The US Department of Justice (DOJ) on Monday asked a US District Court in San Francisco to not let former Bumble Bee CEO Chris Lischewski out of a ruling that found him guilty of participating in a criminal conspiracy to fix prices of canned tuna sold in the United States.
On Jan. 13, Lischewski filed a motion for judgment of acquittal with a US District Court in San Francisco, where only a month earlier he was convicted by a jury of being the mastermind behind the massive scheme involving Bumble Bee, Starkist and Chicken of the Sea International.
Lischewski "does not—and cannot—point to any evidence that would require the court to overturn the jury’s verdict," lawyers representing the DOJ said.
In remarks delivered earlier this month on the state of US criminal antitrust enforcement, DOJ Deputy Assistant Attorney Richard Powers said Lischewski's trial conviction "showed our prosecutors are just as comfortable tracing collusion all the way to the C-Suite in an important consumer market as they are combatting collusion in global financial markets."
