5 charged with abalone poaching

Five men suspected of poaching abalone on the Sonoma Coast were arrested Friday and charged with collecting 31 of the prized mollusks for illegal sale, state Fish and Game officials said.

Charles Lester Miller IV, 20; Michael Ray Phipps, 19; and Joshua William Stockman, 19, all of Santa Rosa, were being held at Sonoma County Jail on felony conspiracy and abalone possession charges. Joshua Cowan Berto, 19, and Corin Robert Devlin, 20, also of Santa Rosa, were released on bail.

Fish and Game officials said Miller, who also is charged in another abalone poaching case from November, was spotted scuba diving at Fort Ross on Thursday by a warden.

A large sack of abalone was found hidden on the beach where Miller was diving, and Fish and Game officials subsequently set up an overnight surveillance on the beach, Game Warden Patrick Foy said.

Miller returned shortly after midnight with Phipps, Stockman, Berto and Devlin and collected the cache from the beach, Foy said.

When the men left the beach and wardens attempted to pull over their two vehicles on Highway 1, the men threw three bags of abalone out the windows, Foy said.

Thirty-one abalone were recovered from the roadside after the men were stopped.

“It’s a very significant find,” he said.

While abalone poaching usually carries only misdemeanor charges, the men are being charged with felonies because of the quantity of abalone poached and their suspected intent to sell it, Foy said.

A 2003 abalone poaching case in Sonoma County resulted in three years of probation for a Cloverdale man accused of harvesting 30 abalone and selling them.

In the most serious cases, abalone poaching can result in prison time.

A Mendocino County judge in 2004 sentenced two commercial fishermen from San Ysidro in Southern California to two years in prison, and also took action to seize their boat and ban them from fishing in the future.

Those men were caught with more than 400 abalone.

Berto and Devlin are scheduled to be in court at 8:30 a.m. Tuesday, and Miller, Phipps and Stockman are to appear at 1:30 p.m. Tuesday.

You can reach Staff Writer Laura Norton at 521-5220 or laura.norton@pressdemocrat.com.