November 1, 2017 (Saving Seafood) — The government prosecution in the Carlos Rafael case has filed notice that they are appealing Judge Young’s decision on forfeiture to the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit, as well as Judge Young’s memorandum denying the government’s motion for reconsideration.
For more information on the Carlos Rafael verdict:
Judge denies feds’ motion for Carlos Rafael to forfeit more vessels, permits
The closure will allow the fish to spawn.
October 30, 2017 — Part of the New England herring fishery will be shut down for two weeks to allow the fish to spawn.
The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission says samples from Massachusetts and New Hampshire show a high number of spawning herring in the area. That means a stretch of coast and ocean from Cape Cod to southern Maine will close from Oct. 29 to Nov. 11.
Read the full story from the Associated Press at the Portland Press Herald
October 30, 2017 — WOODS HOLE, Mass. — A research team led by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution has received a federal grant to develop a system to predict changes in ocean temperature.
The system will estimate seasonal and year-to-year temperature changes in the Northeast U.S. Shelf, which is seeing some of the highest ocean warming rates in the world and is home to a highly productive and commercially important marine ecosystem.
The Northeast Fisheries Science Center in Woods Hole and Stony Brook University are also part of the research team.
“Changes in ocean temperature hugely impacts the living organisms in coastal waters,” said Young-Oh Kwon, an associate scientist in WHOI’s Physical Oceanography Department and lead investigator of the new project.
October 26, 2017 — NEW BEDFORD, Mass. — Judge William Young didn’t waste any time denying the United States’ motion for reconsideration in the case of Carlos Rafael.
The government filed the reconsideration on Wednesday, the same day Young filed his judgment.
The government sought Young to reconsider the forfeitability of Rafael’s vessels and permits.
Young ordered four vessels and the accompanying permits to be forfeited on Oct. 11. U.S. Marshals seized the vessels the Lady Patricia, Olivia & Rafaela and the Southern Crusader II on Oct. 18.
The reconsideration stated, “the court may correct a sentence that resulted from arithmetical, technical or other clerical error” within 14 days. The government, again, is seeking Rafael to forfeit all 13 vessels and permits associated with his guilty plea to 28 counts of falsifying fishing quota, bulk cash smuggling and tax evasion.
Read the full story at the New Bedford Standard-Times
October 26, 2017 — A Waldoboro man has been sentenced in federal court to serve two years in prison for his role in an East Coast scheme that trafficked in millions of dollars in poached baby eels.
Richard D. Austin, 40, pleaded guilty in April to violating the federal Lacey Act by trafficking in baby eels, or elvers. He was accused of illegally harvesting roughly $190,000 worth of elvers in Massachusetts and Virginia from 2013 to 2015 and of selling the poached elvers to dealers in Illinois and New York.
Austin is the first to be sentenced to prison time of 18 men charged as a result of the so-called “Operation Broken Glass” federal investigation. All 18 men have pleaded guilty in the scheme but only five have been sentenced so far.
Appearing Wednesday in a federal courtroom in Norfolk, Virginia, Austin was ordered to report to federal officials to begin serving his sentence on Dec. 11 at a prison not yet selected. He also was ordered to serve three years of supervised release after he completes his prison term. He was ordered to pay a special assessment off $100 but was not ordered to pay any fines or restitution.
Read the full story at the Bangor Daily News
October 27, 2017 — SEAFOOD NEWS — Commercial fishing mogul Carlos “The Codfather” Rafael pled guilty for violations of the Lacey Act, but now Congressman Raúl M. Grijalva and Congresswoman Chellie Pingree want the Department of Justice to penalize him for violations of the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act (MSA).
Grijalva and Pingree sent a letter on Thursday to Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross and Department of Justice Attorney General Jeff Sessions seeking for the forfeiture of assets and permits that are not “directly linked to a specific crime.”
