Something fishy about curfew laws?

BY ALEX COOLMAN

An Irvine family’s attempt to experience the strange spectacle of a

late-night grunion run turned even stranger when their flashlights

attracted Newport Beach Police officers instead of frolicking fish.

Ute Thiu and her family, along with several friends, had come to the

beach last week at Big Corona equipped with lights and tide books in

hopes of seeing grunion thrashing on the beach. The small fish wash up on

shore at certain times of the year in order to reproduce.

But Thiu didn’t get very far before the adventure was cut short.

Police officers showed up and told her, in a manner that she didn’t find

very friendly, that the group had to leave.

“The kids were almost crying,” said Thiu, who was left somewhat

baffled by the experience.

The problem the group encountered, said Newport Beach Police Sgt. Mike

McDermott, had to do with a technicality in the grunion fishing law.

Though hunting for grunion is allowed at state beaches after the city

closes the sands for its 10 p.m. curfew, McDermott said a fishing license

is necessary for the activity.

Thiu and company didn’t have licenses, but they didn’t see why they

should have to have them.

“We didn’t want to fish,” she said. “We just wanted to see the fish.”

That might sound reasonable, but McDermott said it’s not so simple.

“If they’re just out there looking, that would be illegal,” he said.

The reason for the rules, he said, is that gang members sometimes

congregate on the beach late at night using the cover story of hunting

for grunion.

The licensing requirement cuts out that excuse, forcing the people on

the beach to choose between leaving and paying the roughly $800 fine for

fishing without a license.

But the rule also cuts out the seemingly innocent activity of

witnessing a beach covered with silver fish. Thiu, for one, sounds a

little discouraged.

“It was just too bad,” she said. “We didn’t even see any grunion.”