San Carlos Media Hub
A Fish Made of Gold
First and foremost I would like to thank Thalassa FranceTV3 for sending the producer of this documentary, Stephan Poulle to Mexico so he could help me tell the story of how the greed and corruption of a few are helping to destroy the last relatively abundant fish that are left in the Sea of Cortes. I have never been able to get not one American journalist to write not even one paragraph about this in America. Just to let everyone know I was provided a copy of this production which will be dubbed into French. Since I do not know what form the French Narrative would take I decided to simply make my own narration. I also added some shots of my own at the beginning and at the end. 99% of the images were edited by Thallasa. The narration is my own. The original video can be watched on the 14th of April until the 24th of April at the following link. It will be dubbed into french and will have a different narrative but I suspect the story will not change much. Please take note for me the best part of the documentary starts out at the 13 minute mark where Stephan interviews the second most powerful man in Mexico regarding fisheries. The look on his face…… Well just watching that made it all worth while!!
This story is about how the Department of Mexican Fisheries has decided to violate their own laws by allowing the commercial fishing industry to illegally harvest dorado, often called mahi mahi or dolphin fish. Two years ago I produced a documentary called El Oro de Cortez. You can watch our documentary in spanish or English here on this same web site. How do we know Mexican officials are corrupt. Go to this link and you can see the letter that I was provided with by NOAA. Since I have been threatening to sue NOAA over all this they really have tried to be transparent in there dealings with me. They provide me with a letter written to the head of Conapesca, Roman Corral. Asking the simple question is it or is it not illegal to fish and export dorado in Mexico. Again the details of this letter are at this link. Mexican officials have never responded. We even published this letter in one of the biggest news papers in the country La Reforma in Mexico city. Still no response.
So where do we stand right now? I can tell you that I have filed a FOIA, freedom of information act petition through lawyers at the Center for biological diversity , in San Francisco. What I hope is that we could obtain all the information that NOAA has amassed regarding this issue and then file an injunction in a federal court demanding that illegally harvested fish from Mexcio no longer be allowed to enter the United States of America. To this date we have been unable to get any big NGO from the united states on board with us. I hope that this documentary will change all of that.
Thanks for watching, and if you have not all ready please sign up to receive our newsletter at the box on the upper right of this page,
Vince
p.s. anyone reading this page please feel free to cut and paste it and make it go viral. I really want this video to be seen. Especially by those at NOAA and Conapesca. Also as I post this I am reminded of a phrase in a Warren Zevon song from our college days…. So if anyone out there would like to help me please feel free to send me some Lawyers guns and Money…. The Shit has hit the fan!!!!!!!!
Upper Image is from an Email from NOAA fish agent in San Diego, lower image above shows 6500 tons exported to U.S.A. in 2010 so I apologize I was off a bit but with that said the domestic Mexican catch is said to be about the same as the exported catch and I have stats some where on my hard drive on the domestic catch. Now sometimes the exporters actually lie and I have documentation from officials at NOAA that Dorado has actually crossed the border labeled Jurrel, which is yellow tail in spanish so that is 6500 tons of declared fish, how much of it is mislabeled? No one can answer that question. It is all illegal though of that you can be assured and look at the graph, how long before Dorado vanish from the gulf?
I have seen your video but find no reference in it where you notified the USFW of the Lacey Act Violations. The Mexican law protecting dorado is a published law in Mexico. You need no letter from Mexico for the USFW to enforce it at the border. The USFW Serviced ROUTINELY prosecutes people violating the Lacey act. Ask ANY hunter who hunts in Mexico and attempts to cross the border with his animal or birds. William Meyers is in charge in Nogales, Az. for the USFW. Why not ask him?
Thanks for the comment.
At the beginning of September of 2008 I met with USFW and a special agent from the San Diego office of NOAA in Tucson Arizona. I provided them with a great deal of information including a DVD about illegal fishing in Mexico and how the fish are transported north across the border. I did video tape that meeting but have yet to publish those images. I will have to blot out the faces of the Agents. Our meeting lasted around two hours. I have spent countless hours on the phone and on line over this issue since then.
