Seven men face Korumburra court over illegal abalone catching
A group of men have been accused of taking more than twice the catch limit of abalone from a popular beach on Phillip Island.
Bass Coast News
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Seven men have fronted a Gippsland court after they were allegedly busted with more than twice the catch limit of abalone from a popular beach on Phillip Island.
Yu Sun, Dongdong Sun, Zhicong Ma, Miao Li, Hongfei Sun, Youguo Zhou and Haifu Yu appeared at the Korumburra Magistrates’ Court on Thursday, May 1.
The men are facing a raft of charges each in relation to taking a commercial quantity of abalone without being authorised to do so contrary to the Fisheries Act 1995 at Berrys Beach, Ventnor on January 13 last year.
The group were also charged with not carrying an instrument to measure the abalone and also taking assorted shellfish such as whelks and snails from the intertidal zone at the same beach.
The court heard the men spoke Mandarin and would all require interpreters for the hearings.
Magistrate Mia Stylianou said the matters would take some time due to the number of people involved and it would be suitable to have all them heard all together rather than separately.
The hearings were adjourned to the Wonthaggi Magistrates’ Court in June.
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In Victoria, a maximum of five abalone can be caught in a single day, of which no more than two may be greenlip abalone.
A Victorian Fisheries Authority (VFA) spokesman said the VFA knew the vast majority of Victorian fishers did the right thing and large-scale, illegal fishing was not accepted by the community.
Anyone who sees or suspects illegal fishing anywhere in Victoria should call the 13 FISH (13 3474) reporting line.
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