NAIROBI, KENYA (AP) — A court in Kenya's coastal city of Mombasa has convicted a man accused of leading an ivory smuggling ring.

Kenyan Feisal Mohamed Ali was found guilty Friday of possessing ivory. A judge freed Ali's co-accused for lack of evidence.

The case against Ali attracted significant attention from conservationists in Kenya, which faces a persistent problem of elephant poaching and ivory smuggling.

Ali was arrested in Tanzania in December 2014 over illegal elephant tusks weighing more than 2 tons that were discovered in a raid on the Kenyan coast.