Two Maryland seafood dealers and the largest fish wholesaler in Washington will have to pay fines and restitution of nearly $890,000 for their part in what prosecutors and a federal judge have labeled the largest commercial fish poaching scheme in the history of the Chesapeake Bay.
U.S. District Judge Peter Messitte sentenced OceanPro Industries Ltd., also known as Profish, to pay $575,000 in fines for buying tens of thousands of pounds of fish that were out-of-season or oversized. The scheme ran from 1995 to 2007.
Profish vice president Timothy Lydon of Bethesda was sentenced to 21 months in prison and fined $60,000. Company fish buyer Benjamin Clough of Grasonville was sentenced to 15 months in prison and fined $7,500. The men and the organization also were sentenced to three year’s supervised probation and will be responsible for $300,000 in restitution to the Maryland Department of Natural Resources and its Virginia counterpart.
Two OceanPro employees sentenced in striped bass poaching scheme – Baltimore Sun
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