Bumble Bee Foods is the first corporate defendant in an ongoing seafood industry investigation to plead guilty to one count of conspiring to fix prices of canned and pouched tuna fish, the U.S. Department of Justice said Monday.

The San Diego-based company also agreed to pay a $25 million criminal fine that could increase to $81.5 million in the event of the company being sold. Bumble Bee Foods is privately owned by the London private equity firm Lion Capital.

Jill Irvin, Bumble Bee's general counsel since 2006, emailed ALM a statement saying, “The company has taken this matter very seriously and fully cooperated with the DOJ from the start of the investigation. We have established strong guidelines and new internal policies for our path forward, which is being overseen by a chief compliance officer that we hired last fall. We accept full responsibility for needing to earn back any lost trust in our company.” Irvin did not answer questions.