I have seen this happen a couple of times. It sucks because it is false advertising. Good boats don't do these practices because they don't need to.

It may be a non-issue to DFG, but sportboat captains are supposed to keep accurate logbooks of their catch. You might want to call 1-888-DFG-CALTIP and see if they're interested (it's anonymous).

Also, to play devil's advocate here, did everyone on the trip have their fish cleaned? Could it be there were fish still in the burlap that weren't cleaned that you didn't notice? Was the crew fishng and was their catch included in the total? Was there catch and release going on but the released fish were still added to the counts?