Poacher fined $5K after selling lake sturgeon in Transcona parking lot

Illegally selling protected fish, including endangered lake sturgeon, in a Transcona parking lot has cost a Manitoba fisher more than $5,000, but conservation officers say fines aren't enough to prevent poaching. 

The man was caught selling illegal fish in April 2016 when a tipster phoned the province's Turn In Poachers hotline, according to a post made by officers on the Manitoba Conservation Officers Assocation Facebook page. Commercial fishing seasons had not yet begun that year.

A plainclothes officer was sent to the parking lot and waited until the man and a woman showed up and started selling fish. The officer bought smoked fish from the sellers, said the MCOA.

"The man, who was known to officers, was a licensed commercial fisher," reads the post. "No receipts were provided to the officer or to the people who made purchases ahead of him."

Conservation officers in uniform then went to the parking lot and seized "a large quantity of smoke[d] fish, including goldeye, lake trout, channel catfish, lake whitefish, walleye and lake sturgeon."

Lake sturgeon is an environmentally protected species in Manitoba and may not be sold commercially except in rare circumstances. 

A spokesperson for Manitoba Sustainable Development said because sturgeon are slow-growing and long-lived, it can take a long time for populations to recover after mature adults are removed. 

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​The pair also had smoked fish seized from their packing shed near Winnipeg Beach, Man. The fish was donated to Siloam Mission.

The man was a commercial fisher who was known to officers, said the MCOA.

How fish should be sold

Commercial fishers in Manitoba must have a complete and accurate commercial fisherman's trade record for the product they sell, according to the MCOA. It must contain the quantity of fish they've sold, where it came from and the seller's information. The trade records are then forwarded to the Department of Sustainable Development and the quantity of fish sold will be deducted from the commercial fisher's allowable quota. 

The investigation showed the fisher had not "accurately declared the quantity of fish he had on hand at the end of the previous commercial fishing season."

The couple faced 15 charges in total and entered guilty pleas for eight of those charges, said the MCOA. They were convicted in August 2016. 

In January 2017, more charges were laid related to trade records, false documentation and licensing. 

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Buyers should be aware that they're required by law to get a receipt, the province said. 

While the pair paid a fine of $5,067.65, fines in the province don't go nearly far enough, the MCOA added. 

"When this level of poaching for this level of financial gain does not put the violator behind bars, we know that no resource related convictions will," the conservation officers association posted in comments below the original post. 

They cited the case of "the most notorious fish poacher in Manitoba history," who faced dozens of charges and likely made hundreds of thousands of dollars from illegal fish sales, they added. He was fined $9,000.

"He should've gone to a federal prison for the amounts of illegal money he made from fish! He should've been fined a couple hundred thousand dollars as well," wrote the MCOA. 

A provincial spokesperson said the number of poaching investigations can range from "a handful to more than a dozen in any given year." Some poachers make significant profits, others only do a few sales a year, the spokesperson said. 

Two men from Winnipeg recently were fined nearly $15,000 last month for various fishing violations on Clearwater Bay in Ontario. 

Manitoba Sustainable Development encourages the public to report any illegal activities by calling 1-800-782-0076.