“We are writing today to follow up on a letter sent September 21, 2017 regarding Carlos Rafael, the leader of a massive illegal fishing operation in New England, reads the letter. “While Rafael pled guilty to violations of the Lacey Act and was recently sentenced to 46 months in prison, the judge bizarrely rejected the government’s recommendation that Rafael forfeit all 13 vessels involved in the crimes, instead requiring the forfeiture of only four vessels and 34 permits and levying a much lower fine than the government had recommended. We want to thank the Justice Department for its recent motion asking the court to reconsider the ruling, including the level of the fines.”
The letter goes on to state that it’s “unacceptable” to allow Rafael to “maintain the ability to transfer or sell millions of dollars worth of assets.” Although Rafael can no longer participate in the fishery, he still has a reported 27 fishing vessels, as well as an assortment of permits.
“Congress gave the Secretaries clear authority to completely remove bad actors from the fishing industry,” Grijalva said in a press release. “If they don’t use the authority here, it will send a clear signal to Codfather wannabees that the Magnuson Act is a joke. This administration claims to be all about law and order – this is a chance to prove it.”
The letter comes just as William D. Weinreb, acting United States Attorney for the District of Massachussetts, filed a motion to reconsider the forfeiture of Rafael’s vessels.
This story originally appeared on Seafoodnews.com, a subscription site. It is reprinted with permission.
October 26, 2017 — BOSTON — A Massachusetts sheriff’s office captain has been indicted on charges he helped a fishing magnate known as The Codfather smuggle profits of an illegal fishing scheme to Portugal.
The U.S. attorney’s office for Massachusetts says Jamie Melo was indicted by a federal grand jury on Wednesday on charges of bulk cash smuggling, structuring and conspiracy. The Bristol County sheriff’s office captain was arrested in August.
October 26, 2017 — The following was released by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission:
The Atlantic Herring Area 1A (inshore Gulf of Maine) fishery regulations include seasonal spawning closures for portions of state and federal waters in Eastern Maine, Western Maine and Massachusetts/New Hampshire.
Samples from the Massachusetts/New Hampshire spawning area indicate a significant number of spawning herring, defined as 25% or more mature herring by number in a sample that have yet to spawn. As a result, the Massachusetts/New Hampshire spawning area will re-close for two additional weeks, starting at 12:00 a.m. on October 29, 2017 and extending through 11:59 p.m. on November 11, 2017. Vessels in the directed Atlantic herring fishery cannot take, land or possess Atlantic herring caught within the Massachusetts/New Hampshire spawning area during this time and must have all fishing gear stowed when transiting through the area. An incidental bycatch allowance of up to 2,000 pounds of Atlantic herring per trip/ calendar day applies to vessels in non-directed fisheries that are fishing within the Massachusetts/New Hampshire spawning area.
The Massachusetts/New Hampshire spawning area includes all waters bounded by the Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Maine coasts, and 43° 30’ N and 70° 00’ W.
For more information, please contact Toni Kerns, ISFMP Director, at tkerns@asmfc.org or 703.842.0740.
To learn more visit their website at asmfc.org.
October 24, 2017 — CAPE COD, Mass. — The discovery Monday of another dead North Atlantic right whale off Cape Cod escalated the already fevered concern among Canadian and U.S. marine scientists and fishery managers on the imperiled state of the highly endangered species.
The discovery of the severely decomposed whale brings the 2017 death count to at least 16, with the majority of the mortalities — attributed exclusively by researchers to ship strikes and gear entanglements — occurring in Canadian waters.
Four of the right whale deaths have occurred off the coast of Massachusetts.
“Our research and data have shown us that ship-strike or entanglement are the only definitive cause of death,” said Mike Asaro, NOAA Fisheries’ Gloucester-based marine mammal and sea turtle branch chief for the Atlantic region. “There’s nothing else we’re aware of.”
October 24, 2017 — PORTLAND, Maine (AP) — Federal regulators say they have approved a change to fishing rules that will allow Maine and Massachusetts scallop fishermen opportunities to fish in state waters.
An arm of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration says both states qualify for a program called the State Waters Scallop Exemption Program. The program allows some fishermen who are permitted to fish in federal waters to harvest scallops in state waters.
Read the full story from the Associated Press at the Seattle Times