As I mentioned at the end of the story I went to NOAA´s head office in Silver Springs Md. on the 7th of December of 2009. I met with the head of enforcement Dale Jones, who has since been shit canned, and the head of international affairs Rebecca Lent, here is my post on the local fishing forum about this. http://forum.sancarlosmexico.com/forum2/7600.html
Of course I agree with you NOAA or USFW don´t need no stinking letter to enforce American law, but a few hunters violating the lacey act is a bit different than 9,000 tons of fish coming across the border each year. At first NOAA was in disbelieve that it was illegal to fish Dorado in Mexcio. Since this has been going on for years. After providing them the written law and also letters from Politicians in the Southern Baja I think they have finally pretty much come to the conclusion that I am correct and it is illegal to commercially fish dorado in Mexico. But since the Mexican government is condoning this here with a lack of action NOAA does not want to unilaterally close the border. Unless of course we take them to court and a federal judge orders them to.
Vince, could you please supply documentation for your contention that 9000 lbs of dorado are coming across the border EACH YEAR? Not a single year where one load might have been captured and forced to return, but EACH YEAR?? Who is monitoring this at the border that supplied you with these figures???
You seem to be implying a coverup on the part of ICE officials at the border, which I find almost humorous. Are you actually saying that ICE will take away my 20 lbs of dogfood at the border but if I had a ton of dorado, they would let me pass? Are you saying that I just need to pay them off at the border (a la Mexico) and I would be allowed in?
This is just not believable to me. 9000 TONS!!!! Unless they are incorrectly identifying fillets, I dont believe this type of corruption exists on such a wide scale at the US border. It’s not like dorado has the street value of drugs that allows for the same type of corruption of ICE officials (which is VERY rare). Maybe they are ignorant of how to identify dorado fillets? Many fillets look the same unless a patch of skin is attached.
And even if true, the problem lies with Conapesca, not NOAA. Illegally fished dorado (which IS a real problem) will find another market. Illegally caught fish, wherever they are headed, are still dead. Shrimpers have turned to illegal dorado fishing during the shrimp closure months and pangueros have turned to illegal dorado fishing, when yellowtail and bottom fish become scarce in the warm months.
“At first NOAA was in disbelieve that it was illegal to fish Dorado in Mexcio.”
But hay now, they can detect illegal clear plastic bags on undersized Honduran lobster tails…c’mon, how stupid do they think we are?
Since the folks at NOAA are self-proclaimed experts on no-longer applicable Honduran law, and want to take action against the devistating environmental impact a small restaurant owner is having on central american fisheries, then ya think they can figure out Mexico’s obvious law that protects the Dorado? Not a chance! They’re too busy looking for a needle in the haystack inside the burning barn.
Mexico’s law that protects sport fish has been in place for a very long time. The dorado-marlin-sailfish-roosterfish-tarpon were given a protected status by forward thinking people to stimulate and help to promote Mexico’s tourism industry and its overall economy. Tourism is the #3 LEGAL economic contributor only behind PEMEX and Remittances! At least for now it is…
What was NOAA protecting by enacting the LACEY act when they sent a small businesswoman to jail for TWO YEARS?!
from the story-
“Under the Lacey Act, a U.S. law, it is illegal to take wildlife in violation of foreign law. ”
(now you must adhere to the laws of other nations!)
“Diane Huang, a small business owner from New Jersey, is scheduled to enter federal prison on July 21, where she will begin serving a two-year sentence for purchasing undersized lobster tails shipped in clear plastic bags.”
(wow sounds like a threat to national security!)
“Ms. Huang purchased violated obscure laws of Honduras because they were shipped in clear plastic bags, rather than opaque cardboard boxes, and a small percentage of the lobsters did not measure to 5.5 inches in length.”
“…the Honduran laws, which served as the basis for the U.S. government’s case against Ms. Huang, are no longer valid – a fact the government of Honduras pointed out when it filed an amicus brief with both the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals and the U.S. Supreme Court. Huang’s conviction along with those of three others, were upheld in March 2003.”
