Abalone fishers cop big fine

A man and woman believed to be part of a black market abalone syndicate operating in Albany were fined a total of more than $10,000 at Albany Magistrate’s Court last Thursday.

Picture by Department of Fisheries: Abalone believed to have been illegally caught by a black market syndicate.

Wanneroo man Su Van Ly, 56, and Mirrabooka woman Ngoc Dung La, 58, were caught with 115 roe’s abalone over the legal limit in February and pleaded guilty.

Neither appeared in court, but were each given a $2500 fine for possession over the legal limit, a mandatory additional fine by weight of $2310 and a further $500 fine for giving false details to fisheries officers.

Great Southern supervising fisheries officer Mark Kleeman said officers executed a search warrant at an Albany strawberry farm on February 22 as part of an investigation into employees possessing illegal abalone.

Mr Kleeman said the officers found a total of 155 Roe’s abalone in three freezers in temporary accommodation used by Ly and La at the farm.

He said that under interview the pair said they had been given the abalone by a friend and planned to take them to Vietnam for friends and family. Mr Kleeman said the pair both claimed they were unaware of the possession limit, which is 20 per person.

Magistrate Elizabeth Hamilton acknowledged the pair’s early guilty pleas, but noted they were seasonal workers at the same strawberry farm as two men who were convicted for abalone offences in April, meaning it was unlikely Ly and La were not aware of the possession limit.

In April, Koondoola man Thoang Huynh and Bundaberg man Bao Quoc Le, both 27, were fined more than $10,000 each after being caught with 385 abalone at Anvil Beach in Denmark in February. Mr Kleeman said that case led to an investigation of workers at the farm and the prosecution of Ly and La. He said fisheries believed the abalone in Ly and La’s possession were caught by another man known to fisheries, and described the suspected syndicate as a “tangled web”.

In a separate matter, a 33-year-old Orana man was fined $500 plus costs after pleading guilty to fishing for marron out of season and failing to stop for fisheries officers.

The Department of Fisheries alleged two officers attempted to stop Dean Henridous Williams’ vehicle after on Lower Denmark Road in Elleker on August 3 after receiving numerous calls from the public.

The court heard Mr Williams refused to stop, instead accelerating away at a speed unsafe for officers to follow.