VALDEZ, Alaska — Megan Rodolf described the past few weeks as a “year from hell.”
Considering the bad luck that she and her husband, Fred Rodolf, have experienced, it’s easy to see why.
Fred Rodolf, owner and skipper of the 74-foot charter yacht Lu-Lu Belle, sailed from the boat’s Port Angeles winter home into hot water with Canadian authorities May 3 when he forgot to declare three loaded handguns on board.
“It was an innocent mistake,” Megan Rodolf said in an interview Sunday from Valdez, Alaska.
“He forgot that he had them with him on board.”
To make matters worse, the Lu-Lu Belle ran aground early Saturday in Alaska’s Prince William Sound, requiring a Coast Guard helicopter rescue.
At the first of this month, Fred, 72, was on his way to Alaska where he runs the Lu-Lu Belle, which he built 35 years ago, as a charter company. The couple have spent the past seven off-seasons in warmer Port Angeles.
“We were in a hurry to get to Alaska,” Megan said about the couple forgetting about the firearms aboard the vessel.
“We were on our way to work, and we were behind our deadline.
“It’s not like we deal in firearms.”
The Lu-Lu Belle motored into Pender Harbour in the Gulf Islands — the Canadian extension of the San Juan Islands — and failed to declare three loaded handguns.
Victoria lawyer Tom Morino, who is defending Rudolf, told the Victoria Times Colonist on Friday that Rodolf is facing a three-year jail sentence for smuggling firearms into Canada, which frowns on foreigners bringing firearms into the nation.
Rodolf would face a one-year minimum mandatory jail sentence if federal prosecutors allow him to plead guilty to a less serious charge, Morino said.
“This is a classic example of what is wrong with minimum mandatory sentences,” Morino told the Times Colonist.
“The people we’re after with this three-year minimum mandatory jail sentence are organized criminals smuggling handguns on the black market, not some poor guy who stupidly leaves the guns on his boat and comes into Canada with the intention of simply continuing on his way.”
Rodolf called Customs Canada upon his arrival in the Gulf Islands. A Canada Border Services officer asked if he had any weapons aboard. Rodolf said that he had a shotgun, Morino said.
Officers boarded the vessel and noticed a box of .38 caliber bullets beside a box of shotgun shells.
Rodolf first denied having any other weapons aboard, but within five minutes he admitted having three loaded handguns aboard and showed them to the officers, Morino said.
“He forgot about them, and then he remembered about them,” Megan Rodolf said Sunday.
“It was a bad mistake to make — forgetting that he had them.”
Rodolf was charged with making a false statement to Canada Border Services officers, three counts of smuggling loaded handguns and three counts of unlawful possession of a firearm.
He was released on $2,000 cash bail and the Lu-Lu Belle with the couple aboard continued its journey to Alaska.
“He does not belong there [in jail],” Megan Rodolf said.
“He does not have a criminal bone in his body.”
Things got worse for the Rodolfs at 3:54 a.m. Saturday, when the Lu-Lu Belle ran aground in Alaskan waters.
“Now we may have lost our livelihood,” Megan Rodolf said.
“This has been a year from hell.”
Coast Guard Sector Anchorage received a call from the Lu-Lu Belle reporting the grounding and sent a rescue helicopter.
“We were tired, and we grounded the boat,” Megan said.
No pollution or injuries were reported.
On Sunday, Fred Rodolf was trying to salvage the Lu-Lu Belle and was out of cell phone range for comment, his wife said.
The couple’s Glacier Wildlife Cruises website describes the Lu-Lu Belle as “the limousine of Prince William Sound.” Fred Rodolf has been helm on every cruise since 1979.
Megan Rodolf said her husband has a court hearing in Victoria scheduled June 1.
Morino said the case will likely go to trial sometime next year.
Fred Rodolf’s charter company tours the Alaska’s wilderness, glaciers in Prince William Sound, Valdez’s harbor and the terminus of the Trans-Alaska Oil Pipe Line.
“He is the tour,” Megan Rodolf said.
“It’s his boat. He is the narrator and the captain.”
In Port Angeles, he’s also known as a good samaritan.
In December 2008, he rescued a Port Angeles boater whose sailboat washed ashore just east of Hollywood Beach during a storm.
Fred Rodolf arrived in the Lu-Lu Belle at high tide and helped Doug Zimmerman pull the Esther Marie from a precarious position on the rip-rap rocks — where high waves had pushed it — to deeper water near Port Angeles City Pier.
“He’d give you the shirt off his back,” Megan Rodolf said of her husband.
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Staff Writer Louise Dickson of the Times Colonist, a news partner of the Peninsula Daily News, contributed to this report.
Reporter Rob Ollikainen can be reached at 360-417-3537 or at rob.ollikainen@peninsuladailynews.com.
