captioning funded by cbs and ford. we go further, so you can. >> this is the largest criminal investigation ever undertaken by the army in connection with this recruiting program. >> david martin: senator claire mccaskill first drew attention to the fraud at a congressional hearing two years ago. what was your reaction when you saw how far out of control it had spun? >> it was mind-boggling to me that this amount of money would be going out the door without anybody doing the basics of control of a program. >> martin: so far, the army has spent nearly $28 million to uncover $10 million of alleged fraud. >> anderson cooper: nearly 40 paintings --supposedly created by some of the most important artists of the 20th century--

were all fakes, painted by a struggling artist in his garage in queens. the fraud might still be going on if were not for an art historian named jack flam, who was the first person to uncover the scheme and blow the whistle to the government. when you found out that all these paintings were forged by one guy working in queens, what did you think? >> i was amazed. i was truly amazed. the guy really knew what he was doing. >> sharyn alfonsi: scientists from the u.s. and mexico recently surveyed the gulf to count the last vaquitas still in existence. it's not easy, because their numbers are dwindling and the animals are notoriously shy and elusive. that's one reason why most people have never heard of a vaquita-- >> okay, they're right here! ten o' clock! >> alfonsi: -- and fewer have seen one. we didn't expect to see any, either. what's your best guess? how many vaquita are left? >> i think there's certainly

fewer than 100. >> i'm steve kroft. >> i'm lesley stahl. >> i'm anderson cooper. >> i'm bill whitaker. >> i'm sharyn alfonsi. >> i'm scott pelley. those stories on this special edition of "60 minutes." over 4 million women have discovered silky smooth feet they can't help but touch. discover their secret with product of the year winning amopé pedi perfect extra coarse electronic foot file with diamond crystals. it removes even heavy callouses revealing soft, beautiful feet. now try the latest innovation from amopé the pedi perfect wet & dry rechargeable foot file. works on wet... or dry skin. feel it yourself! gift soft beautiful feet this summer with up to $17.50 off on coupons.com and you're talking to your doctor about your medication... this is humira. this is humira helping to relieve my pain

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>> steve kroft: now, david martin on assignment for "60 minutes." >> david martin: it is the largest criminal investigation in the history of the united states army: an aftershock caused by the wars in iraq and afghanistan. running short of soldiers, the army national guard came up with a scheme called the recruiting assistance program which paid a $2,000 bonus to members of the guard who brought in a new recruit. a total of 105,000 soldiers got those bonuses, but some of them scammed the system by claiming to bring in recruits they had never met. 80 soldiers have pled guilty or been convicted, and another 60 remain under indictment. by now, most of the big fish have been caught, including some

who raked in more than $100,000 in fraudulent bonuses. but as the investigation grinds on into its fourth year, a backlash has set in. some soldiers claim they did nothing illegal and are being made scapegoats for a recruiting program the army admits was badly mismanaged from the start. master sergeant jerry wilson is one of the 105,000 soldiers who fell under investigation. last year, he walked into adams county courthouse in colorado charged with felony theft for the bonuses he received from the recruiting assistance program. how many potential soldiers did you end up recruiting? >> jerry wilson: 22. >> martin: and how much did you make for those 22 soldiers? >> wilson: $43,000. >> martin: $43,000. >> wilson: yes. >> martin: a combat veteran and recipient of the bronze star, wilson had been in the army for 21 years, most of it as a green beret. >> judge: we will call 14-cr-327 people v wilson.

>> martin: now he was facing four to 12 years in prison after the army's criminal investigation division concluded he was not entitled to any of the bonus money he received for soldiers who joined the colorado national guard. we've talked to your lawyer and she said it looked like a strong case. when she first saw it, she was worried. >> wilson: okay. >> martin: were you? >> wilson: no, because i thought i was innocent. i mean, why would i go to court and put myself through everything i put myself through if i didn't think i was innocent? >> martin: prosecutor ted d'arcy told the court wilson came up with dates of birth and social security numbers of young men already on track to join the guard and entered the information into a website without their permission, then collected a $2,000 bonus. >> ted d'arcy: this was a program that was so easy to abuse. >> gary cheek: we had a program with the best of intentions, but unfortunately it was poorly designed. we left ourselves vulnerable to fraud. >> martin: according to lt. gen. gary cheek, director of the army

