NEW BEDFORD Two former employees of Buyers and Sellers Exchange (BASE) are alleging owners and brothers Raymond and Richard Canastra were aware of and involved in Carlos Rafael s falsifying of fish quotas, according to two affidavits filed last week as part of an ongoing lawsuit.
In their written statements, signed in September 2020 under the penalties of perjury, former BASE employees Peter Medeiros and Nelson Couto allege Raymond Canastra and Rafael instructed them to destroy and falsify paperwork detailing the species and quantity of fish caught an important record that must be submitted weekly to the federal government.
Medeiros, who said he worked at BASE from 2006 to 2018 as general manager overseeing unloading of vessels, wrote the Canastra brothers instructed him to handle the unloading of Rafael s groundfish boats differently from all other groundfish boats starting in 2010.
At the October meeting, Markey stated that Solrac LLC has been owned by the Rafael family for 20 years and in addition to Rafael-DeMello, Hathaway and his wife, Ivonilde Rafael Hathaway, and a third sister are also principals.
The Rafael family has yet to buy the property, which is still owned by Quinary Properties LLC, whose principals are the Aghai family, according to the meeting minutes, but Markey said Solrac LLC has a purchase and sale agreement for the property.
While Rafael himself isn’t mentioned at the meeting or listed under the LLC, he discussed the project with an editor from Dartmouth Week, along with plans to restore the Hawthorne Country Club on Tucker Road.
Blocked from fishing, Carlos Rafael looks to real estate
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Dec. 10, 2020 17:13 GMT
Carlos Rafael, the so-called Codfather of New Bedford, Massachusetts, may be prohibited from ever participating again in the commercial seafood industry, but that hasn t stopped him from getting into another business venture, based on a report in Dartmouth Week. [.]
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