Posted by Dave on December 05, 2001 at 23:41:13:
In Reply to: Undersize Lobster - Open Reply posted by Bob on December 05, 2001 at 22:35:40:
I seem to recall being on a Santa Barbara based boat after a multi-day lobster season opener.
I noticed upon leaving that people were lining up to have their gear and game bags checked by 2 DFG types. Talk about a bunch of flemmings...
In my case, I had no intention of lining up voluntarily and having my time wasted. I also had no intention of giving up rights to be free from unreasonable searches and sizures.
Unless a law enforcement officer can get a search warrant, non-game bags are not subject to be searched, nor does one have to voluntarily line up and be searched.
Since I refused to consent to a search and some jackass ratted me, eventually some suspect lobsters made their way into the hands of the DFG types.
One citation later, I ignored the whole misdemenaor citation. That was over 10 years ago. If they had bothered to ever tried doing something about it, I would have filed a motion to dismiss under the grounds of a lack of prosecution under the authority of Penal Code Section 1382.
For the guy that got pinched, personally I would ignore the whole thing and let it go to warrant if at all. If it ever came to that, then after four months of them failing to take you into custody, and they WILL fail to take you into custody, then under the authority of People v Rost, I would file a Rost rule dismissal peition, of which the court would be without jurisdiction to deny.
This is how I used to ignore traffic citations on a regular basis, then later repeatedly humiliated the district attorney when I legally blind sided them in court.
Don't get me wrong, I am not in favor of raping and pillaging lobsters or abs, but for christ's sake, when you are just having a lobster or two for personal consumption, the goverment has no business telling me what I can eat. If it was the last lobster on earth, then I would seek a different means of nourishment, but that isn;t the case, so save your flames.