staff, the national guard created the program in 2005. between iraq and afghanistan, the guard had more troops deployed than at any time since world war ii, and fewer recruits coming in. >> cheek: when you zero in on the time that this program was initiated in 2005, the army was under a lot of stress. we're fighting in two wars. the national guard was 20,000 soldiers under strength and attempting to grow. >> martin: so, what's the practical impact of having the national guard be short 20,000 soldiers? >> cheek: they will end up having a unit that's under strength to go to combat. >> martin: the recruiting assistance program was considered, in the words of this national guard publication, "one of the most successful recruiting and retention programs launched in recent history." so successful, it was adopted by the rest of the army. >> cheek: the only metric we were tracking was success. how many soldiers are we recruiting. this is a big mistake in running a program like this. >> martin: so the numbers were

going up? >> cheek: the numbers were going up. >> martin: how long did it take the guard to get back to the strength it was supposed to be at? >> cheek: so it took about three years for them to meet their recruiting objectives. >> martin: so, if the problem's pretty much solved by 2008, why does this bonus program keep running until 2012? >> cheek: i think that's a great question. >> martin: and the answer is? >> cheek: and the answer is they probably should've reviewed it and considered terminating it. >> martin: by the end of 2010, army investigators had uncovered 19 criminal cases, including a ring of seven soldiers in texas led by specialist xavier aves who admitted "he and his co- conspirators unlawfully obtained a total of at least $244,000 in fraudulent recruiting referral bonus payments." the army was beginning to suspect the program had "systematic failures." but that didn't stop the national guard from exhorting

soldiers like jim root to take part. >> jim root: when i enlisted, they were promoting this like no tomorrow, wanting everybody to participate in this program. and there was never once a conversation about, "this program is under investigation for fraud. you should stay away from this program." >> martin: four years later, root was indicted for "unlawfully, feloniously and knowingly" claiming recruiting bonuses he did not deserve. he insisted he was innocent. did they offer you any plea deal? >> root: initially, they offered me to drop the charges if i paid back $18,000. i know as it got closer, i think they wanted $6,000 or $9,000 and they would drop charges. >> martin: but that must have been a tempting deal. you can get this out of your way for just paying $5,000, $6,000. which is a heck of a lot less than you're going to end up paying in legal fees.

>> root: there was a lot of sleepless nights. i actually had thought about, because i seen the heartache that my family... excuse me. the heartache. my family faced through this process was very tempting, at times, to throw in the towel and say, "enough is enough." but inside of me, the integrity that i had i could not do that. >> martin: in 2012, the army cancelled the recruiting assistance program and set up a special unit of 60 full time agents to investigate every one of those 105,000 soldiers who received bonuses. its name: task force raptor. its motto: "do what has to be done." so far, the army has spent nearly $28 million to uncover

$10 million of alleged fraud. over 100,000 soldiers have been cleared with more than 4,000 still under investigation. >> flora darpino: once we discovered or believed that soldiers had taken advantage of the program to commit criminal misconduct, we were going to fully investigate it. >> martin: lt. general flora darpino is the army's top lawyer. >> darpino: when it comes to crime, it isn't really about the cost of what it takes to investigate. it's making sure that people are held accountable for criminal misconduct. and that's why we investigate. >> martin: the army national guard spends seven years exhorting its soldiers to serve as part-time recruiters. and then it turns around and puts them all under investigation. that's an about face. >> darpino: if we believe there's criminal misconduct, we owe the american people a full investigation to determine if in fact people have defrauded the government.

