Shipping Repo Man: Capt Jack Meets Capt Max

I have to give credit for finding this article to my friend Rich Palarea.  Rich sent it to me today with intent that it show up on the Freight dawg. This appeared in the Los Angeles Times back in March.

Max Hardberger is an attorney cum repo man whose specialty is commandeering ocean vessels whose operators have failed to meet commercial lending arrangements or outright stolen the goods and ships involved in international trades. The article below describes Hardberger's outright mercenary tactics used to reclaim the MV Aztec Express, which was stuck in port in Haiti under a corrupt court order. 

In most modern countries, arresting a commercial vessel is done through a court order and papers are served on the master of the ship.   In Haiti, where officials can commonly be corrupt and voodoo is a powerful religion, creativity, guile and some downright cajones are needed to rip off a ship from a foriegn harbor. 

This is very good reading and somewhat "different" than your normal maritime article!  Capt Jack Sparrow has nothing on Captain Hardberger.  The Black Pearl would have been freed in no time.  And what kind of movie would that make?

clipped from www.latimes.com This repo man drives off with ocean freighters It's a rare specialty that can be dangerous, given parts of the world in which he must operate. By Dan Weikel, Times Staff Writer March 1, 2007 NEW ORLEANS - If repossessing a used Chevrolet can be tricky, consider retrieving the Aztec Express, a 700-foot cargo ship under guard in Haiti as civil unrest spread through the country. Only a few repo men possess the guile and resourcefulness for such a job. One of them is F. Max Hardberger, of Lacombe, La. Since 1991, the 58-year-old attorney and ship captain has surreptitiously sailed away about a dozen freighters from ports around the world. "I'm sure there are those who would like to add me to a list of modern pirates of the Caribbean, but I do whatever I can to protect the legal rights of my clients," said Hardberger, whose company, Vessel Extractions in New Orleans, has negotiated the releases of another dozen cargo ships and prevented the seizures of many others. His line of work regularly takes him to a corner of the maritime industry still plagued by pirates, underhanded business practices and corrupt government officials, waters the Aztec Express sailed right into.

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Comments

[John Licht]

What a great topic for television show. Hello History Channel, Discovery, or other similar channels.

John