Pacific black sea bass are a protected species and can’t be legally possessed.  Recently an Orange County angler hooked into a beauty from the Balboa pier which he ended up killing and it looks like he may find himself in trouble.  Video on this page doesn’t look very convincing that he tried to return it to the water quickly.  The case has been turned over to OC District Attorney.  It sounds like releasing one of these fish, however, requires more than just knowing how to remove a hook and apparently the air bladder somehow needs to be deflated as well.  Perhaps even if he had returned it more quickly it wouldn’t have survived anyway.  Hard to know, but it sure seems like he could have decided to cut the line about 15 minutes before he did.

These are clearly special fish.  Just look at historical photos such as this one posted on Shorpy.com, you can see why.  It looks like a giant largemouth bass.  Hard to imagine catching such a massive fish like this one.  Wow.