Anglers net heavy fines

FOUR Noble Park residents were last week charged over two separate incidents involving illegal fishing and the theft of abalone.
On 26 August, two Noble Park men, aged 50 and 45, and a woman, 51, pleaded guilty in the Frankston Magistrates’ Court to possessing and using commercial fishing equipment.
The court heard the two men used a 60-metre long mono-filament mesh net at Glade, near the mouth of the Patterson River at Carrum, in the early morning of May 8.
They caught 143 fish which included seven stingrays, 107 mullet, two flathead, four Australian salmon, 12 garfish, 10 sand crabs and one beaked salmon.
The 50-year-old man was convicted and fined $3000 for possessing and using commercial fishing equipment, and the 45-year-old man was convicted and fined $2000. The woman was convicted and fined $800 for possessing commercial fishing equipment.
The three defendants were also ordered to pay $953 each in compensation for the fish they destroyed and the impact on the ecosystem and recreational fishers.
On 27 August, a Noble Park mother and son were fined for the theft of a large quantity of abalone in a reserve adjacent to the Mordialloc Pier in February.
The woman, 49, and her son, 19, pleaded guilty and appeared before Magistrate Franz Holzer in the Moorabbin Justice Centre on 27 August.
The magistrate heard the pair collected a catch bag left in the water by a diver on a closed day for abalone harvesting. The bag contained 149 black-lip abalone that had been shucked.
DPI fisheries officers intercepted the pair as they attempted to leave the scene with the abalone. The mother was convicted and fined $2500, ordered to pay costs of $381 and banned from abalone fishing related activity for two years.
Her son was fined $1000 without conviction, ordered to pay costs of $381 and also banned from abalone fishing related activity for two years.
People who suspect illegal fishing activity should call the DPI fisheries 24-hour offence reporting line 13 FISH (133 474)