Ex-Senator, wife cop $75k fine for trafficking abalone

A former Tasmanian Labor senator and his wife have been fined more than $75,000 in total for trafficking 37kg of abalone. FULL COURT WRAP-UP >>

FORMER Labor senator Shayne Michael Murphy and his wife Ruhua Liu have been fined more than $75,000 in total for trafficking 37 kilograms of abalone, after special penalties were applied.

On December 14, 2015 Ms Liu deposited three polystyrene boxes to a Toll Transport depot in Launceston to be delivered to Melbourne.

An employee notified police after becoming suspicious about the delivery when they noted it was to a seafood business.  

Police later found 186 abalone in the three boxes.

The court heard when questioned by police the next day she admitted knowing the boxes contained abalone and they were being sent to Melbourne.

Former Senator Shayne Michael Murphy and wife Ruhua Liu leaving the Launceston Supreme Court after sentencing. Picture: Rosemary Murphy

Murphy admitted being in possession of the abalone, but claimed they were left over from a seafood business he had run from 2011 until 2013.

In sentencing Justice Robert Pearce said he rejected that explanation, saying he accepted instead the evidence of a former employee and Murphy’s business partner that they had not dealt with abalone and there was none left over when a stocktake was made.

Justice Pearce said Murphy had none of the licences, receipts or dockets needed for authorised possession of abalone of that quantity.

“By then packing it and by being party to its transport and proposed delivery, he thereby trafficked it,” he said.

Justice Pearce said there was “strong evidence that the fish had not come from a legitimate supplier” and it “cannot be said that these fish were lawfully taken in a way which did not improperly deplete the resource”.

The couple was found guilty last month by a Launceston Supreme Court jury of trafficking fish contrary to the Living Marine Resources Act 1995.

Liu was convicted and fined $2000 and Mr Murphy convicted and fined $6000, with both to pay a special penalty of $33,945 relating to the value of fish trafficked.

Justice Pearce said with Murphy’s experience of the seafood industry he should have been aware of the strict compliance requirements.

“The acts which constitute her (Ms Liu’s) trafficking, on the evidence before me were limited,” he said.

“However, she had some involvement with her husband’s seafood business and like all citizens she should have been aware of the requirement for regulatory compliance.”

Liu did not possess the licence or the receipts or dockets required for possession of more than five abalone, was found to have trafficked the abalone under the strict provisions of the Act because she possessed the abalone, transported it and attempted to deliver it to another person.

He said Murphy had no prior convictions that were regarded as relevant for sentencing and “his earlier involvement with the seafood industry had previously been without blemish.”

After Justice Pearce had left the courtroom Murphy said from the dock “I would like to say something” and he was advised to speak with his lawyer.

“I gave an interview with police, that I was open and frank about the abalone, if I was in a position to have been dealing with abalone illegally I would hardly go and give an interview with police,” Murphy said outside court.