well its my opinion and so really you cant question my opinion if it was a fact yes jump all over it. may be its the thing that I spend crazy amounts of money there so may be that is why he is alright to me.. well on these boards its hard to tell when someone is either voicing a opinion , stating a fact or just being a AIR head.

other thing that gets me on this was if he had actually gotten that permit, which I'm sure they do give, we all would just continuing happily buying the product.

In other words, we're all okay with the raping and pillaging the environment as long as the paper work is in order???

I met Jason a number of times...first, when he wildly overcharged me to re-silicon a leaking hex (I did not know any better at the time, it was the first tank I had that needed silicon repair), and had to re-do it twice (and I still had to go in and fix some spots!). Then, I used to drop into SWC to browse-- until I looked at prices and found they were way out of whack (high). I bought a couple of corals (not endangered, I never buy endangered, I research them first) and stopped buying when the corals I got from him would die, and similar corals I got from other shops (cheaper) to replace them flourished. I was glad I'd quit buying from him when I heard about the problem in 2007.
As soon as he realized I was not going to be spending a fortune in his shop, he became terse, even rude when I went in. I observed he was very charming, though, when he had a sucker on the hook who was happy to overspend ridiculous amounts of money for creatures (like the large clams) that would not survive in their tanks (I would overhear discussions about lighting-- he would be selling clams to people with T5HO lighting).
The last purchase I made was many, many months ago, meds I couldn't find anywhere else. As always, he was rude.
And a note of clarification: he did not simply import without proper permits. He imported huge amount of rock and species for which you cannot GET permits because they are endangered.
As for why he would do this? Money, money, money. This stuff sells for a LOT on the black market.

He imported endangered species for which you cannot get permits. The permit system is designed to prevent people from importing such species. If the paperwork is in order, the species is not endangered or threatened.

Moot point.... YOU CANNOT GET PERMITS FOR WHAT HE BROUGHT IN.

We all keep fish in glass boxes but I for one do not keep any endangered species. I think that by keeping fish as we do, we raise awareness and knowledge of these wonderful animals and by doing so we help to maintain these animals in the wild.

By rationalizing what he did we support the unscrupulous people who are willing to destroy the environment to line his pockets.

I agree 100 percent, hypocrisy runs rampant in this hobby and it really makes me want to puke...I don't care how well you provide for your little fishies bottom line is the vast majority and in most cases ALL of our tanks live contents come from the wild. How can any tank owner trash talk the hobby knowing this? You have no idea what took place or how they were handled when the creatures of your tank were collected.

This is a cut and paste from the news article, what are you talking about?

"The rare type of rock is protected because it contains coral. It can only be imported or exported if an international permit is obtained, which wasn’t done here."

It sounds like it was obtainable but he didn't get one

We have two people from Winnipeg with less than 100 posts between them on here crucifying a Winnipeg business, sounds more personal than anything.

What the hell difference does it make how many posts we have on Canreef?!? Like the number of posts you have made makes your point more or less valid. Give your head a shake.

Fact- The guy broke the law. He should be punished.

Nothing personal at all....but if no one says anything about stuff like this then it continues. By not speaking out against it, you are condoning the behavior.

I don't know where my shoes were made either, but if I hear a company uses sweat shops, then I don't buy from them anymore.

To state that we shouldn't comment on this because we aren't intimately aware of the process of collection is retarded. By commenting on this we are making ourselves more aware of the process and by getting rid of greedy conmen we are making sure that those shady practices are not allowed to continue.
Anyone that would defend this guys actions are just showing their true character, and I wouldn't buy anything from you either.

the guy ****ed me off. wouldnt warranty his product brand new out of the box.

i hope his business fails so he can stop screwing people

his logic was: the store i bought it from took my money so they should warranty it.

my question to him was "you send out skimmers to retail stores for free?"