Paul Watson rams whalers for a living

He's a fugitive on Interpol's Red List and a marine vigilante who's done jail time for extradition requests. Yet to many, he's also a heroic marine conservationist who risks his life and those of his crew to save countless endangered whales, turtles, dolphins and sharks from slaughter.

Love him or loathe him, Paul Watson, the 65-year-old, silver-haired founder of Sea Shepherd and co-founder of Greenpeace is now a celebrity because of his job: ramming whaling boats for a living.

Watson has a hit US reality TV series, Whale Wars, that has aired on the Discovery Channel since 2008 about his organization's fight against Japanese whalers. And his influence reached new heights with the award-winning documentary Sharkwater, which conservationists say resulted in shark finning being banned worldwide.