>> claire mccaskill: this is the largest criminal investigation ever undertaken by the army in connection with this recruiting program. >> martin: senator claire mccaskill first drew attention to the fraud at a congressional hearing two years ago. what was your reaction when you saw how far out of control it had spun? >> mccaskill: it was mind- boggling to me that this amount of money would be going out the door without anybody doing the basics of control of the program. >> martin: last year, the army issued this reprimand to now- retired lieutenant general clyde vaughn, who as director of the army national guard championed the recruiting assistance program. "your lack of oversight," it said, "contributed to conditions vulnerable to pervasive fraud, waste and abuse." vaughn, who declined to be interviewed on camera, strongly disputes that. but he is retired now and a reprimand has no affect on his benefits. an internal army audit estimated the total fraud "could be as high as tens of millions of dollars." investigations and audits have

produced hundreds of pages of documents which the army released to "60 minutes." i'm just going to quote you from one of them: "found a failure to adequately plan, award, manage and oversee the contracts." >> cheek: i agree with that completely. >> martin: did anybody put in measures to prevent fraud? >> cheek: no, that was the... that was the key problem. >> martin: it seems so simple. all you do is ask the soldier who was recruited, "who recruited you?" >> cheek: i think there were a lot of ways we could have done this. >> martin: some recruiting assistants would simply go to a shopping center or a job fair wearing a t-shirt like this: "ask me about the national guard." all they had to do was talk up the benefits of joining the guard, and if a young man or woman showed any interest refer them to a full-time recruiter, who would do the hard work of getting them to sign on the dotted line. >> root: i could have a two- minute conversation with you, dave, and ask you, "would you be

interested in finding out more information about the national guard?" "yes." "here, fill out this piece of paper for me." you fill out this piece of paper. i turn that paper over to a recruiter. it's the recruiter's job to close that contract. >> martin: doesn't that piece of paper have to include his social security number... >> root: name, social security, address, phone number. >> martin: and do you have to tell him that you might use this to claim a... >> root: yes. >> martin: a bonus? >> root: yes. >> martin: and did you? >> root: yes. >> martin: after a three-day trial, the jury took just 40 minutes to reach a verdict. and the verdict was? >> root: not guilty. >> martin: and your reaction? >> root: weeping. felt like collapsing. >> we will begin this morning's proceedings with opening statements. >> martin: as for jerry wilson, the green beret master sergeant facing up to 12 years in prison, his trial lasted four days. the prosecution presented witnesses who didn't remember

giving wilson permission to use their social security number. defense attorney julia stancil chipped away at their testimony, questioning their recollection of events that took place more than four years earlier. but her main argument was that soldiers like wilson were taking the fall for a badly run program. >> julia stancil: soldiers as scapegoats for an inherently flawed gigantic, mismanaged government program worth $500 million. >> martin: even the prosecution had a hard time arguing wilson had deliberately committed a crime. >> darcy: the system was easy to take advantage of. and frankly, i think it was out of character from everything we've heard about sergeant wilson. but he did take advantage of it. >> martin: it took the jury 90 minutes to reach a unanimous verdict. >> we the jury find the defendant jerry jerome wilson not guilty of count number one, theft. >> martin: wilson walked out of court, thinking it was all behind him.

he would be able to get back to his army specialty as a medic by returning to the physician's assistant school he had to quit when he was indicted. >> wilson: i promise you i will never see the inside of a courtroom again. >> martin: one of his commanders sent out this e-mail stating "master sergeant wilson is authorized to reenroll and attend the physician's assistant course. please do all that you can to assist the soldier in this process." so you think it's a done deal? >> wilson: yeah. >> martin: was it? >> wilson: no. >> martin: instead, the commanding general of the colorado guard placed a reprimand in wilson's file, killing his chances for promotion. it cited "compelling and substantive evidence that you defrauded the government. . ." wilson responded by accepting "some responsibility" saying "if i could go back and do it all again i would keep a very specific record of everyone i talked to." but he disputed he had acted "through nefarious means." a jury had acquitted wilson of committing a crime but that, as

lt gen. gary cheek explained, is not always good enough for the army. >> cheek: we have our army values that we're part of. so if you are found not guilty in a court of law, that really simply means that you are not guilty of a crime. but you have done something unethical within the military for which you could receive an administrative action. >> martin: the same thing happened to jim root after he was acquitted. >> root: even though i was found not guilty, they felt in their eyes i was still guilty under their military rules and regulations, and that i would be removed from military service. >> martin: root was able to avoid being kicked out by taking a medical discharge instead, but that doesn't make him any less bitter. >> root: the army has this motto, "no soldier left behind." they didn't leave me behind. they threw me off the bus.

