A 26-year-old man in Australia has been arrested and charged for allegedly kidnapping a wild platypus from a local waterway and taking it on a train, reported the New York Times. After CCTV footage emerged of a man and a woman boarding a train with the creature that the Queensland police sprung into action and made the arrest.
The two were seen with the platypus, the size of a kitten, wrapped in a towel, petting it and showing it off to other commuters, said the police.
"According to the report that was provided to [authorities], they were showing it off to people on the train, allowing people to pat it," Queensland Police’s Scott Knowles said to the New York Times.
After coming to know about the kidnapping of the platypus, police pleaded for the animal’s surrender, saying it could become sick or die on being displaced from its habitat.
“It can be dangerous for both the displaced animal and the person involved if the platypus is male as they have venomous spurs,” police said in a statement following the man’s arrest.
Police said they charged the man for allegedly stealing the platypus and have spoken with the woman he was seen with. Authorities also said they have not been able to recover the platypus that was released into the Caboolture River in the east part of the country outside of Brisbane by the man.
In Queensland, it is illegal to take “one or more” platypus from the wild, according to conservation laws, and carries a hefty fine reported the New York Times.
The man charged for stealing the platypus is expected to appear in the court on Saturday, April 7 and could face a fine of up to nearly $300,000.
A platypus is an extremely rare type of mammal which lays eggs.