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CRUCIAL records have been "mislaid" in a £4 million
confiscation hearing regarding Britain's largest privately-owned fish firm.
The hearing at Truro Crown Court is determining how much Newlyn-based W
Stevenson and Sons must pay after being convicted of "blacking" fish –
falsifying landing documents in order to sell more expensive fish between April
and September 2002.
But yesterday the defence team acting for the Stevenson firm revealed that
some of the records taken for the previous year by an officer from the Marine
Fisheries Agency had been lost.
In the closing speech for the prosecution, Martin Edmunds QC told the court
that at an "extremely conservative estimate" the Stevenson firm had benefited to
the tune of more than £4 million in the period under examination.
Mr Edmunds said: "On any view it's not correct that blacking started in 2002.
What we have here is, in any event, an under-estimate."
But defence barrister Philip Hackett, QC, told the court that some of the
records for 2001, taken by Danny Poulding), fishery officer with the Marine
Fisheries Agency, had been lost.
Mr Hackett said: "What has happened to the records A-F? The fact is that they
have been lost and not by the defence. The prosecution had them and they are no
longer available – they have been mislaid."
The court has already heard how in November 2002 The Marine and Fisheries
Agency launched a probe into what was happening at Newlyn after officers became
suspicious.
Next week Judge Philip Wassall will decide how much money W Stevenson and
Sons will have to pay back.
article copyright WESTERN MORNING NEWS
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