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>> anderson cooper: when one of the oldest and most respected art galleries in america, the knoedler gallery in new york, closed its doors abruptly in 2011, the art world was stunned. not because the gallery closed, but by the discovery that over the course of 15 years, the

gallery and its president, ann freedman, had sold millions of dollars in forgeries to wealthy collectors. nearly 40 paintings, supposedly created by some of the most important artists of the 20th century, were all fakes, painted by a struggling artist in his garage in queens. the fraud might still be going on if it weren't for an art historian jack flam, who was the first person to uncover the scheme and blow the whistle to the government, putting the brakes on an $80 million con, the most audacious and lucrative art fraud in u.s. history. at the center of the story are these seven paintings that sold for more than $3.5 million. they're known as "spanish elegies" and were supposedly created by the artist robert motherwell. do you think those are the series the artist is best known for? >> jack flam: they definitely... the elegies are definitely the series that he's best known for. and i believe that they command the highest prices. >> cooper: jack flam should know.

he is one of the world's top experts in robert motherwell and was friends with the artist for years. robert motherwell was the youngest of a group of famous american painters that included jackson pollock, mark rothko and willem de kooning, who pioneered a new style of american art known as abstract expressionism. after robert motherwell's death, jack flam became president of the foundation dedicated to his work, and was assembling a catalogue of all of motherwell's paintings, what's known as a catalogue raisonnee. essentially a dealer would want a motherwell that they have, that they are selling, to be in the catalogue of motherwell's work, so that-- >> flaml absolutely. >> cooper: it gives it legitimacy? >> flam the catalogue raisonnee in a way is the bible for the market. >> cooper: for years, jack flam and his researchers had been gathering information about hundreds of purported motherwell paintings, analyzing them to sort out the real ones from the fakes. essentially you're doing detective work? >> flam: it is very much

detective work, yes. >> cooper: into an artist's past, an artist's history? >> flam: yes, i mean you end up knowing things about the artist that the artist himself or herself did not know. >> cooper: in what way? >> flam: well, because the artist never sees his or her work all together like that. whereas we were living with these things, you know, pretty much every day. >> cooper: the first time he saw one of the forgeries was in 2006, when ann freedman, president of the knoedler gallery, showed him what she said was a newly discovered painting by robert motherwell, a spanish elegy. she said it belonged to a collector who wanted to remain anonymous. when you saw this elegy, did you think it was genuine? >> flam: i had no reason to believe it was not genuine. >> cooper: because? >> flam: because it was in the knoedler gallery. it looked like an elegy. >> cooper: tell me about the knoedler gallery. what was their reputation? >> flam: they had a very good reputation. it's one of the oldest, if not the oldest gallery in new york, and maybe in the united states. so i mean they had a really sterling reputation. >> cooper: but it wasn't until a year later that jack flam and his team of researchers lined up that alleged motherwell elegy with six others that had recently surfaced, and became suspicious.

>> flam: that day, when my team and i sat in front of the computer and looked at those images, we realized that something was gravely wrong. >> cooper: something about the way they were painted. >> flam: the way they were painted. >> cooper: signature? >> flam: signature, the histories, the titles. >> cooper: not just the histories. the lack of history? >> flam: the lack of history, right. >> cooper: jack flam says the signatures on the seven paintings were almost identical, as if copied from a template. and the words "spanish elegy" were written on the backs although motherwell never inscribed his works that way. he pressed ann freedman, president of knoedler gallery, for the name of the person who was actually bringing her the paintings. >> flam: we asked her who the intermediary was. >> cooper: the person she bought the paintings from? >> flam: the person she bought them from that turned out to be glafira rosales. >> cooper: had you heard the name rosales at all? >> flam: no. i had never heard of her. >> cooper: jack flam says he was assured that glafira rosales was an elite international art dealer, but when he hired private detectives to investigate her gallery, all they found was this modest house

in great neck, long island. >> flam: it was just a house in a neighborhood with newspapers lying in the yard. >> cooper: that was the gallery? >> flam: that was the gallery. >> cooper: not exactly the kind of gallery you expected? >> flam: no, it wasn't what i expected. >> cooper: jack flam's investigators also discovered glafira rosales' boyfriend, carlos bergantinos-diaz, had been accused of selling forgeries in spain. >> flam: i was frankly very surprised that no one at knoedler seems to have done the simplest background check. >> cooper: how long did it take investigators to find out this information? >> flam: about a week. >> cooper: jack flam suggested the paintings be sent for scientific testing to jamie martin, one of the world's top forensic art analysts. martin showed us how he examined one of the fake robert motherwells using a stereomicroscope to study every milimeter of the painting's surface, and to select and then remove samples for identification. that's how he detected circular marks in the base layers, indicating an electric sander had been used to remove paint.

