Tag Archives: found not guilty

Fisherman Yarn Garrick Ward accused of making deckhand swim across crocodile-inhabited river walks free

A professional fisherman accused of torturing his deckhand, including making him swim across a crocodile-inhabited river, has been found not guilty in a Far North Queensland court. Yarn Garrick Ward, from the small fishing community of Karumba, was on trial at the District Court in Cairns this week over the torture of Cairns man George Jelef in 2019. It took the jury less than half a day on Friday to find Mr Ward not guilty. Mr Ward denied assaulting Mr Jelef and suggested his deckhand was under the influence of drugs, which he said would describe his “erratic” behaviour. >click to read< 09:23

Jury clears fish broker in alleged tuna smuggling scheme

A Marblehead tuna broker has been cleared of federal charges  that he orchestrated a scheme to illegally catch and export bluefin tuna. Robert Kliss and his Lynn-based business North Atlantic Traders were found not guilty of charges that included conspiracy, smuggling and falsifying records, by a U.S. District Court jury on Friday. Kliss, his business and a captain-for-hire, John Cafiero, were indicted in April following a four-year investigation by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and federal prosecutors. The allegations came to the attention of investigators in 2012, after a member of the crew on the famous fishing boat the F/V Hannah Boden came back from a swordfishing trip off the coast of Long Island, New York, and reported to the boat’s manager that Cafiero had also been fishing for bluefin. click here to read the story 21:17