Shipping Companies Ordered to Pay $10.4 Million Penalty for Altering Oil Logs

PHILADELPHIA—Two shipping companies based in Germany and Cyprus were sentenced by a federal court in Newark, N.J., July 23 to pay a $10.4 million criminal penalty for deliberately concealing pollution from four ships that visited ports in New Jersey, Delaware, and Northern California, the Justice Department said (United States v. Columbia Shipmanagement GmbH).

Columbia Shipmanagement (Deutschland) GmbH (CSM-D), a German corporation, and Columbia Shipmanagement Ltd. (CSM-CY), a Cypriot company, pleaded guilty March 21 in U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey to obstruction of justice, making false statements, and violating the Act to Prevent Pollution from ...