News
California Baby Shark Poaching Ring Indicted
February 10, 2006, 12:0AM MT
By Jessica Cliver
A pastor was among six members of an alleged poaching ring indicted for snatching undersized leopard sharks from San Francisco Bay and selling them worldwide, US officials said.
A pastor was among six members of an alleged poaching ring indicted for snatching undersized leopard sharks from San Francisco Bay and selling them worldwide, US officials said.
The group took thousands of California leopard sharks too young and small to be legally harvested from San Francisco Bay and sold them to pet distributors, according to US Attorney Kevin Ryan.
The pastor of a local unit of the Unification Worldwide Church near San Francisco and a fisherman parishioner were among those charged, according to Ryan.
Pastor Kevin Thompson and the church co-owned at least one of the boats used to poach, prosecutors said.
Others in the group were associated with aquarium companies.
Court documents said the poachers sold 465 juvenile sharks to companies in the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, and the United States.
After their arrests, the six men made initial appearances in federal courts in Oakland or Los Angeles on Tuesday, prosecutors said.
California leopard sharks are commonly found in ocean waters along the Oregon, California, and Baja Mexico coasts, and San Francisco and Monterey Bays are major "pupping areas" where young leopard sharks are born during the March-July season.
The slow-growing sharks are protected by California law from being bought or sold until they grow bigger than 36 inches (91 centimeters), prosecutors said.
A size limit was enacted to protect the sharks, which have natural life spans of approximately 30 years but don't reach sexual maturity until between seven and 13 years of age.
The maximum penalty for conspiring to poach the sharks is five years in prison and a fine of 250,000 dollars.
Story: news.yahoo.com
Photo: http://www.flmnh.ufl.edu/fish/Gallery/Descript/LeopardShark/LeopardShark.html