Saving Seafood

Enforcement

Scallops seized, captain arrested in New Bedford

October 18, 2018 — A scallop vessel that landed in New Bedford on Oct. 10 had its catch seized and the boat’s captain arrested, according to Massachusetts Environmental Police.

The vessel reportedly contained 150 pounds of scallops concealed within a beverage cooler and the captain was found to be in possession of Oxycontin without a prescription.

On Oct. 10, a Massachusetts Environmental Police officer conducted a commercial permit inspection aboard the scallop vessel in New Bedford. The vessel was found to be permitted federally but did not possess a valid commercial permit to land scallops in Massachusetts.

The officer then requested the captain display his catch of scallops to ensure compliance of the federally permitted possession limits. The captain presented the officer with the vessel’s allowable catch of 600-pounds. Upon further inspection of the vessel, the officer located an additional 150-pounds of scallops concealed within a beverage cooler, authorities said.

The catch was seized and the vessel captain was subsequently arrested for failure to display fish/catch upon demand.

Read the full story at the New Bedford Standard-Times

City leaders angered by US government action against former Rafael captains

September 26, 2018 — A recent action by the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to punish 22 captains of fishing vessels owned by convicted New England fishing mogul Carlos Rafael crosses the line, believe some important figures in the city of New Bedford, Massachusetts, the South Coast Today reports.

Last week NOAA filed a 51-page superseding charging document that added 20 of Rafael’s ship captains to the list of the two previously charged with violating a long list of fishing-related regulations. It seeks the revocation of 17 of the captains’ operator permits.

The captains have 30 days to request modifications to the charges against them, administrative hearings to challenge the charges, or additional time to respond.

NOAA’s latest move, which also includes increasing civil money penalties from about $1 million to $3m, builds on a civil action filed in January.

Rafael began serving a 46-month sentence in November after pleading guilty in March 2017 to operating a long-running scheme through which he submitted falsified records to the federal government to evade federal fishing quotas.

Read the full story at Undercurrent News

1 Person Killed, 1 Injured in Attack Aboard Fishing Vessel Off Nantucket

September 24, 2018 — One person was killed and another injured when a crew member on board a fishing vessel off Nantucket attacked two of his shipmates on Sunday afternoon.

The Coast Guard said they received an emergency call on Sunday afternoon from the Captain Billy Haver, an 82-foot fishing vessel out of Virginia, saying that a member of its crew had attacked several other fishermen.

The Coast Guard would not confirm what weapons were used in the attack.

The fishing trawler was 60 miles east of Nantucket at the time of the incident.

Read the full story at NECN

NOAA seeks $3 million in fines from Carlos Rafael

September 24, 2018 — Carlos Rafael sits in federal prison, nearing the end of the first year of his 46-month sentence for bulk smuggling and lying for at least four years about the nature and value of his landings.

But that doesn’t mean NOAA is done with the man known as “The Codfather” or many of his vessel captains.

The federal fisheries regulator has updated the civil case against the convicted fishing mogul, more than doubling the number of violations to 88, seeking to revoke 42 of Rafael’s federal fishing permits and increasing the total amount of civil penalties against Rafael, his partners and some of his captains to $3,356,269 from the $983,528 contained in the original charging document.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration also said it will seek to prevent “Rafael or his agents” from applying for any NOAA permits in the future.

The new charging document also takes aim at the vessel captains that ran Rafael’s fleet throughout his era of malfeasance.

Read the full story at the Gloucester Daily Times

NOAA seeks $3 million in civil fines against Carlos Rafael

September 21, 2018 — NEW BEDFORD, Mass. — NOAA hasn’t removed Carlos Rafael from its crosshairs. It’s requesting more than $3 million from the fishing tycoon and also took aim at 20 additional Rafael captains in a civil action filed last week, the governing agency told The Standard-Times on Thursday.

NOAA issued superseding charging documents in its civil administrative case involving Rafael on Sept. 10, which added charges and included more respondents than the original document NOAA issued Jan. 10.

The new document seeks to revoke 42 of Rafael’s federal fishing permits, prevent Rafael or his agents from applying for NOAA permits in the future, and increase the total monetary penalties sought from $983,528 to $3,356,269.

NOAA said Thursday that it does not comment on ongoing litigation.

The documents, which are non-criminal, also increased the number of alleged violations of federal fishery laws from 35 to 88 in addition to lassoing 20 of Rafael’s captains into the civil action. The original documents included only two captains. NOAA also is seeking to revoke operator permits of 17 fishing vessel captains for Rafael.

Read the full story at The New Bedford Standard-Times

 

Ex-fish exec’s fraud sentence: 2 years in prison, $1.2M restitution

September 21, 2018 — Another former National Fish & Seafood executive is on his way to federal prison. But not for anything he did while director of sales at National Fish.

James R. Faro, 62, who worked at Gloucester-based National Fish from 2012 until approximately January, was sentenced Monday in U.S. District Court to two years in federal prison and ordered to pay $1.21 million in restitution.

Faro was convicted of conspiring to commit bank fraud at Marlborough-based Sea Star Seafood Corp., the frozen seafood distributor he founded in 1983.

As part of a plea agreement with federal prosecutors, Faro admitted that he and John Crowley, the chief financial officer at Sea Star, conspired to defraud the Commerce Bank & Trust Company of Worcester by lying about the value of Sea Star’s outstanding accounts receivable to increase its borrowing limits.

