Poaching on Ohio waters

[CAPTBRIAN]

For what they did and did it twice seems like a low fine to me.

[wakina]

$5,000 is probably less than what the perch were worth that they had poached and were on board at the time of their arrest. I am sure they didn't get caught every time they poached and probably made several hauls before their first arrest. Their gill net tug should have been taken from the owners cut up and sold as scrap 100 lbs at a time. The owners should have been fined an additional amount of 10 times the worth of their catch and the captain and crew fined at 2 times the worth of their catch. That would take the incentive out of poaching in Ohio waters!

[PCperchhunter]

Agree with Wakina 100%. I'm sure they benefited far more than $5K on their hauls, not to mention all the other fish that were killed and tossed in the water by the gill net. I doubt the fine even covered the man hours, equipment and time invested in catching them. They'll be back out again this summer.

[wakina]

Has any one of our members ever mis-counted on their perch limit and got a ticket for being one or two over? The reason I am asking is to relate what the fine was for being one or two over vs a gillnet tug with lets say only 500 perch which would make them 500 over as well as fishing without a licence.