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Fort Myers man caught with illegal fish and firearm in Punta Rassa
10:21 AM EDT, Wed April 22, 2020
PUNTA RASSA, Fla. – A Fort Myers man faces charges of resisting an officer and driving under the influence after an eventful stop at the Punta Rassa Boat Ramp by a Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission lieutenant last week.
Joseph Eugene Szalay, 44, was backing his Ford F150 truck down the boat ramp so he could put his 17′ Regal FB motorboat on the trailer that was connected to his truck.
FWC Lieutenant David Barrett introduced himself to Szalay and walked with him down to the end of the dock to where his boat was located.
After arriving at the boat, Barret saw several empty beer cans on the boat. He also noticed a strong odor of alcohol coming from Szalay and noted that he was talking slow, slurred and was unsteady on his feet.
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"The subject appeared to be extremely intoxicated," Barrett noted in an arrest report from FWC.
Barrett asked Szalay to open the cooler on his vessel just to make sure he didn't have any illegal fish on board. The boater opened the boat's live wells first and then opened the cooler lid only halfway.
That's when Barrett saw a fish that looked like a snook surrounded by more beer cans.
Szalay became verbally aggressive when the lieutenant asked for him to open the cooler all the way to confirm what he saw and started to untie his boat from the dock and drive towards his trailer on the boat ramp.
On the way to the ramp, Szalay took the snook out of the cooler and tossed it into the water. The snook floated behind his boat as he moved towards his trailer.
When Szalay reached his truck on the ramp, he jumped off his boat, onto the seawall, and started walking aggressively towards Barrett.
Barrett pointed his taser at him, but didn't deploy it because it might've caused Szalay to fall off the seawall and get seriously injured.
Szalay was eventually detained and other FWC officials who responded to the scene started a routine search of his truck and boat.
Investigators found a loaded handgun on the driver's side seat of Szalay's truck along with fish slime and scales in his boat.
FWC officials decided not to perform a field sobriety test because of his dangerous and argumentative behavior.
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