so robert motherwell didn't use an orbital sander to sand down paintings? >> jamie martin: no, no, forgers tend to use orbital sanders to remove paint from old paintings so that when that painting is handled, the back and edges look suitably old. >> cooper: jamie martin also used what is called raman spectroscopy, which can help detect historically inaccurate paint pigments. >> martin: the smoking gun in this particular case was the red paint that is present on the edge of the work. >> cooper: why was that the smoking gun? >> martin: well the smoking gun is that the red paint contains a pigment called pigment red 170. >> cooper: it turns out, pigment red 170 wasn't available until more than ten years after the paintings were supposedly created. when you saw the evidence that came out from the report, from the forensic testing, you had no doubt these are fakes. >> flam: when i saw the report, i thought to myself "nobody could have a doubt now."

>> cooper: jack flam took his information to the fbi's art crimes unit, which launched an investigation. in 2013, glafira rosales confessed to playing a key role in the multi-million dollar fraud. she is now awaiting sentencing, and told the fbi the forgeries were the handiwork of this man: pei-shen qian, an artist who lived in queens and painted the works in his garage. when you found out that all these paintings were forged by one guy working in queens, what did you think? >> flam: i was amazed. i was truly amazed. the guy really knew what he was doing. >> cooper: these are all pei- shen qian's forgeries. incredibly, he was able to copy the style and technique of not just one major artist, but many of the giants of the 20th century: jackson pollock, willem de kooning; richard diebenkorn, barnett newman; clyfford still; franz kline; lee krasner; mark rothko and others. he forged 63 works that sold for more than $80 million to

collectors. federal investigators don't know exactly how much pei-shen qian made on the scheme, but it was at least $65,000. he fled to china and was later indicted. in an interview with bloomberg news three years ago, the forger explained he began painting in shanghai, and moved to the u.s. in the 1980s. he insisted he never intended to pass his paintings off as anything other than imitations and found it incredible that anyone had taken the paintings seriously. forensic analyst jamie martin points out there were obvious clues these paintings were fakes if you knew what to look for. this forged jackson pollock, for example, came with a misspelled signature. the "c" in pollock is missing. this fake mark rothko painting was sold by knoedler gallery for more than $8 million. jamie martin found evidence it was a forgery within just a hour of looking at it. an hour? that's all it took? >> martin: well, you and i can detect it probably within five minutes. >> cooper: how? >> martin: if we turned around

the back, we can see that the white ground is apparent on the back of the canvas. >> cooper: the white ground between the canvas and the paint was crucial evidence because mark rothko did not use white ground layers until ten years after this painting was supposedly created. >> martin: the white background here is a complete tip-off that this work is anomalous. it's historically inaccurate. >> cooper: in some instances, the forged paintings had been given a false patina of age by subjecting them to heat or rain, or staining the canvases with tea. so how did all these obvious clues escape notice by the knoedler gallery and its president ann freedman? that's what buyers of the fakes want to know. domenico de sole, the chairman of sothebys, is one of 10 wealthy art collectors who have sued ann freedman and knoedler gallery after buying one of these forgeries. do you feel you did enough due diligence as a buyer? >> domenico de sole: my due diligence was to go to the best,

most prominent gallery in the united states dealing with a person with a stellar reputation, and pay a price that was reasonable, it was fair. >> cooper: domenico de sole was the person who bought that $8 million fake mark rothko and told us he believes knoedler gallery and its president ann freedman either knew or should have known that this lucrative collection could not possibly be genuine. greg clarick is his attorney. >> greg clarick: the red flags began with the notion that glafira rosales, who was an unknown person to knoedler, who knoedler never investigated, came in and she started delivering what turned out to be an endless stream of never- before-seen paintings was enough to raise a huge red flag. >> cooper: strangers don't walk off the street into a gallery saying that they have access to a never-before-seen collection of some of the greatest masterpieces. >> clarick: that's right. second, the works had no provenance. >> cooper: no chain, no history? >> clarick: they had no history. they had no documents. >> cooper: so there was no evidence these paintings had