….excuse me but WTF?!
This convinces me not to give up the fight on this side of the border (Mexico) I think we have a better chance of winning it here, even as screwed up as things are. But with that said, I will continue to support ya all the way Vince!
I will post the info from NOAA, it is well documented that last year it was 9000 tons. The numbers have steadily increased each year. This information is readily available on line. I have the graph in an email from one of my friends out of La Paz who is a fisheries scientist. Pam you know him Well. It is Carlos Vivavicencio.
And I agree Pam that lobster tail story is incredible and true as well. That is why I feel we have a strong case and could win in federal court. This is such an obvious violation of the Lacey Act that it defies all reason and common sense. It will be important to help me to lobby the Lawyers at the center for biological diversity to take on this case.
I will post a picture of an email that was sent to me by NOAA agents in San Diego in May of 2010 Check the post above, this is for two months of stats on Dorado into the usa.
Oh yes and by the way Alberto I forgot to mention. Dorado is most of the time packaged as a whole fish. Not filleted. So when they export the whole fish there is no confusion on its identity. If you watched my original documentary you see clearly the workers put every single fish into a box whole and ship it to the U.S.A.
NOAA was completely unaware that Dordado was a protected species in Mexico. Roman Coral and the other talking heads at Conapesca wanted it that way. They are very upset that NOAA now knows the truth and I also disagree with you to a certain extend about not an American problem. America is the closest and easiest consumer to ship to. It will not be as easy as you think for illegal Mexican fisherman to simply change markets and ship directly to Asia or Japan of China just like that.
Thanks for the comments!!
Interesting that over the last couple of years the restaraunts here in Cabo began to sell Mahi Mahi not Dorado. When I asked one of the owners of a restaraunt they explained that selling Dorado is illegal and yet he and most know that mahi mahi is the same fish only using the Hawaiian name…
Obviously many Mexicans know the law including the Mexican officials
ohhhhhh america, we think we have the right answer for everything! were not content with the land we stole from them years ago, or the women we marry south of the border to take home for our own. illlegal commercial fishing of dorado? please, these commercial fishing fleets consit of a bunch of pangas, 1 or 2 persons per boat, and it’s their way of life. they run around barefoot for a reason in all of your footage gringo. it’s really a shame cause sportfishing isn’t all that different, actually they might catch more dorado and pelagic fish than the panga fleets. plus pangas are not a long range boat and will never deplete the sea of cortez of it’s bounty. this micheal moore style documentary is a farse on one gringo’s take and manifested his own bullshit from some video shot at a couple harbors throughout baja. i think you prematurely blew your wad amigo. no mames guey! fight the illegal flow guns and drugs south and then you’ve fought a worthy battle. these local fisherman are saints compared to the real cooruption in the high branches of mexican authority. your efforts seem worthy of a good cause, but your premise is bullshit and your numbers make as much sense as americans trying to get coorupt mexican officials to enforce their own laws. be happy you got a wife a kids from this wonderful culture. VIVA MEXICO. for those of you not familiar with what your in love with when entering mexico, it’s the cooruption. call it what you will, but at the end of the day it all points back to the cooruption! AMERICAAAA FUCK YEAHHH!!!!!!
Good job Vince. Keep it up. You can win this one!
Matty you have no idea what you are talking about. Here in Guaymas shrimp boats tow up to 10 pangas over to the Baja and load up with Dorado. If you had seen the original documentary you would have seen images of factory boats working out of Puerto San Carlos over in Mag bay loaded up with Dorado. I was actually the only person in Mexico who got video images of those boats tied up to the docks after being confiscated.
