OBSTRUCTING INVESTIGATION COSTS FISHERMAN £450 The court heard that in June 2006, Officers of the South Wales Sea Fisheries Committee seized a drift net and fish from two fishermen operation illegally in Carmarthen Bay. The drift net was taken to a storage unit in Llanelli where, 11 days later Brian Harries, of 22 Upper Cross Roads, Llanelli, arrived and duped a member of staff present into letting him take the net away. Harries contended that the seized net was his property and had been taken from his yard and used by the two men without his permission. He claimed to have been given the go ahead to reclaim the net by Fishery Officers in conversations he had with them. At the trial, the court heard that no such conversations had taken place and that in phone calls made and letters written by Harries to the Committee’s offices in Swansea, he had demonstrated an understanding that the net was part of an investigation and that he would need to make subsequent representations to the court when that case was heard. Individual fines of £1000 were imposed on two cockle gatherers for poaching incidents which took place last year. Ammanford magistrates sitting on Monday 5th heard prosecution cases brought by the South Wales Sea Fisheries Committee in relation to the cockle fishery in the Three Rivers area of Carmarthen Bay. In the first case the court heard that Fishery Officers had observed Nigel Davies of Square Hall, Pemberton, Llanelli gathering cockles with an accomplice on the closed beds in the Taf estuary near Laugharne on 5 August 2006. Apprehended near Llanybrie, the pair were found with 350 kg of cockle worth £300. Davies was fined £1000 in his absence and ordered to pay £70 costs. Evidential reasons prevented the prosecution of his accomplice. In the second case, Lee Jackson, of 45 Trallwm Road, Llanelli was also fined £1000 in his absence and ordered to pay £300 costs. In the company of two others he was stopped by Fishery Officers on the track leading from the closed cockle beds at Llanybrie on 20 July 2006. In the rear of the vehicle in which they were driving, Officers inspected gathering equipment and cockles worth £500. Despite the catch and the men dripping with water and mud, the defendants, when interviewed claimed to have taken the cockles from unrestricted beds in Pembrokeshire. The magistrates heard that samples taken from the defendants catch were seized and then analysed by the Committee’s biologists in relation to their age, size, condition and colour. Analysis showed that the sample taken from the defendants was totally different from the site in Pembrokeshire, whereas it was identical to the cockles at Llanybrie. The court found the case against Jackson proved. His co-defendants Luke Muir, of 9 Y Rhoddfa, Burry Port and Steven Billings of 27 Morawel, Cefncaeau, Llanelli had both pleaded guilty to the court on 29 January 2007 when, having been given credit for their early admissions, were each fined £300 and ordered to pay £150 in prosecution costs. A spokesman for the Committee welcomed the level of support from the court in the task of managing and conserving the fishery. ‘Cockle form a very important element in the marine environment where they occur. Natural mortality in 2006 dictated that the Three Rivers fishery remained closed. Effective deterrence in the form of these fines is a central plank of our management strategy’. |
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