I am sure that others on this list are trying to help Mike prove with his
confiscation fines, but since I have access to the Westlaw legal database
for free (one of the benefits of being in law school) I thought I'd check
to see if I could find anything of use.
 
I found the regulation (14 CCR Section 671, Division 1, Subdivision 3,
Chapter 3 Subsection (c)(2)(K)) but was unable to find records of cases
against other ferret owners.  When I ran searches of some of the california
newspapers, I found 8 or 10 references to the fine for ferret ownership,
which was stated as a misdemeanor punishable by up to 6 months in jail and
a $1,000.00 fine.
 
I also found a mention of another ferret owner who was charged with owning
3 ferrets, and only had to pay $194.00 to fly the ferrets out of state.  I
could not find out how the case came out, but the article said he the
maximum fine was $1K and the transportation.  This was in 1998, the guy's
name was Eugene Soroten, his attorney was Joseph Kouri, the prosector was
Mark McCannon, and it was in Alameda County.
 
If anyone would like me to send the articles I found, just drop me an email
and I'll be happy to send them along.  Also, if anyone has suggestions or
requests of additional searches, I'll be happy to help out.  I think that
the problem is that the ferret cases are tried in municpal courts, not
state courts, and I do not have access to the records from most municipal
courts (too much money for them to give their records to Westlaw, and
perhaps not enough demand.)
 
HTH
Melissa
[Posted in FML issue 2848]