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4 FACE FELONY TRIALS IN ABALONE CASE SR
JUDGE: EVIDENCE SUPPORTS CONSPIRACY
Published on August 2, 1995
© 1995- The
Press Democrat
BYLINE: Bony
Saludes
Staff Writer
PAGE: B1
A Santa Rosa judge Tuesday ordered felony conspiracy trials
for four San Francisco residents who have been cited
repeatedly for poaching abalone from the Sonoma County
coast.
Game wardens believe the four residents, who were
arrested in June after being cited several times in the Fort
Ross area, may have taken as many as 3,000 abalone over
the past year.
At the conclusion of a preliminary hearing Tuesday,
Municipal Court Judge Knoel Owen ruled prosecutor Kate Huff
had introduced sufficient evidence to show a conspiracy.
Owen ordered Xi Huan Chen, 37; Linda Li Chen, 33; Jack
Chen, 30; and Ru Feng Huang, 36, to appear in Superior Court
Aug. 15 for setting of a trial. Xi Huan Chen and Jack Chen are
in custody.
Although game wardens are saying the suspects may be
responsible for taking as many as 3,000 abalone from
the coast since last October, a game warden testified the most
abalone they caught the suspects with at one time was
50 on June 11.
Deputy Public Defender Virginia Mercoida, who
represents Jack Chen, said the game wardens have no evidence
to support their claim the defendants have poached 3,000
abalone from the coast.
Court records show that since last October Ru Feng
Huang has been cited or arrested six times for alleged
abalone poaching on the Sonoma County, Xi Huan Chen
five times and Linda Li Chen and Jack Chen, three times each.
Officers said they seized 48 abalone from the
suspects in October and caught them with slightly more
abalone than allowed or undersize abalone on the
other occasions prior to the June arrests.
Game wardens say they believe the illegal
abalone are being sold to restaurants because
abalone meat goes for $40 to $60 a pound.
Just before the start of the hearing, the four
defendants rejected an offer by Huff to plead guilty to felony
conspiracy in exchange for no prison, probation and a payment
of $6,000 each to an abalone resources recovery fund.
She also wanted them to serve time in the county jail for
probation violations.
Huff said she would withdraw the offer if they didn't
take it, meaning they face up to three years in prison if
convicted of felony conspiracy.
Law enforcement officers last year broke up an
unrelated 12-member abalone poaching operation believed
responsible for illegally taking more than 20 tons of
abalone from the Sonoma County coast.
The operation is believed to be the biggest in the
state's history.
Two of those suspects have pleaded guilty to conspiracy
charges and the others are awaiting trial. One of them was
ordered to pay $30,000 in installments into the abalone
resources recovery fund.
Keywords: FISHING CRIME
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