COMPANY AND OFFICER PLEAD GUILTY TO CONSPIRACY TO ILLEGALLY IMPORT $2 MILLION
OF UNDERSIZED LOBSTER INTO UNITED STATES

Marcos Daniel Jiménez, United States Attorney for the Southern District of Florida; Richard C. Livingston, Special Agent in Charge, National Marine Fisheries Service; and Jesus Torres, Special Agent in Charge, Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, announced today that Neptune Fisheries, Inc., a Norfolk, Virginia, based seafood company, and Aaron Candella, pled guilty in Miami federal District Court in connection with a conspiracy that imported more than $2 million worth of undersized spiny lobster from Nicaragua to the United States. Neptune and Candella, a Director and Vice President of the company, were charged with conspiring over a five-year period to enter approximately 190,000 pounds of frozen spiny lobster into the United States contrary to the laws of Nicaragua, which set a legal minimum size of 5 ounces, all in violation of the federal Lacey Act, Title 16, United States Code, Sections 3372 and 3373, prohibiting such imports, and in violation of the anti-smuggling provisions of Title 18, United States Code, Section 545.

Neptune faces possible criminal fines of the greater of $500,000 or twice the gain or loss from its relevant conduct, while Candella may receive up to a five-year term of imprisonment and a possible fine of up to the greater of $250,000 or twice the gain or loss from his relevant conduct under federal sentencing guidelines. United States District Judge Shelby Highsmith accepted the guilty pleas and scheduled sentencing for February 24, 2004, at 9:30 a.m.

According to the Information, and a detailed statement of facts submitted by the parties, between March 1996 and June 2001, Neptune and Candella were involved in more than 80 shipments of frozen lobster tail, harvested in Nicaragua and destined for Neptune. Since 1988, Nicaragua has placed limits on the size of spiny lobster in order to protect that segment of its domestic fisheries from over-fishing and collapse of the species by loss of the reproductive stock. Below a certain size, the lobster are not mature enough to reproduce and repopulate the species. The spiny lobster fishery is a significant source of employment and revenue in Nicaragua, particularly for the indigenous people of the Miskito Cays. The Nicaraguan lobster population is also the parent population for spiny lobster stocks elsewhere in the Caribbean, including some Florida waters. In recognition of the significance of the 5 ounce limit and the problems associated with protection of the reproductive stocks throughout the Caribbean, the investigation was dubbed “Operation Nickel Defense.”

Neptune and Candella, in concert with others, devised a scheme to mis-label and ship undersized lobster to the United States using a coding system not recognized in legitimate industry practice. Shipments were labeled as “XX,” “XXX,” and “XXXX,” to conceal the fact that those boxes held 2, 3, and 4-ounce tails; all below the legal limit for processing and trade under Nicaraguan law. Twice, in 1997 and in 1998, the operation in Nicaragua was fined by Inspectors from the Nicaraguan Fisheries Department for processing and attempting to export to the United States spiny lobster tails that did not meet the 5-ounce size requirement. Correspondence among the conspirators, dated in 1997, explicitly discussed the size limitation in Nicaraguan law, but included assurances that a way to bring the small tails into the United States would be found and it should not be a cause for worry.

Mr. Jiménez commended the investigative efforts of the National Marine Fisheries Service and the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement. This case is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Thomas Watts-FitzGerald.