Days before the U.S. Commerce Department's Inspector General released a scathing report on law enforcement policies and practices against the fishing community, high officials in the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration were trying to pull together an industry team for rebuttal.
An internal memo obtained yesterday by the [Gloucester] Times shows that, down the line of command — from the special agent in charge of the southwest region in Long Beach, Calif., to agents in other California ports and Seattle — went the order to find "three or four people in the industry" willing to speak positively about the Office of Law Enforcement and spin media coverage.
The degree of importance was listed as "high."