ever been painted by the artists? >> clarick: that's correct. >> cooper: not only that, there were no bills of sale, no insurance records, no shipping documents, and no museum exhibitions for any of the paintings. greg clarick told us the gallery had motivation to overlook the paintings' shortcomings. >> clarick: over the period of this fraud, knoedler sold these paintings for about $67 million. knoedler made over $40 million in profit from selling these paintings. and at the same time, knoedler made essentially no money at all from selling other paintings. >> cooper: their business wasn't doing well? >> clarick: their business didn't exist as a profitable venture from 1994 until 2009 except for selling fake paintings from glafira rosales. >> cooper: we wanted to talk to knoedler gallery president ann freedman and though she initially agreed, just a few days before our scheduled interview, she backed out. luke nikas is her attorney. did ann freedman know she was selling forgeries? >> luke nikas: no, she didn't.

>> cooper: not at all? >> nikas: not at all. >> cooper: never suspected over the course of 15 years? >> nikas: she didn't. she believed in the pictures and she believed in the pictures because that's what the experts were telling her. >> cooper: luke nikas says ann freedman showed the paintings to art experts and none of them told her the works were fake. >> nikas: she disclosed there were no documents about these paintings. never found a single one. she disclosed that. she disclosed this unusual backstory about the paintings. and from her perspective, the people who bought these pictures appreciated the risk. >> cooper: a lot of these buyers say "look, i never doubted these works because ann freedman vouched for them. the knoedler gallery was selling them." >> nikas: i think many people do say that. but if you are going to buy a painting that has no documents, has very little history, has this unusual backstory, and you're not comfortable with that, even with the knoedler name on it, then you shouldn't buy the painting.

>> cooper: of the ten civil lawsuits brought against ann freedman and knoedler gallery, six have been settled out of court for undisclosed sums, including domenico de sole's case over that fake mark rothko. as for ann freedman, she is back in the art business. she has opened another gallery and is once again selling paintings just a few doors down from her old gallery in new york city.

>> "60 minutes" continues in a moment. and we are always online at 60minutes.com ,,,,,,,,

>> sharyn alfonsi: you would think the most endangered sea mammal in the world would be a cause celebre, complete with a

star-studded, high profile campaign to save it. but that's not the case with the vaquita, a small porpoise with a distinctive face that's on the verge of extinction. it lives in waters off baja california where the mexican government is trying to save the vaquita by paying fishermen not to fish. scientists from the us and mexico set sail recently to count the last vaquitas still in existence. it's not easy, because their numbers are dwindling and the animals are notoriously elusive. that's one reason why most people have never heard of vaquitas and fewer have seen one. we didn't expect to see any either. to have any chance of seeing a vaquita, we had to travel to the only home they have on the planet: the northern end of the gulf of california. it's a stunning landscape of desert, sea and sky that's home to nearly a third of all marine mammal species in the world. on

on the map, these waters look like a slender finger separating baja california from the rest of mexico. but out on the open sea, it seems vast and empty. last fall, a joint mexican-u.s. scientific survey crossed these waters to count the last vaquitas still alive. >> station calling ocean starr. >> alfonsi: the morning we sailed out to meet the ocean starr, the expedition's research vessel, we were expecting to only see scientists. >> okay, they're right here! ten o'clock, ten o'clock! >> alfonsi: a vaquita sighting is barely more than a glimpse of a dorsal fin and an arched back. they usually travel alone or in pairs, like a mother and her calf. what you don't see is that they are tiny. the smallest porpoise in the world, about five feet long and a hundred pounds. locally, it's known as the "vaquita marina," which in spanish means "little sea cow." its unique black eye rings and lips lead some to call it the panda of the sea, but it has a p.r. problem.