Riberenos are coastal fisherman all right and they are getting used and screwed like they always do. But it is not by the sport fisherman but by there own politicians who promise them every year that they will get the law protecting Dorado lifted. It now seems sure that the tourism sector is strong enough to beat back any more attempts at changing the law. I must ask you a question though. Now that the shrimp are all gone, sharks are all gone, escama is all gone, mantas are all gone, cayo de hacha is way down what are they fishing now. Jelly fish. Ya thats right jelly fish is being commercially fished right now in Sonora. How sad is that? Sonoran fisherman are poor because the federal government of Mexico has never implemented any kind of sustainable fishing program in Sonora. I have spent a lot of time talking to fisherman and I can tell you the one thing that everyone agrees on is how corrupt the Government is, especially in Sonora, the wild wild wild west where the sheriff is perpetually out of town.
Now the commercial fisherman are coming for the last species left. The sport fishing species that the Mexican congress protected by law. Thats right amigo sport fishing Mexicans decided to protect their marine resources. The sad fact is that Conapesca is full of corrupt leaders who feel they have the right to decide which laws they will enforce and which they will not. As you may know the rule of law is weak in Mexico but I can assure you even that is slowly changing for the better. I do agree with you that the drug war is a major problem that needs to be dealt with but I do not believe that means we are supposed to close our eyes to the rape and pillage and ultimate destruction of the Gulf of California and sustainable sport fishing. When the dorado are all gone what will they fish next? Plankton?
Thanks for that insight Jim. I just received an email from some very concerned Restauranteurs in Sinaloa who are currently working on a certification program for restaurants to make sure they stop serving sport fishing species. I was also speaking with Minvera last week and it would appear there may be a very strong campaign to finally get sport fishing species off the menu. Especially in towns like Cabo were you would expect restaurant owners to have a strong ethic.
ahi por dios los mexicanos malparidos hacen eso joder
how can I or we help
I don´t know Dave, just spreading the word is a start. We are hoping to move forward in court eventually if the Governments on both sides of the border still refuse to act. I will be keeping everyone informed as we move forward on this. I was just contacted by an NGO out of Canada who has actually offered me legal advise and or assistance. The person I spoke with believes that the movement of Dorado north from Mexico to the U.S.A. and possibly Canada is a violation not only of the Lacey act but also NAFTA.
Vince, thanks for sharing this information with everybody. Great efforts to do the normal ethical procedures, which many times do not go anywhere…, but good to show them so all could be exposed. Any new developments at the borders? Still waiting for that letter from the Mexican Goverment before any actions could take place from US Officials?
Best wishes amigo!!
Vince, congratulations on your hard work… We are a scuba diving school located in Hermosillo called “Aquademia de Buceo”, please count with us and our staff to help you on this war. Anything we can help or do by our side together count on it.
I am trying to let people know about reef fish fishing, illegal fishing practices, we also have some films of illegal fishing… Great work, looking forward to meet you in person next time I go to San Carlos, my scuba diving season just started… Once again congratulations
Ok Thanks for that. We as divers have a different problem regarding fisheries here in Sonora. I am sure you are aware of the pistoleros that have been working the area now for some time. Pistoleros are riberenos who go out at night with compressors and lights and spear guns and rape and pillage our reefs. The problem has been pretty bad in the Baja but it is now getting much worse here in Sonora. Of course our friends at Conapesca are not doing much about the problem. Since you guys are up there in Hermosillo perhaps you can put some pressure on them to stop this illegal practice that is really depleting our reef fish on local dive sites.
Look forward to meeting you.
V
Yes I am aware of it, I have actually seen them get ready and how they work, I do believe I have a video on that. Same as you, I had shown that and no feedback from authorities.
Do you allow me or give me permission to distribute your video? we might get feedback and make noise about this. You let me know if I can proceed with that
Ivan
Absolutely Ivan, perhaps we should get together and shoot a new mini documentary on the Pistolero Probelma here in Sonora. Where is your video at, I would be happy to take a look at it and move forward on this issue.
V
I live in Los Barriles and sport fish regularly-this winter I have caught one dorado! Something is very wrong I only hope it is not too late.
