About

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Helping Importers and Exporters Solve Problems with Us Government Agencies

Peter S. Herrick has locations in St. Petersburg, Florida, Long Beach, California, and serving since 1977. Being a Federal practice, we represent clients in every U.S. port.

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Career Highlights

Peter S. Herrick graduated from the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy and served aboard merchant's vessels as a third and second mate and aboard U.S. naval vessels, retiring as an LCDR USNR. He then graduated from Georgetown Law School as an attorney and began working at U.S. Customs in Washington D.C., in the Office of Regulations and Rulings, and transferred to the Miami Regional Counsel’s office as Assistant Regional Counsel.

He entered private practice in 1977, concentrating on representing clients before customs, other federal agencies, the U.S. Court of International Trade, and various U.S. district and appeals courts. He has also achieved success on many federal issues.

Peter’s Achievements

  • Removed our client from the Office of Foreign Assets Control’s SDN list.
  • Detroit Customs remitted a counterfeit penalty of $197,535 in total.
  • Litigation in U.S. District Court for Puerto Rico resulted in Customs being barred from assessing counterfeit penalties based on an alleged UL trademark violation.
  • Customs broker penalties of $30,000 and $10,000 canceled.
  • Recovered $25,000 in Customs duties based on drawback claims being litigated in the USCIT.
  • The only litigated drawback penalty case since 1993 reduced to appx. $13,000 from appx. $365,000.
  • Counterfeit penalty, 1526(f), of $594,000 – canceled.
  • Counterfeit penalty, 1526(f), of $26,325 – canceled.
  • Customs penalty for bond violation reduced from $171,189 to $2,700.
  • Broker penalty of $30,000 mitigated to $6,000.
  • In transit liquidated damage claim reduced from $30,474 to $1,125.
  • Customs liquidated damages for bond violation reduced from $43,909 to $3,000.
  • Three containers of clothing detained by Customs released.
  • 164.45% dumping duty cash deposit rate reduced to 56.98% retroactively.
  • Liquidated damages of $184,905 for failure to redeliver; $1,500 offer of compromise accepted by Customs.
  • Liquidated damages of $37,500 and mitigated to $625 by Customs.
  • U.S. vs. UPS Customhouse Brokerage, Inc., Slip Op. 10-11 the government failed to prove it was entitled to custom broker penalties.
  • U.S. vs. Saad Nigri, Slip Op. 10-5, the judge dismissed Nigri from the section 1592 penalty litigation because the lawsuit against him was baseless.
  • Our Colombian client was removed from OFAC’s SDN list.