North Carolina man came to the Keys to fish. Undersized lobsters got him in trouble
A Florida Keys judge sentenced a North Carolina man this week to a year of probation after he pleaded guilty to keeping eight undersized lobsters while fishing off Islamorada last year.
Vaughn King, 52, of Raleigh also must pay a $500 fine, $248 in court costs, perform 50 hours of community service, take a state marine resources education course and is banned from Florida Keys waters for one year, according to the Monroe County State Attorney’s Office.
The State Attorney’s Office has recently made a priority of seeking stiff penalties for those caught violating fisheries laws in the Keys.
Keys judges have obliged in several recent cases, including one this month where a commercial fisherman was sentenced to one year in jail and banned from fishing in the state for life after pleading no contest Jan. 3 to possessing more than 100 undersized lobsters, a felony, as well as more than 200 fisheries misdemeanors.
Assistant State Attorney Paul Vargo was seeking a 30-day jail sentence and 4 1/2 years’ probation for Vaughn, who could not be reached for comment, if he pleaded not guilty and the case went to trial.
A Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission officer cited King on Nov. 25, 2018, in Florida Bay off the Venetian Shores subdivision after receiving calls that people in a boat in the area were catching undersized lobsters, according to the State Attorney’s Office.
The officer pulled up to Vaughn’s 18-foot Boston Whaler and asked him if he caught anything. State attorney spokesman Larry Kahn said Vaughn held up a mesh bag containing 11 lobsters, eight of which were legally too small to keep.
A lobster’s carapace, or the part that is not the tail, must measure at least three inches long, and the measuring has to take place in the water.
Vaughn, who was with his son, but was the only person on the boat with a lobster recreational fishing license, also kept too many of the crustaceans that day, Kahn said. The legal bag limit in the Keys is six lobsters per person.
Lobster season runs from Aug. 6 to March 31.
This story was originally published January 9, 2020 at 12:45 PM.
