Department of Justice
Assistant U.S. Attorney's Office
- District of Massachusetts

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
April 9, 2008

NEW BEDFORD FISH DEALER SENTENCED TO JAIL IN CASH PAYMENT SCHEME

BOSTON , MA - A New Bedford man was sentenced to federal prison for falsifying reports to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and structuring hundreds of cash transactions, in order to cover up a scheme to pay cash to fishing vessel owners. 

United States Attorney Michael J. Sullivan, Andrew Cohen, Special Agent in Charge of NOAA Fisheries Enforcement in New England and Douglas A. Bricker, Special Agent in Charge of the Internal Revenue Service, Criminal Investigation - Boston Field Office, announced that ARISTIDES M. "STEVE" COUTO, age 57, of 155 Winston Street, New Bedford, was sentenced by the United States District Judge Nathaniel Gorton to a year and a day incarceration and a $10,000 fine on charges of making false statements within the jurisdiction of a government agency, and with structuring cash transactions for the purpose of evading currency transaction reporting requirements.

For several years, COUTO operated a fish wholesale business in the South Terminal area on the New Bedford waterfront called Steve's Fillets, through which he bought fish directly from commercial fishing vessels and sold it to wholesalers and retailers of fish.  Beginning no later than 2002, COUTO enticed fishing boat captains to sell their fish to him by offering to pay for part of their catch in cash.  The cash portion of COUTO’s fish purchases ranged from $2,000 to $10,000 per fishing trip.

In exchange for his willingness to pay in cash, COUTO often demanded and received prices for fish that were lower than the prevailing daily prices.  COUTO also paid captains cash for "overages," that is, fish caught in excess of regulatory limits, thereby enabling them to avoid detection by law enforcement.

COUTO concealed his cash payments in two ways.  First, he routinely lied in the dealer reports he was required to submit to NOAA by understating the amount of fish he purchased.  The purpose of dealer reports was to provide NOAA with reliable and current information about the size of fish stocks so that it could tailor its regulations to conserve those stocks while balancing the interests of the fishing industry and the communities in which it does business.  Over a four-year period, COUTO concealed from NOAA at total of approximately $774,000 in fish purchases.  As part of his sentence, COUTO is prohibited, upon his release from prison, from paying cash for fish. 

In addition to falsifying his dealer reports, COUTO hid his large cash transactions by structuring cash withdrawals from his bank accounts at Webster Bank to avoid regulations that require banks to report to the U.S. Department of The Treasury cash transactions over $10,000.  For over a three year period, COUTO did this by withdrawing cash in $9,900 increments on 133 occasions.   

The case was investigated by the New Bedford office of NOAA Fisheries Enforcement and the Internal Revenue Service, Criminal Investigation - Boston Field Office.  It was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Jon Mitchell of Sullivan’s Economic Crimes Unit.