This will be my last post on this thread triplenickle. I don't want to come off as a redneck, and apparently you don't get what I'm saying.
In the past when there were more resources for enforcement, restaurants were frequently investigated and prosecuted for illegal seafood sales. There are very limited resources on the west coast for Personel to investigate infractions. Restaurants obviously are at the end of the illegal supply chain. Priority seems to be focused on apprehending the suppliers, not the small retailers in the restaurant business these days. A large fine like $77,000 could never be paid by a small restaurant. The return on manpower hours is far greater if the targets are companies that can afford to pay a large fine. So, that is apparently where the enforcement seems to be targeted, not the small end retail restaurants.
If you look at my post I made a point of saying the majority of "SHELLFISH" poaching infractions came from one group. The overall infractions may be 50/50 taken as a whole, but the shellfish infractions are exclusively represented by one group. If you look carefully at the infractions you'll see that some were commercial Crabbers. Commercial crab boats take massive quantities of crab in comparison to an individual. That alone should give you an indication of the amount of illegal harvesting that is taking place.
There is a very big underground economy fueled by illegal shellfish harvest. The restaurants are just one end of that supply chain. If you can't understand that apprehensions of massive quantities of illegally harvested shellfish is for retail sale in restaurants and other retail outlets then I guess I'll never be able to explain how a supply chain works. The violators wouldn't be harvesting such large quantities, if it was not profitable and there was no demand and ready market for their illegally harvested shellfish. The restaurants are one end of the illegal shellfish trade. If you choose to believe this is not happening that's fine, but it's pretty obvious to many it is a large underground industry on the coast.