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Fisherman guilty of illegal queen scallop fishing

Fri, 05 Feb 2016

A fisherman from Ramsey has been fined £5,000 for illegally fishing for queen scallops in Manx waters.

47-year-old Charles Boyce allowed his vessel to stray into an area off the east coast which had been closed off to fishing in July last year.

At Douglas Courthouse yesterday he pleaded guilty to illegal fishing - the area was one of four which had been closed off in a bid to replenish the scallop stocks.

Boyce was caught out when tracking data from a GPS device - which he was carrying to assist government's scientific research - showed him in the no-go zone.

He'd already landed his catch of over 4,000kg of scallops which were valued at just under £2,500 - the court heard it was impossible to say how many of those were fished from the wrong place.

Describing it as a "mistake" Boyce's advocate said he had the wrong data logged in the vessel's system as to the closed off areas saying he'd had "no intention of illegally fishing".

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