SDB: To some extent I concur with you. This guy was not caught taking females or undersized males nor was he marketing his catch under the table thereby avoiding paying landing fees and having his harvest included in accruing totals for the industry that season. He was, however, taking crab in his excess pots which would have been available to his buddy commercial fishers; a clear and obviously intentional violation of the law.

That said, remember how the commercials in P.S. made a huge deal over the alleged recreational violation rate based upon on the water contacts by LE? Turned out the biggest single violation was not immediately recording harvest. In fact, that violation percentage exceeded the cumulative number for all other cited violations. As I recall in 2012 it was roughly 20% whereas overlimit was at 2% so clearly not an attempt to exceed daily limits.

And, yes, I would like to see the system (not necessarily the courts) handle it like it is done with the sports. And that would mean no special suspension committee with a voting majority made up of commercial fishers. And if one were to dig further into the law and common practice the commercials get a pass on low levels of illegal product in their deliveries. Maybe that, too, should go away and every crab/fish harvested be immediately documented on a CRC and evaluated individually for compliance. One short crab and busted! Three busts and suspended. Just like how sports are dealt with by the system.