Congratulations Vince for all your efforts on making people conscious about how this planet is being destroy little by little. It’s very sad to see how money has the power to corrupt authorities here in our Mexico and everywhere else. Unfortunately that is what you are up against, OUR MEXICAN GOVERNMENT AND IT’S BUNCH OF UNCONSCIOUS REPRESENTATIVES.
Keep up the good work, this planet needs people like you, and your wife of course (she also should take lot’s of credit for all of this) God bless you in your journey.
I forgot to add my webpage.
Congrats Vince. Keep working on it. I think is going the right way, today myself and 48 more friends got an e-mail regarding this problem. We will spread the word until someone does anything about it. I can assure you that the people that you want it to see it, they have seen it already… keep making noise until pressure finally gets them. Congratulations! Please let me know if anything, my best regards….
thanks for that comment Leon, Dorado are targeted the moment they enter mexican Waters as far south as Chiapas. What you are seeing is 10 years of completely unregulated commercial fishing of Dorado. How can we expect the fish to get into the gulf when they are so heavily fished on their migration North. I fear this winter will be the worst ever for Dorado in the Sea of Cortes, I hope I am wrong.
thanks Carlos, can you tell me how you found out about our efforts?
Hi Vince,
Dont you think , that it will be much easy to go in the direction of American Authorities to block these trucks full of dorados? There is no way to get certified doccument from the Mexican Regulationay Laws as evidence of that ilegality…
In Spain, where I am writing, they have or about to aprrove Dorado as commercial fishing as well…. I believe that sushi exponential restaurant openings, are part of this cause…. After red tuna is almost banned (specie almost gone) they are after the remainings….
By the way, yesterday I was doing zapping on my TV in The Canary Islands, and your video was shown on Le Monde 5 in french, transalating your interviews…. Your word is absolutely spread…. Again good job.
Yes Marco I agree, that is what I have been doing. I have been to head officials in the United States but they have so far refused to act. It is possible that we will have to go to court to stop this. Is Dorado a dish that you find on the menu in Spain? I know there is a lot of sea food in Spain. When I was there I ate a lot but that was many years ago.
Thanks for the information!!!
I salute your efforts; these first steps are always the most difficult, but with pressure, Mexico may think twice and stop before it kills the proverbial golden goose. A future consisting of jelly-fish netting is pretty grim to imagine.
Can you direct me to the official Mexican law – either in Spanish or in English translation- that prohibits commercially catching and marketing dorado, pez gallo and marlin. Of course these fish are on on the menus of many restaurants in Mexico; I would like to start shaming some of the owners.
The law is Article 68 of the General Law of Mexican Fisheries Gunnar. It was established a long time ago but what has happened is that Conapesca the department of mex fisheries have tried over the years to create loopholes in the law. The most famous being Shark Norma 029 which tried to legalize sport fishing species as by catch. Of course the by catch then became the targeted catch.
This is for Gunnar:
http://mexico.justia.com/federales/leyes/ley-general-de-pesca-y-acuacultura-sustentables/titulo-septimo/capitulo-i/#articulo-68
it is the complete ley federal de pesca in Spanish and Art 68 will appear at the top
Thanks for that Pam!!
I took the opportunity to open a post with the video in a fishing forum to also give awareness . Here is the link:
http://www.thehulltruth.com/sportfishing-charters-forum/348555-documentary-about-ilegal-fishing-mexico-dorados.html
regards
marco
Thanks, I am going to post a comment on that thread Marco.
Hello to all, i just received and watch the video; very very sad, that precisely who is supposted to protect not only Dorado but many other species that represent the marine habitat of our beautiful aquarium of Mar de Cortez know what is going on and let it happen; not all of us mexicans like to break the law, or let things happens without saying a word, or are corrupted authorities; you have to follow the thread, who are the companies, the authorities, the fisheries funcionarios and inspectors? because there is a buyer and there is a supplier, they have to request permits, to export/import, etc etc. but also, what we have to do is send this to congressmen, different ones, and hopefully someone will help. I will try to help with that, i am going to forward to different ones, someone has to see it, and has to take action, we have laws, it is just a matter of applying them, to everyone, make a complain, i hope it works.