Department of Justice
Assistant United States Attorney
- Eastern District of Virginia

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
December 18, 2007

Member of United States Coast Guard Indicted on Conspiracy Charges

( Norfolk, VA) – Morris Wade Hughes, age 50, of Chesapeake, Virginia, was indicted in a seven-count indictment today. The first count of the indictment charges him with conspiracy to defraud the United States for impeding the lawful functions of the United States Coast Guard, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and Department of Homeland Security Immigration and Customs Enforcement Bureau. The other charges include four substantive counts of unauthorized access of a government computer and two counts of dissemination of confidential information. Dana Boente, Acting United States Attorney of the Eastern District of Virginia; Cassandra M. Chandler, Special Agent in Charge, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Norfolk Field Division; Andy Cohen, Special Agent in Charge, Department of Commerce, National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration, National Marine Fisheries Service-Office of Law Enforcement; and LT Gene Maestas, of the Fifth Coast Guard District, made the announcement.

According to the indictment, between November 2003 and December 2006, Hughes had a relationship with a corporate officer of a commercial fishing corporation. On several occasions Hughes accessed government databases and unlawfully disseminated the information to the corporate officer. Hughes also told the officer to instruct her foreign-born workers to leave their identity documents at home during fishing trips and claim to be United States Citizens if the boats were boarded so the Coast Guard could not enforce statutes related to aliens on fishing boats.

If convicted, Hughes faces a maximum of five years in prison on the conspiracy count and up to one year on prison on each of the remaining six counts.

This case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Coast Guard Investigative Service, and the United States Department of Commerce, NOAA Fisheries, Office of Law Enforcement. Assistant United States Attorney Joseph DePadilla is prosecuting the case for the United States.

Defendants are presumed innocent until and unless proven guilty.