If Congress is serious about keeping illegal radio stations off the air, perhaps its members can push the Justice Department to follow through on recent FCC forfeiture orders.
You’ll recall that in 2020, the Preventing Illegal Radio Abuse Through Enforcement (PIRATE) Act became law, giving the FCC additional enforcement authority, including higher penalties against pirate broadcasters and any person who permits the operation of pirate radio. It required the FCC to conduct periodic enforcement sweeps and gave it authority to pursue enforcement action against landlords and property owners in such cases.
The commission has taken various steps since, which you can see listed in summary form on its Pirate Radio Database.
Notably, in the past nine months the FCC has confirmed forfeitures of more than $2.3 million each against two separate radio operations in New York City. But will this make any difference? Will those operators ever be obliged to pay, much less turn off their transmitters?
In the first case, finalized last fall, the commission said César Ayora and Luis Angel Ayora are guilty of the “longstanding illicit operation of an unauthorized radio station known as Radio Impacto 2” on 105.5 MHz in Queens.
It said enforcement agents found scores of apparent violations between March and September 2022, including multiple weekly on-air radio programs. The Ayoras even advertised their pirate radio station for at least 25 weeks, and continued to operate their unauthorized station at last check.
There has been no subsequent news from the commission about that case in almost a year, and the FCC declined comment when I asked. Presumably the fine has not been collected.
In the second, more recent case the FCC issued a penalty against Johnny (or Jhonny) Peralta for allegedly operating “La Mia Radio,” a pirate station on 105.7 MHz in the Bronx.
It said the station continually identified itself on the air since at least 2018, and that FCC activity over several years included multiple field strength readings, photos of antenna equipment and a notice of unauthorized operation left at the site. The antenna appears to have moved at least twice.
The large forfeiture is based only on broadcasts between November 2022 and February 2023, when agents did field strength measurements and La Mia Radio was advertising on-air programs on its website.
The FCC said Peralta has been identified in multiple newspaper articles and social media accounts as the owner and director.
La Mia Radio appears to remain active, at least based on online activity. The website Al Momento published a story in July reporting that “Dominican radio broadcasting entrepreneur Jhonny Peralta led the relaunch of his radio station ‘La Mía Radio 105.7 fm’ with a luxurious and modern booth, located in the Bedford Park Blvd. sector of the Bronx.” A photo of a nattily outfitted studio appeared on Instagram.
Neither organization involved in these cases responded to Radio World requests for comment. In both cases the FCC gave the operators 30 days to pay. But I’m not holding my breath on that.
Historically, collection of pirate radio fines has been problematic to say the least. FCC and DOJ officials generally don’t talk about that aspect. But they announce consent decrees, so based on the paucity of such news, my uninformed belief is that bureaucracy gets in the way of follow-through or that Justice usually has had bigger things to worry about, given the small financial penalties involved.
My hope is that the attention from Congress and the much larger penalties now in play will prompt the Justice Department to come knocking. Meanwhile there are several more pirate cases that have gone as far as notices of apparent liability, at least three of which involve potential seven-figure penalties. But for these bigger fines to have teeth, pirate operators need to believe that the pain, when inflicted, is going to be real.
