One of California’s top sushi chefs was sentenced on Monday, May 18th, for serving endangered sei whale meat to customers at The Hump, a now-closed eatery in Santa Monica, California. According to U.S. District Judge Dale S. Fischer, chef Kiyoshiro Yamamoto was issued a $5,000 fine, as well as 200 hours of community service and two years of probation after admitting to his role in the scandal. The sentencing was the result of an investigation that began in 2010, when Yamamoto and fellow chef Susumu Ueda served whale meat to the producers of the documentary The Cove. Undercover cameramen filmed the transaction, and DNA testing of the meat later confirmed that it came from a sei whale, which is protected under the Marine Mammal Protection Act of 1972 and listed as endangered under the Endangered Species Act of 1973.
It is illegal to sell whale meat of any kind in the United States, and Yamamoto, Ueda and The Hump’s parent company Typhoon Restaurant Inc. were all charged as a result of the ensuing scandal; the restaurant closed its doors permanently that same year. Last year, Yamamoto and Ueda pleaded guilty to misdemeanor counts of conspiracy and to the violation of the Marine Mammal Protection Act. In the plea agreement, they admitted that they had been given approval by the restaurant’s owner and manager to order a variety of whale meat products in 2007, including whale akami (red meat), whale bacon and whale onomi (tail). Yamamoto’s sentence is identical to the one meted out to Ueda earlier this month. The owner of Typhoon Restaurant Inc., Brian Vidor, received one year’s probation in April, while he and the company are jointly responsible for paying a fine of just $27,500.
Sei whales are the fourth-largest rorqual whales after the blue whale, the fin whale and the humpback whale, and are classified as Endangered on the IUCN Red List. They were pushed to the brink of extinction by commercial whaling efforts in the late 1800s and early 1900s, and as such, the species is now internationally protected. Small-scale whaling for this species still continues today, however, as a result of a loophole in the moratorium on commercial whaling, which allows the Japanese to kill limited numbers of sei whales for research purposes. The Japanese kill approximately 50 sei whales every year under the auspices of this loophole.
According to court documents, the whale meat at the center of this case was purchased from Ginichi Ohira, a seafood dealer based in Gardena, California, who procured his products from a supplier in Japan. In light of this claim, it would seem that the sei whales ostensibly being killed by the Japanese for research purposes are instead being processed as part of an illegal trade in whale meat. Ohira pled guilty to selling the illegal meat in 2011, and will be sentenced in June.
In the meantime, Yamamoto is working at LA sushi restaurant Yamakase, an “invitation only” establishment. Please do let owners know that you won’t be frequenting a business that would employ a chef who knowingly purchased and served customers an endangered species.
