Posted August 3, 200817 yr A shock wave has run through the fishing industry an extraordinary case in Ipswich Crown Court. When the Marine and Fisheries Agency (MFA) caught the last three Thames Estuary fishermen with boats just over 10 metres long committing comparatively minor offences against the regulations, it invoked a law designed to confiscate the assets of drug dealers and other serious criminals to punish the men so severely that they stand to lose all they possess. Because the agency, ignoring its own rules, had denied them a quota sufficient to earn a modest living, Victor Good, 68, of Harwich, Trevor Mole, 56, of West Mersea and Steve Barnes, 48, of Whitstable, had landed 19 tons of sole for which they had no EU quota. When they were caught by a year-long agency "entrapment" operation, Judge Neil McKittrick not only imposed crippling fines totalling £42,500, with costs of £27,646, but also agreed to confiscations of their assets under the Proceeds of Crime Act, to a total of £213,461. Unless this is paid within months they face two years in prison. The root of the problem for the three men was that their sole quota had been reduced so much that it no longer paid them to fish. They were aware that substantial quantities of UK quota, allocated mainly to Dutch-owned "flag boats", were not being fished for. See whole story here: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jh...08/03/do0307.xm Is this not taking the law too far?
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