CAUGHT!

A historic, family-run restaurant in Biloxi, Mississippi, made its name by offering freshly caught seafood. Then the feds showed up with an extraordinary claim: The fish was not what it seemed.

- By BOYCE UPHOLT

0n the morning of November 19, 2019, federal agents-at least 15, according to reporters on the scene-swarmed Mary Mahoney's Old French House, perhaps the most prominent restaurant in Biloxi, Mississippi. A confidential informant had told investigators that a local seafood company was passing off imported shrimp and fish as premium, local product-including red snapper, the star of several iconic dishes at Mahoney's.

The Old French House is a brick residence featuring parapet gables, a cast-iron railing across its four front bays, and an ancient live oak in the courtyard. The building, constructed around 1835, is one of Biloxi's oldest documented structures, a fact the restaurant incorporates into its mythology. The place was meant to be Old South classy and entirely local. Eventually, though, the restaurant would be charged with wire fraud and conspiracy to misbrand seafood-a serious crime that undercuts both commercial fisheries and other, competing restaurants. The allure of local catch-a plate of all-American seafood-lies at the heart of Biloxi's appeal to tourists. Or at least it was thought. In court, a lawyer representing one of the restaurant's co-owners would argue that no one seemed to care about the supposed fraud.

For now, though, after the feds arrived, Bobby Mahoney-the son of the eponymous Mary, and the man who serves as the co-owner and public face of the restaurant-sent home the employees who had been preparing to serve lunch in the high-ceilinged dining room. A note appeared, taped to the green gate beyond the courtyard, announcing a brief closure: "Sorry for the inconvenience!" To reporters, Bobby Mahoney diminished the event. Any wrongdoing was "very trivial," he said, just "about fish." The agents remained inside the restaurant for several hours, while dark SUVs lingered in the street.

For many businesses, a federal raid might be a fatal blow. But Mary Mahoney's is no ordinary business, and Biloxi is no ordinary town.