Coast Guard law enforcement action leads to POTENTIALLY LARGE NOAA penalty for fishing vessel CAPTAIN and owner BOSTON – The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association has issued a Notice of Violation and Assessment of Civil Penalty carrying a $663,000 fine and a four-year permit sanction to the Aveiro Corporation, owner of the New Bedford fishing vessel Lutador II, and the vessel’s master, Jose Silva of Dartmouth, for alleged violations of several federal fishery regulations discovered during a Coast Guard boarding. Additionally, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts has initiated an Adjudicatory Proceeding that could result in the suspension or revocation of their State lobster permits. A law enforcement boarding team from the Coast Guard Cutter Chinook boarded the 75-foot fishing vessel Lutador II on March 7 as it headed into New Bedford. Coast Guard personnel uncovered a cache of 670 illegal lobsters hidden in two bins under boards, tarps, ice and a layer of fish. In a highly successful cooperative investigative effort, all lobsters were further examined on shore by officers from the Massachusetts Environmental Police, special agents from NOAA’s Office of Law Enforcement and Coast Guard personnel.
Many of the illegal lobsters were found to be female, and Bruce T. Estrella, a state biologist brought in by MEP, confirmed that more than 500 of the hidden lobsters showed evidence of having been “scrubbed” of their eggs. Scrubbed is a generic term for an egg-bearing lobster that has had its eggs forcibly removed. It has major impact on the resource since killing those eggs removes future lobsters from the fishery.
“Our actions in the case really are about providing a level playing field for the vast majority of legitimate operators working under some pretty challenging regulatory and environmental conditions,” said Captain Mark Landry, chief of the Coast Guard’s law enforcement operations in the Northeast.
The Aveiro Corporation faces the potential penalty as a result of seven different alleged violations of the Atlantic Coastal Fisheries Cooperative Management Act by the Lutador II, including the illegal possession of lobster parts, scrubbed lobsters, berried (female egg-bearing) lobsters, more than the legal limit of lobsters, and v-notched lobsters. A v-notch placed on the tail of a lobster by a fisherman denotes that a particular animal was egg-bearing when caught and was returned to the sea by that responsible fisherman. It is illegal under federal law to possess v-notched lobsters. The individual penalties for each violation ranged from $33,000 to the maximum allowable penalty of $120,000.
“This is one of the most significant lobster cases in the history of the commonwealth, just by the sheer numbers of lobsters and its destruction to that resource. I want to commend the crewmembers of the Coast Guard Cutter Chinook for their expertise in boarding the vessel, as well as the MEP officers and biologist who responded,” said Lt. Peter Hanlen, a supervisor with MEP.
The federal government and the Commonwealth share important and overlapping legal, environmental and economic interests in preserving the future viability of the living marine resources in the Northeast through the effective enforcement of complex fisheries laws and regulations. This case is the perfect model of federal-state cooperation in furtherance of important economic policy objectives in the region.
“This is, by far, the most egregious federal lobster violation that I’ve seen in over 20 years,” stated Charles R. Juliand, Senior Law Enforcement Attorney from the NOAA General Counsel’s office, who is handling this administrative action.
“The cooperation among the Coast Guard, the MEP, and NOAA law enforcement has been outstanding,” added Juliand.