The conduct of enforcement agents for the National Marine Fisheries Service should be a target of more than an audit or a civil inquiry by the U.S. Department of Commerce Inspector General.
It deserves a criminal investigation.
The evidence continues to pile up that the agency, which is under the oversight of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, has been functioning as a law unto itself. It is not just a pattern of disproportionate enforcement. It now includes things like unauthorized entry and, most recently, an allegation that agents may have tried to coerce a witness before the start of a trial.
The blatant, ongoing disproportionate enforcement is bad enough. IG Todd Zinser, in a recent report, found that fines and other penalties assessed against fishermen in the New England region were more than double those in other regions of the country.