Jack Ventola, the founder and president of National Fish, currently is serving a two-year sentence at the minimum-security Federal Medical Center, Devens in central Massachusetts after pleading guilty to failure to pay taxes on $2.9 million he “fraudulently diverted” from National Fish’s majority owners.

Ventola also was ordered to pay $1.07 million in restitution to the Internal Revenue Service.

Ventola admitted to conspiring with two other National Fish executives — senior sales executive Richard J. Pandolfo and an unnamed head of operations — and National Fish accountant and director Michael Bruno to defraud the IRS and Pacific Andes in a scheme involving a temporary labor company.

Read the full story at the Gloucester Daily Times

Campaign regulators levy $1,925 fine against group opposing salmon ballot measure

September 13, 2018 — The agency overseeing Alaska campaign finance laws handed down a $1,925 fine against Stand for Alaska — Vote No on One, saying the group violated requirements associated with previously using a name that did not clearly show opposition to the Stand for Salmon ballot measure.

But the Alaska Public Offices Commission reduced the potential top fine of $7,700 that could have been levied against the industry-backed group. The harm to the public was not enough to justify a larger amount, the three-member commission said in an eight-page decision Friday.

The opposition group had called itself Stand for Alaska but changed its name in June, adding the tagline showing dissent. The group should have changed its name March 13, when the state certified the initiative for the ballot. It was improperly named for about three months.

Other violations were related to YouTube videos with “paid for by” lines incorrectly bearing the group’s previous name for roughly two to three weeks, depending on the video.

The measure — called Ballot Measure 1 by the state — goes before voters Nov. 6. Opponents have argued it will stop development projects across Alaska. Supporters say it will protect salmon and other fish without hurting the economy.

Read the full story at the Anchorage Daily News

Hawaiian Longline Operators Accept $475,000 MARPOL Fine

September 12, 2018 — The U.S. Department of Justice and the U.S. Coast Guard have reached a consent decree with Hawaii-based operator Asure Fishery over the discharge of oily waste from a commercial longliner. It is the fourth MARPOL enforcement action that the USCG has brought against a Hawaiian longline fishing firm this year.

In a federal complaint filed last Friday, federal prosecutors alleged that the tuna longliner Jaxon T was not equipped for the treatment or storage of oily bilge waste under way, and she often discharged these wastes at sea. The complaint alleges that company managers Khang Quang Dang and Hanh Thi Nguyen had reason to know that the vessel lacked proper equipment for handling oily waste, but still allowed it to sail.

According to the complaint, the bulkhead separating the Jaxon T’s engine room from the fish hold had penetrations that allowed “free flow of fluids” between the two compartments. Apart from the potential safety implications of this arrangement, “substantial” amounts of water from melted ice would flow into the engine room, where it would raise the level of the water in the bilge. To address this problem, the crew would allegedly pump the bilge water directly over the side using a portable electric water pump, “one or more times per day.”

Read the full story at the Maritime Executive

 

Fed seizure of accounts closes fish auction

August 27, 2018 — Last Friday night, without any notice, the U.S. Labor Department seized the bank accounts of the Cape Ann Seafood Exchange, leaving the fish auction and seafood processor unable to pay fishermen for landed fish and imperiling even further its ability to profitably operate on the Gloucester waterfront.

CASE owner Kristian Kristensen first knew there was trouble afoot when he started receiving text messages from his bank that his business balance had dipped below $25.

“I didn’t put the pieces together until Saturday,” Kristensen said Thursday. “That’s when I knew it was the Department of Labor.”

What followed was a business nightmare, as Kristensen tried to contact fishermen and other vendors about his inability to access his bank accounts for payments.

“Obviously at that point, checks were bouncing all over the place,” Kristensen said.

On Thursday afternoon, following two frantic days, Kristensen was still immersed in negotiations with Labor Department officials to regain control of his bank accounts and establish a plan to repay the balance owed in a manner that will allow him to remain in business.

“We’re about halfway there, but not all the way,” Kristensen said late Thursday afternoon. “We’re not quite there yet, but almost. It’s not like I don’t want to pay this.”

Read the full story at the Gloucester Daily Times

Ex-New Bedford fishing captain pleads to hindering Coast Guard inspection

August 24, 2018 — A former New Bedford fishing boat captain pleaded guilty Thursday to interfering with a U.S Coast Guard inspection and faces sentencing Nov. 28, federal prosecutors said.

Thomas D. Simpson, 57, of South Portland, Maine, pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court to one count of destruction or removal of property subject to seizure and inspection, according to a news release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office.

Simpson was the captain of the Bulldog, a New Bedford-based commercial fishing vessel and one of several fishing vessels owned by Carlos Rafael, the news release said. On Sept. 25, 2017, Rafael was sentenced in U.S. District Court, Boston, to 46 months in federal prison on charges related to the operation of his commercial fishing business.

On May 31, 2014, the Bulldog was engaged in commercial fishing off the coast of Massachusetts when the USCG boarded the vessel to perform a routine inspection, the news release said. At the time of the boarding, the Bulldog’s net was deployed in the water and the crew was actively fishing.

The USCG boarding officer encountered Simpson in the wheelhouse and instructed him to haul in the fishing net for inspection, the news release said. Instead of hauling the fishing net onto the vessel, he let out more of the cable attaching the net to the vessel.

Read the full story at the New Bedford Standard-Times