NEWPORT NEWS, Va. — A Newport News seafood business owner was sentenced to nearly four years in prison for blending foreign crab meat with Atlantic blue crab meat and labeling it "Product of USA."
James R. Casey, 74, from Poquoson was the owner and President of Casey’s Seafood, Inc.
According to court documents, from at least July 2012 through June 2015, Casey knowingly conspired to replace Atlantic blue crab with crab meat from Indonesia, China, Thailand, Vietnam, and Central and South America.
Casey and his co-conspirators falsely labeled at least 397,917 pounds of crab meat, with a retail value in the millions of dollars, as Atlantic blue crab and “Product of the United States”.
Court documents said Casey directed employees to remove foreign crabmeat from the original shipper’s packaging containers, blend and combine foreign crab meat from one processor with crab meat from another processor, and place it into different packing containers with fake labels.
Casey also directed employees to place labels with “Product of the USA” on containers that covered up labels that stated “Product of Brazil” or “Product of China.”
On top of the prison sentence, Casey was fined $15,000.
