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TWO MEN were asked to make a charitable donation of € 1,000 after being charged under the Wildlife Laws with illegal hunting and possessing 345 live and five dead crayfish, which are a protected species under the Laws of Life Wild from Ireland.
Scaletchi Dumitru of Bettystown, Co Meath, and Veaceslav Verdes, of 51 Bathe Abbey, Duleek, Co Meath, appeared before the Dundalk District Court yesterday.
The animal is common in many lakes and rivers in limestone districts and is an important species from an ecological point of view, both as a herbivore and as a favorite food of otters.
The case was taken up by the National Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS), through state attorney Liam Keane.
Appearance in court
NPWS Conservation Ranger Kieran Buckley told Judge Erinn McKiernan that on June 30, 2019, the defendants were caught with two buckets full of crayfish.
The crime took place on the Grand Canal at Baronrath Bridge, Ardclough, Co Kildare.
All live crayfish were returned unharmed to the Grand Canal.
Buckley told the judge that the white-clawed crayfish is considered a globally threatened species.
Ireland has an international responsibility because it remains the only part of the EU with no invasive alien species of introduced crayfish.
Due to the numbers in possession of the defendants, the prosecution’s case represented the most significant intervention of the State to protect the crayfish.
The judge was told that 50% of the illegal catches were likely breeding females. Buckley to the Court that had the NPWS not detected the crime and intervened, the defendant’s actions could have resulted in a potential loss of thousands of juvenile crayfish because there would have been total reproductive failure of all females in the catch. sample.
Source: NWPS
Defending
The defendants admitted under caution that they had planned to release the crayfish they had caught in a lake, and not in the Grand Canal.
The Court heard that this action would have posed a significant threat to the recipient population if it had materialized. He said the scientific consensus is clear that any movement of crayfish from one body of water to another is a major causal factor driving the spread of the deadly ‘crayfish plague’.
This disease is extremely virulent; it had already eradicated previously known populations on Lough Lene and Lough White.
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Interrogation
When questioned by defense attorney Paddy Goodwin, Buckley was asked if he knew that the defendants spoke poor English.
The Court heard that the prosecutions case included photographic evidence of warning signs in ten languages on the side of the canal where the crimes were committed.
He was then asked if he knew that crayfish hunting was an acceptable practice in Moldova. Buckley said he was unaware of Moldovan laws, but added that hunting or possession of crayfish is illegal in Ireland.
Judge McKiernan found the facts of the case proven and accepted by the Court.
She awarded the expenses to the State, applied the Probation Law and said that if each defendant made a charitable donation of € 1,000 to the Red Door Project (an addiction service) and Turas (a social assistance program to work) before the February, a criminal conviction would not be recorded.
Otherwise, you would record a criminal conviction and impose a fine.
Judge McKiernan issued a warrant for the arrest of a third person who did not appear in court.
He was also cited for hunting and possession of the crayfish.
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