real star of the show. Then we thought it was Miss Helen, who'd gotten so big time that her whereabouts needed to be kept secret. But once we decided to take a closer look at the kidnappers' claims, well, we found a much bigger fish, Ammon Covino.
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Chapter 3: Who is Ammon Covino and what is his role in the aquarium?
With all the red flags stacking up, I decided to take a closer look to see if there was any truth to the allegations against him.
My name's Ammon Covino. That's the short and sweet of it.
The touch pools, the interactive exhibits, and the petting zoos, these were all part of the vision that Ammon Covino had been pursuing for years to bring animals and people closer together.
I think there's a lack of animal interaction with humans on this planet. It's just the world getting out of balance and the oceans getting out of balance. We have millions of people a year go through our aquariums. Millions. more than any other aquarium in the country, period. And when you have that kind of volume and you're teaching people, these are animals we should love.
These are animals we should care for.
So when Ammon heard that some guy had stolen a shark from his aquarium, and then when the thief was caught, he claimed he was doing it to protect the shark from mistreatment, Ammon wasn't exactly pleased.
Well, was the animal being harmed, right? That's the first thing. Second thing is, the parameters of the water are perfect. He had to dig his hands all the way to his shoulders to get the fish out. It's not designed to do that way. Those sharks and all those fish have a way to get away from people if they don't want to be touched.
In fact, if you want to touch one of the animals, they have to come up to you because the animals need to feel safe. And that's what we try to create there at the aquarium.
Ammon Covino started the San Antonio facility back in 2014, but it was far from his first foray into aquariums. For most of his life, he was actually in the construction business, but he was first and foremost a fish person. He had a large aquarium at home with exotic fish that he adored and tended to meticulously. In 2001, he decided to make good on his passions and start a fish store.
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Chapter 4: What are the allegations against Ammon Covino's facilities?
And she says, to tell you the truth, I like your aquarium, but I'm a single mom. I used to be a stripper. That's what I did for a living. This is easier for me. And then she pulled out her phone and started scrolling the pictures of a deer that she had as a pet that was sleeping on her bed next to her dogs. And I thought, okay, well... What are you doing?
Why do you have a deer in your house, on your bed? What's going on with that? So there's no organization from top to bottom. They lie to people.
Wow. All right. Let's reset here for a moment and talk about why PETA took an interest in Ammon Covino in the first place.
We focus our attention on the worst of the worst. And Ammon Kavino's wildlife trafficking conviction certainly put them on our radar real fast.
Chapter 5: How does PETA view the treatment of animals in aquariums?
Ammon's conviction goes all the way back to the first aquarium he opened in Idaho. That enterprise had been plagued with legal troubles from the get-go. He had already run afoul of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for illegally housing puffins.
But the crime that eventually sent him to prison was that he was caught illegally importing stingrays and lemon sharks, a threatened species, from an unlicensed fish catcher off the coast of Florida. Ammon didn't have the proper permits to buy or show those fish, and what's more, the seller had told him he was selling the fish without a proper license.
And when he asked if he could purchase them, he was, you know, the guy in Florida said, I can't sell you these animals without a permit. I don't have a permit. So he knew that this was illegal. And he basically said the quote from the indictment is just start doing it. Who gives a shit, man?
Ammon was sentenced to a year in prison for wildlife trafficking, protected species, for buying those fish without proper permits. But as you might imagine, Ammon's version of the story is a bit different. He feels he was set up by the federal government. He says he was trying to do the right thing, helping out a friend down on his luck by buying his sharks.
And when he found out about the permitting issue, Ammon claims he went to all the relevant authorities to clear the purchase at the state level. But when the fish came in, cops bust in and arrested him anyway. Turns out the fish seller had been working with the feds for years.
When you deal with the federal government, they kind of do things dirty, because that's how they are a little bit. All they're trying to do is put someone in jail. I spent two years, 23 months, in federal prison lockup. 18 of those months were in maximum security. I didn't break the law. I did it straight as an arrow. Christian kid, right? And they put me in a cell that was a 10 by 8.
And that door opened one hour a day to take a shower. That's it. So you put somebody like that in that kind of environment, it's really difficult. And why? Why do that? What did I do? I bought a fish from a guy who lied about catching it. I paid for that animal. I paid for it. I filled up permits twice for it. And...
