Firm admits to avoiding shrimp tariff

(CBS) LOS ANGELES A Placentia firm and one of its executives admitted illegally avoiding a tariff on imported shrimp by claiming the bottom-dwelling delicacies were caught in U.S. waters.
Tony Zavala, vice president of sales for Pacific Shrimp Co. Inc., and the company admitted buying frozen shrimp from other countries and creating phony documents indicating the shrimp was harvested in the United States.
The shrimp was sold in Mexico. The phony documents claimed the shrimp had been inspected in the United States, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office.
Mexico normally imposes a 20 percent tariff on imported seafood, prosecutors said. But, under the North American Free Trade Agreement, seafood grown or harvested in the United States can be imported duty-free.
In all, Pacific Shrimp and its Mexican customers avoided paying more than $100,000 in duties, according to the government.
Shrimp imported from Asia has nearly killed the industry in the United States, which has imposed steep shrimp tariffs in recent years.
In one shipment on May 2003, Pacific Shrimp and its employees made a bogus certificate to export about 65,000 pounds of frozen peeled shrimp to Mexico, according to prosecutors. The certificate falsely stated the shrimp had been inspected by the U.S. Department of Health Services and that lab analyses did not detect the presence of bacteria and viruses such as salmonella, listeria or cholera, authorities said. An attorney for Zavala and Pacific Shrimp, Benjamin Ladinig, said no health concerns stem from the false documentation.
"The shrimp was inspected before it came into the United States," Ladinig said Tuesday.
The company pleaded guilty to six felony violations, including two counts of unlawful exporting of wildlife and two counts of falsifying a government document.
Under a plea deal with prosecutors, the company is expected to be sentenced to five years of probation and fined $120,000, the U.S. Attorney's Office said. Of the fine, $70,000 will be earmarked for a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration program to expand a fish DNA database, authorities said.
Zavala, 44, of Orange, pleaded guilty to using a counterfeit government seal. Prosecutors have agreed to recommend that he receive 10 months in prison. The plea bargain represents a "mutually beneficial resolution" to the case, Ladinig said. Both the company and Zavala are scheduled to be sentenced Dec. 4 by U.S. District Judge John Walter.