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Seafood wholesaler, boat master fined for obstruction

Seafood wholesaler fined

A Richmond seafood wholesaler specializing in crab, and a commercial fishing vessel master, have been fined for obstruction in an investigation by the Department of Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DF) that turned up undersized crabs.

The fines resulted from what DFO describes as “a serious case of obstruction,” which included the co-owner of the wholesaler eating a receipt rather than give it to a DFO officer.

A B.C. provincial court judge has found Tenshi Seafood Ltd. and the company’s co-owner, Dishi Liu, guilty of violating the Fishers Act. The company was fined $75,000; Liu was fined $25,000.

The judge also handed a $10,000 fine to Thuong Nguyen, master of the commercial fishing vessel Dream Chaser, for obstructing a fisheries officer.

The fines resulted from a routine inspection in September 2018 by a DFO fisheries officer, who observed someone running away from the seafood processor in Richmond and speeding away in a vehicle with what appeared to be a crab crate.

“Once inside the plant, the owner, and some staff, actively obstructed the fishery officer from conducting an inspection, would not answer questions, failed to provide the necessary paperwork, weights or volume figures from the previous sale, and attempted to destroy evidence,” DFO says in a press release.

“Throughout this event the co-owner of Tenshi, Ms. Liu, refused to provided fishery officers with any of the necessary paperwork for the source of the crabs found on the premises, refused to answer questions from the officers, and attempted to destroy evidence by eating a receipt.

“Several undersized crabs were found discarded in the processing plant.”

In addition to the fines, the company was ordered to provide DFO with a list of its customers for the past two years.



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