>> barb taylor: it's been impossible to sell the vaquita to nature shows because they want underwater, full frame videos of vaquita and they live in muddy waters. >> alfonsi: barb taylor works at n.o.a.a.-- the national oceanic and atmospheric administration-- and is co-chief scientist on the survey expedition. >> taylor: if you look out there now it's a sea of triangles. and what we're looking for is a little triangle. >> alfonsi: the spotters spend much of their time looking through the big eyes, 25 power binoculars which can spot a vaquita up to two miles away. this is the third expedition to count vaquitas since 1997. the population then was estimated at 567. a decade later, the number had dropped to 245, less than half. what's your best guess? how many vaquita are left? >> taylor: i think there's certainly fewer than 100. >> alfonsi: fewer than 100? >> taylor: fewer than 100 individuals left.

which is, as i say, very critically endangered. and it may be fewer. i mean, that's why we're out here. >> lorenzo rojas-bracho: we cannot lose it. i mean, we... this is our species, our marine mammal species. >> alfonsi: lorenzo rojas-bracho is with mexico's national institute of ecology and is the expedition's other chief scientist. he's been studying the vaquita for nearly 20 years. none are in captivity, and he says our knowledge of the animal is limited. >> rojas-bracho: we know they breed every other year. they're slow breeders. so... >> alfonsi: they breed every other year? >> rojas-bracho: every other year. so that the impact of that is that the cov... recovery will not be very fast, of course. we know very little from their behavior. we know they are very shy animals. >> alfonsi: what do you mean shy? >> rojas-bracho: they don't like boats or noise. so if you approach them, they will tend to go away. >> alfonsi: in recent years, many of the sightings have been of dead vaquitas. the small one in this photo is a calf. a healthy vaquita can live for 20 years, but most don't. they're dying at the hands of their only known predator:

fishermen and their gill nets. hundreds of miles of gill nets are lowered from fishing boats to drift with the tide and catch fish and shrimp. there's no money to be made from catching vaquita. they are just collateral damage. what's the problem with gill nets? >> taylor: they're basically an invisible net in the water. the fishermen put out the net. they sit and let the net soak, so there's no motors going. and the animals just get tangled in them and drown. >> alfonsi: last april, mexican president enrique pena nieto announced a ban on the use of gill nets for at least two years. it was an extraordinary, last ditch effort to save the vaquita. you've lived here your whole life. have you ever seen a vaquita? >> sunshine rodriguez: never. >> alfonsi: never? >> rodriguez: i cannot say i have. >> alfonsi: sunshine rodriguez is the president of the federation of coastal fishermen, which represents more than 600 from the town of san felipe.

including those who work on his six boats. >> rodriguez: i'm not going to lie, i'm not going to say they don't exist. but out of 20 fishermen that i have, one has seen a vaquita. >> alfonsi: what does that tell you? >> rodriguez: it's going to be very hard for them to save them. i believe that the government came in too late for them, unfortunately. for us, we're in our best interest to save it. but if not, we want our ocean back. we want our old habits of fishing with what we had. >> taylor: a lot of fishermen say, absolutely truthfully, that they have never caught a vaquita in their net. the reason for that is that their grandparents caught a lot of vaquita in their net. their parents caught some vaquita in the net. and now that we're down to less than 100 individuals, it's an extremely rare event. >> alfonsi: for generations, the fishermen of san felipe have depended on gill nets to pull in their catch of shrimp and fish, like croaker and shark. >> rodriguez: everybody in our federation has stopped their boats.

we don't go out there. but these people are going to get tired. >> alfonsi: of sitting here and not fishing. >> rodriguez: of sitting, not doing anything. >> alfonsi: faced with a ban, they're trying to figure out another way to fish with new nets that won't kill vaquita. so far, results have been mixed. the test run with this prototype was disappointing. just five fish were caught. this is it? >> fisherman: uh-huh. >> alfonsi: for the day, this is all you got? >> fisherman: ay. >> rodriguez: if you're going to tell me that i'm going to go out there and work 12 hours a day instead of making $30 a day, i'm gonna be making $5 a day, it's not going to work. we're not going to... >> alfonsi: but... >> rodriguez: respect it. >> alfonsi: but what if you're going to make a little bit less, and then you might also save the vaquita? >> rodriguez: if it's a little bit less, we're willing to sacrifice it. but what's a little bit less for you? what's a little bit less for them? >> alfonsi: for two years, fishermen are being compensated for their lost catch. the mexican government is paying them $60 million not to fish.

