Mississippi seafood giant sold thousands of pounds of imported frozen fish and passed it off as fresh-caught local fish

Quality Poultry and Seafood Inc., the largest seafood wholesaler on the Mississippi Gulf Coast, agreed to forfeit $1 million and pay a $150,000 fine, the Justice Department said. The company’s director of sales, Todd A. Rosetti, and business manager James W. Gunkel, both of Ocean Springs, Mississippi, also pleaded guilty to mislabeling the seafood.

Tuesday’s events are the latest in a case involving a well-known Mississippi Gulf Coast restaurant, Mary Mahoney’s Old French House in Biloxi.

In May, the restaurant pleaded guilty to conspiracy to misbrand seafood and wire fraud. A co-owner/manager of Mary Mahoney’s, Anthony Charles Cvitanovich, also pleaded guilty to mislabeling the seafood.

The Justice Department said Tuesday that QPS admitted to participating in the fish substitution scheme from 2002 to November 2019. An indictment alleged that QPS recommended and sold foreign-sourced fish to restaurants as substitutes for local fish that the restaurants they announced in the menus. The department said QPS mislabelled imports it sold to customers at its own shop and cafe.

“QPS and company officials went to great lengths to conspire with others to perpetuate the fraud for more than a decade, even after knowing they were under federal investigation,” said Todd Kim, Assistant Attorney General of the Division of Environment and Natural Resources of the Department of Justice.

Todd Gee, the U.S. attorney for southern Mississippi, said the false marketing of imported fish diminishes the value of the local catch on the Gulf Coast.

“This type of mislabeling fraud is affecting the local seafood market and robbing restaurant customers who were paying extra to eat a premium local product,” Gee said.

The indictment alleged that even after FDA agents executed a criminal search warrant at QPS to investigate the sale of mislabeled fish, the wholesaler continued for more than a year to sell frozen fish imported from Africa, South America and India, as substitutes for local fish.

Mary Mahoney’s admitted that between December 2013 and November 2019, it fraudulently sold, as local premium species, approximately 58,750 pounds (26,649 kilograms) of fish that were not the types identified on its menu. QPS supplied seafood to Mary Mahoney and other restaurants and retailers.

Sentencing for Mary Mahoney and Cvitanovich is set for Nov. 18, according to court records. Sentencing for QPS, Rosetti and Gunkel is set for December 11.