What he did then is entrapped me to buy two animals, a stingray and a shark, while he didn't have a fishing license on permit. Legally, he lied about it, and then he baited me to it, and the federal government told him how to do it. Oh, we're going to get this guy.
Now, to reiterate, this is Ammon's version of events, and it's not backed up at all by the eight-year-long undercover investigation federal authorities conducted to take down fish smuggling off of Florida's coasts. And to reiterate again, Ammon was found guilty and sentenced to a year in prison for these crimes, which he says were apparently not illegal and entirely fabricated.
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Chapter 6: What controversies surround the interactive aquarium experiences?
Well, it's not a bite, right? Let's be real, it's not a bite because it's not considered a bite unless it breaks the skin.
We also have a photo of the injury, and yeah, it broke the skin. But what really set him off was when we asked about his probation, which prohibited him from working with any aquarium or zoo. What's the deal there?
Let's bring this out too. Are you ready for this? This is great. In my stipulations for probation, it said these words. You cannot buy, sell, transport, or exhibit fish. Or animal wildlife. Those are the four things. I didn't do that. I didn't buy, sell, transport, or exhibit animals.
But he was caught emailing the construction managers at his brother's new Sequest locations five days after being released from prison.
Chapter 7: How does Ammon Covino defend his practices?
I was building a facility that would potentially hold animals or could hold animals in the future. But apparently... That is not against the probation violation.
Why keep going back to the aquarium business? I'm not in it. Not in it. And I mean, after that probation, in the construction, why keep working with these aquariums? Because I wasn't breaking the law. I never did. I've never broken the law.
I'm confused what your involvement is.
That's our producer, Morgan.
I think I'm just still confused about the involvement.
You want to get the bad guy here, right?
Absolutely not. Okay. They don't need me. The place has been running itself for years and years and years. I haven't been involved. I prefer to be at home listening to my music, chilling with my family, watering my plants, picking strawberries. That's what I do. I don't interact with the aquarium nor do I care.
Ammon continues to insist that he has nothing to do with the operation of the aquariums that his wife owns today. But the reason we reached out to Ammon in the first place is because his name was all over the news articles about Miss Helen and the shark thief. Even on the aquarium's own website, he was listed as the owner of the San Antonio Aquarium.
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Chapter 8: What are the consequences of animal interactions in public aquariums?
And in articles, we found him referred to as, quote, Ammon Covino, the aquarium's chief operating officer, which didn't really square with everything he was telling us now.
I'll tell you why. Because my name, Ammon Covino, had been smeared all across the country. And I talked to a PR company that says, there's really not much you can do about it. You can't really get rid of those sites. They're smear sites and whatever. So what I did was...
What I did was thought, well, what better opportunity than to get my name out as Ammon Covino with a shark being stolen by a baby cart. So when they search Ammon Covino, that bumps up higher. So they don't see, oh, this guy is PETA hates him. And he's this horrible person. So I took that as an advantage to be able to lower my name on Google searches. That's why I did that.
Very specific reason why.
We can go back and forth all day about the ethics of zoos and aquariums and if it's even possible to run one of these facilities responsibly. If the disagreements between Ammon, PETA, and the shark thief prove anything, it's that there's more than one way to love a fish. But you have to admit, the empire that Ammon Covino has built is impressive.
And the handover fist success that he's had also seemed to convince him that the fact that he's being attacked is proof that he's doing something right.
So it's really frustrating. It's frustrating to be treated unequal. If I really cared one shit about it, I'd sue the federal government and I have a leg to stand on. If I gave two shits, I'd spend time doing that. But I'm not going to. It's in the past. It's done. It's gone. It's buried. It's done. I've been mistreated by lots of people my whole life.
In fact, I talked to the... Ah, it doesn't even matter. This stuff's all shit. It doesn't even matter. It's all in the past. What else you got for me?
These days, it's not just the USDA or PETA on the Covino's case. The call is coming from inside the house, too. A group of former Sequest employees have now started an online campaign to bring awareness to the alleged neglect they've seen at Covino Aquariums. Their message to the public is simple. If you don't want to abuse animals, don't give these people your money.
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