Zhifei Li, 29, is from the Shandong Province, China. Since 2011, he has owned and managed an antique shop, Overseas Treasure Finding, located in Jinan City, Shandong, China. Li was involved in purchasing, selling and smuggling Asian art and antiques prior to opening his own business. 

Li was arrested on or about January 30, 2013, in Miami Beach, Florida, on a Criminal Complaint sworn out in the District of New Jersey, on September 27, 2012, charging Li, who lived in China, with wildlife smuggling. Li's trip was planned in coordination with a Chinese national who owned an antique business in New York (hereinafter, the "Long Island City Dealer") and who, at Li's direction, on numerous occasions over more than a year, smuggled rhinoceros horns and art objects made from rhinoceros horn and elephant ivory to Li in China by way of Hong Kong. Prior to entering the United States, Li asked the Long Island City Dealer to assist him in locating rhinoceros horns there.

Li was arrested by Special Agents with the US. Fish & Wildlife Service - Office of Law Enforcement ( "USFWS-OLE") several days after arriving in the United States and after he purchased two horns of the endangered black rhinoceros in an undercover operation in Miami Beach, Florida, of which he was the target. Li has been detained since his arrest. He was indicted on two counts in the Southern District of Florida on February 12, 2013. The second count charged a violation of 18 U.S.C. § 554 (smuggling raw rhinoceros horns from the United States). On February 11, 2013, Li was indicted in the District of New Jersey in a one-count indictment charging conspiracy to smuggle raw rhinoceros horns from the United States, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 371.

Defendant Li purchased raw rhinoceros horns, as well as carved rhinoceros horns and objects made from elephant ivory, in the United States and smuggled them to China by way of Hong Kong. Li purchased these items via Internet auction, phone bidding and through the Long Island City dealer and two other Chinese nationals who worked in the United States as antiques dealers. These dealers then smuggled the wildlife items out of the United States without declaring them to USFWS, and without obtaining, or applying for, the required CITES export and import permits.