How WDFW Pinched A Suspected Crab Pot Thief

No doubt the tide collects its share of crab pots deployed in Puget Sound, but a Lynnwood man is suspected of actively swiping them from sport and tribal crabbers last year.

Game wardens recovered pots, buoys and lines from at least four different fishermen as well as the decoy setups they used to crack the case while serving a search warrant at the 40-year-old’s home in late February, according to court documents. 

Papers filed with Snohomish County prosecutors state that crab and pot theft is “prolific” in the inland sea but that it’s hard to detect, so last fall Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife officers decided to set out two decoy setups on Port Gardiner’s Everett Flats and monitor them. Like other crabbers do, they used a pair of very uniquely marked buoys to tell their gear from others bobbing around on Marine Area 8-2, then began surveillance.

While they reported catching “multiple people stealing crab out of these pots,” the prime suspect allegedly didn’t just settle for somebody else’s delicious Dungeness for dinner; he went for the whole shebang – and in doing so got pinched. 

“It is collaborative operations like this that truly have a significant impact in ensuring that we have an orderly fishery,” said WDFW Sergeant Hwa Kim about the case.

THE CASE AGAINST the Martha Lake neighborhood resident began to take shape when surveillance showed that on the afternoon of December 31, the last day of 2023’s winter crab season, a boat with a Bimini top and three people aboard pulled up to one of WDFW’s specially marked buoys and yarded it and the attached red and white float and pot into the boat, then quickly grabbed the second setup. A subsequent search of the water by officers in early January 2024 revealed that the WDFW buoys were nowhere to be found. 

In late January, Officer Nick Libbing reviewed security camera footage taken at the Port of Everett, the closest public launch to the flats. It showed that about an hour and a half after the buoys had been taken on New Year’s Eve, a boat with a Bimini top was loaded onto a trailer pulled by a blue Toyota and then two people moved two crab pots from the boat to the bed of the truck.

Libbing then requested and received from the port a list of everyone who had ended their dock lease at the end of crab season. Using that information, he found a 2005 Triumph 191FS that matched the description of the boat seen pulling the WDFW buoys and appeared later the same day on the security camera. A Bimini top is essentially a sun shade/water blocker over and around a boat’s cockpit. 

With the address from the boat’s registration in hand, Libbing drove an unmarked vehicle to the owner’s home, where he saw what appeared to be the same watercraft parked in the driveway next to the officers’ decoy buoys, as well as several other buoys.

That led game wardens to serve a search warrant on the premises. According to court documents, the suspect acknowledged he had gone crabbing on December 31, but when read his Miranda rights, he said he didn’t want to speak further without a lawyer present.

Besides their own two crab traps – one of which was also identifiable because of an orange cord used during an on-the-water repair – officers recovered numerous other pots and buoys. While names and phone numbers on some of the buoys found in the suspect’s yard had faded and were hard to read, others clearly did not belong to the man due to the name or phone number.

Two had markings indicating they were owned by a pair of Suquamish Tribe fishermen. When shown photos of 30-inch-by-30-inch pots, both tribal fishermen positively identified them as theirs based on unique bridles, zip ties and/or weights they used.

Court papers say another buoy was traced to a Lynnwood crabber, who reported to officers that in December he’d also lost two pots in the same area WDFW’s decoy buoys had been set up. And an Issaquah man whose nickname, address and phone were clearly written on still another buoy confirmed it had gone missing last year.

Along with the suspect’s boat and its trailer and engine, officers seized nine crab pots and seven buoys, among other items. When advised that the two commercial crab pots were being taken for evidence, the suspect allegedly stated he’d bought them off Craigslist and could prove it, according to court papers.

WDFW officers recommended that Snohomish County prosecutors charge the suspect with possession of stolen property and second-degree theft, both class C felonies, and unlawful interference with fishing gear.

SOMETHING LIKE 12,000 pots are lost annually in the Salish Sea due to strong tides and not enough weight or leaded line being used, or gear being set up in ferry and other shipping lanes, all contributing to the loss of tens of thousands of crabs trapped inside them, according to the Northwest Straits Initiative. But the case against the Lynnwood man confirms what crabbers have long suspected – that not all pots are just disappearing into Davy Jones’ locker.

It might also serve as a potential deterrent to Puget Sound pot pillagers. WDFW Police’s Facebook post on it in mid-April, which noted that two other boat operators observed taking crabs from the decoy pots were identified and contacted as part of the overall operation, received the highest number of reactions of any of the agency’s crime-related posts in over a year, some 1,200-plus likes, hearts, wows and more, as well as 313 shares, helping to spread the word even further as this summer’s season nears. 

“We are hopeful that this sends a clear message that crab poachers should think twice before pulling someone else’s gear,” WDFW Sergeant Kim said.

Crabbing on Puget Sound opens July 1 this year.