Illegal Crabbing In Puget Sound - Seattle Times

[racfish]

The whole Native thing is a mess. They do what they want and as they please. The tribal police are virtually useless. If a native is caught poaching or over harvesting they say its a ceremonial hunt. Time for giving freebies to feeloaders should be done with. This is why states and Govts are broke. Excuse my lil Fri rant. Like I said earlier. The only time enforcement works is when the press ie ..( Seattle Times) is with them.

[Toni]

Yes, there is one race that takes more than they should.


























The human race.
There are cheats of every color and language. If you pick out one over another it is because it isn't your language or skin color.
I have seen the WDFW check boats. Last year I saw one WDFW boat come and check out and ticket for illegal crabbing at Dash Point. This year they approached us and another boat. They pulled up crab pots that weren't floated right. 2 years ago I saw people leave when they showed up at the dock to check because we called in people keeping illegal crabs. It took them an hour to get out there but they did come.
I have heard that the county where the ticket is given is where the money for the ticket stays. This is not helping out the WDFW. Maybe we can think up something that our people in charge (I don't know if it is senators or legislators) could do to change it?

[MarkFromSea]

My desire is that no individual race is targeted. That is just bad politics. Enforcement needs to be evenly diligent among the users, tribes, commercial and sportees. I've been checked plenty of times so I'm glad to hear when they check the tribes or commercials. We know sportees offend, most(?) of us have seen it. Any ideas to what would be the most efficient way for enforcement to catch the worst of the offenders? Two years ago, TV news showed enforcement ticketing pink hunters somewhere on the Duwamish. Does this sort of news coverage help enforcement? I think it does curve illegal activity for those who watch the news.... LOL How many law breakers watch the evening news? LOL

[MarkFromSea]

The whole Native thing is a mess. They do what they want and as they please. The tribal police are virtually useless. If a native is caught poaching or over harvesting they say its a ceremonial hunt. Time for giving freebies to feeloaders should be done with. This is why states and Govts are broke. Excuse my lil Fri rant. Like I said earlier. The only time enforcement works is when the press ie ..( Seattle Times) is with them.

I've heard that sometimes the ceremonial hunt claim works and sometimes it doesn't when an offender is actually brought into a court room. This also occurs with people CLAIMING to be a tribe member that actually have no relation to a tribe within the state. I saw this on Hood Canal once, gunnysacks full of clams, the one guy might have married into the tribe, but, looked as European as a viking. Damn, wish I had married into a tribe, lucky buggers! ;) My point is, some offenders claim to be in one of the participating tribes but actually have no relationship with a participating tribe. Gives tribes a bad name regarding fishing.