NJ Fishermen Win $767K In Tuna Tournament

A firefighter and police sergeant from Trenton fishing from an Ocean County boat caught a 236.5-pound bigeye tuna at a tournament in Maryland.

Damien Romeo owns the boat "Hubris" out of Forked River, and often fishes in tournaments with his friends, police sergeant Brian Suschke and firefighter Rich Kosztyu. They've fished the White Marlin Open in Ocean City , Maryland.for years, but have never caught a fish this size or won this much prize money.

The three men were 80 miles offshore trolling for tuna when they got a bite. Kosztyu fought the fish for about an hour til Suschke was able to hook it into the boat.

They knew the fish was big enough to contend for the title, but tragedy almost struck when the boat lost steering two miles from the inlet. After a tow in, they trucked the fish to the marina for the official weigh-in.

Two days later, after all the fish had been weighed, they were handed a check for $767,091. They just edged out a 233-pound tuna, which earned that boat a $131,968 prize.

The tuna initially earned them $400,000, but because of special buy-ins in the tournament, they also won the pot for the blue marlin winner-take-all.