if you drive around san felipe today, there are more boats on land than at sea... with fishermen tending to their pets, not their nets. they know they risk losing the fishing industry permanently in san felipe if they can't certify their new methods are vaquita friendly. u.s. seafood buyers and restaurants are considering boycotts if gill nets go back in use. >> rafael pacchiano: it would be very bad, especially for the upper gulf. because 100% of the products that they fish, they export it to the u.s. >> alfonsi: rafael pacchiano is mexico's secretary of environment and natural resources and the point man on saving the vaquita. how difficult is it to get people to care about an animal that they never see? >> pacchiano: that's one of the main challenges for taking care of natural resources. first of all, you have to let people know that they exist. because no one takes care of what they don't know. >> alfonsi: but the threat to vaquita from commercial fishing is now being overtaken by the threat coming from criminal

enterprise. in february, environmental activists from sea shepherd pulled this net and its catch from the water. it's the work of poachers going after what may be the most valuable fish in the sea. meet the totoaba. a fish that, like the vaquita, can only be found in the gulf of california. it, too, is endangered. but unlike the vaquita, there's money to be made in poaching totoaba. from this: it's a swim bladder, an organ which helps the fish maintain buoyancy. >> rojas-bracho: they open the totoaba, and they throw away the meat. and they just throw it to rot in the beach. >> alfonsi: so they just want the bladder? >> rojas-bracho: they just want the bladder. >> alfonsi: eventually, the bladders end up in hong kong and china where they are believed to possess medicinal value. which gives them monetary value. the environmental group greenpeace used hidden cameras to capture hong kong merchants trying to sell totoaba swim bladders.

the prices went up to $40,000. >> rojas-bracho: this hunger for endangered species is killing vaquitas here. because the mesh size of the gill nets for totoaba is about the size of a head of a vaquita. so they get easily entangled. >> alfonsi: scientists say the big money from china for poached totoaba is now the single biggest factor driving the vaquita to extinction. >> rojas-bracho: and they were paying at some point $8,500 u.s. for a kilo of the swim bladder. >> alfonsi: $8,500 for a kilo? >> rojas-bracho: $8,500 for a kilo... >> alfonsi: that's-- that's drug money. >> rojas-bracho: that's drug money. so a friend says "cocaine of the sea." and i was saying it's like if... >> alfonsi: cocaine of the sea? >> rojas-bracho: yeah. >> alfonsi: over the past year, the mexican navy has confiscated hundreds of gill nets and fishing boats. it may have dented the poaching, but hasn't stopped it. this spring, a sea shepherd drone discovered poachers operating at night. after being spotted, they cut their gill net loose and fled.

sea shepherd has found numerous nets with totoaba, along with three dead vaquita. in recent years, poachers have smuggled millions of dollars of totoaba swim bladders out of mexico. sunshine rodriguez admits the big money is tempting to everyone. >> rodriguez: totoaba is a gold rush of the year 2015 in san felipe, you know? anybody that has a boat that says, "well, if i catch three, four or 20 of those, i make $20,000, $30,000, $50,000, i'm going to go ahead and risk it." >> alfonsi: do you think they can stop the poachers? >> rodriguez: it's a big ocean. >> alfonsi: all of this has nothing to do-- and yet everything to do-- with the vaquita, which no one is trying to kill or capture. seeing vaquitas in the wild is exciting, but the drama mostly comes from knowing the animal is rarely seen and soon may never

be seen again. a week ago, barb taylor and lorenzo rojas-bracho announced the results of the survey they led in the gulf of california. they now estimate there are only about 60 vaquitas left in existence. fall in love with a new daily fiber. new mirafiber from the makers of miralax. it's the only fiber that supports regularity with dailycomfort fiber. so unlike others, mirafiber is less likely to cause unwanted gas. love your fiber. new mirafiber. befi was active.gia, i was energetic. then the chronic, widespread pain drained my energy.

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>> steve kroft: i'm steve kroft. we'll be back next week with another edition of "60 minutes." tomorrow, be sure to watch "cbs this morning." all the best stuff happens in the dark.

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