The State of Environmental Crime Enforcement: A Survey of Developments in 2014

The federal environmental crime enforcement program seems poised for significant change. On Dec. 16, 2014, John C. Cruden was confirmed by the Senate as the Assistant Attorney General for the Environment and Natural Resources Division (“ENRD”). ¹Meet the Assistant Attorney General, DOJ, (Mar. 6, 2015, 3:56 PM), http://www.justice.gov/enrd/6451.htm. Cruden has publicly announced a commitment to large cases and using enforcement as a means of taking the profit out of noncompliance. ²Juan Carlos Rodriguez, DOJ’s Cruden to Focus on Bringing Bad Actors into Line, Law360, Mar. 3, 2015. Moreover, in addition to new leadership, new approaches to criminal enforcement investigation and prosecution are under way. These approaches aim to utilize publicly available data to target suspected entities, and to investigate for environmental crimes where a workplace safety issue arises. Both the Environmental Protection Agency (“EPA”) and Department of Justice (“DOJ”) have made clear that, whenever a significant industrial or transportation incident occurs (such as a pipeline failure, a plant fire or explosion) there is a near certainty of an investigation for possible criminal violations. Recent statements made by Douglas Parker, director of the EPA’s Criminal Investigation Division (“EPA-CID”), ³See Steven P. Solow and Anne M. Carpenter, The State of Environmental Criminal Enforcement: A Survey of Developments in 2012, Bloomberg Bna, Daily Environment Report, at 32-34 (Mar. 15, 2013); see 51 DEN B-1, 03/15/2013. and by Deborah Harris, the newest chief of DOJ’s Environmental Crimes Section (“ECS”), ⁴See Interview with Deborah Harris, Chief, ECS, infra. provide the clearest statements to date that, after more than thirty years, the federal environmental crimes approach is changing.

On March 4, 2015, at the American Bar Association’s annual White Collar Crime Conference in New Orleans, Doug Parker reported that EPA-CID’s investigations are aimed at three basic categories: a) core cases, b) analytically driven cases, and c) cases derived from catastrophic incidents. ⁵Doug Parker, Environmental Enforcement, Panel at the American Bar Association’s Twenty-Ninth Annual White Collar Crime Conference (Mar. 4, 2015). According to Parker, EPA-CID’s core cases consist of the types of cases prosecuted during the past decades, such as asbestos rip-and-run cases, illegal storage or transport of hazardous waste, wildlife cases and violations of National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (“NPDES”) permits or wetlands protections. Often, the cases prosecuted in this category will fall within one of EPA’s National Enforcement Initiatives, announced every three years. ⁶National Enforcement Initiatives, EPA, (Mar. 13, 2015, 8:54 AM), http://www2.epa.gov/enforcement/national-enforcement-initiatives; see also Interview with Deborah Harris, Chief, ECS, infra (citing as a focus for ECS “pollution activity associated with fossil fuel extraction in shale formations across the nation.”

These core cases mirror the cases brought beginning more than 30 years ago, when there were four or so full-time environmental prosecutors at Main Justice, and not many more scattered across the 93 United States Attorney’s offices. By the mid-1990’s the number of prosecutors and agents reached a level that has remained relatively constant. ⁷Currently, there are 43 prosecutors in ECS, and slightly fewer than 200 EPA-CID agents. See DOJ, http://www.justice.gov/enrd/ENRD_ecs.html; see also Steven P. Solow and Anne M. Carpenter, The State of Environmental Criminal Enforcement: A Survey of Developments in 2012, Bloomberg Bna, Daily Environment Report, at 32 (Mar. 15, 2013); see 51 DEN B-1, 03/15/2013 (noting that as of February 2013, CID only had 185 agents, which is 15 less than the legislatively prescribed minimum established by Congress with the passage of the Pollution Prosecution Act of 1990.). During this same time key legal standards related to criminal prosecutions were litigated and largely clarified.

As to be expected, there was an initial series of civil cases that defined key definitions, such as a “point source” in the Clean Water Act ⁸United States v. Holland, 373 F. Supp. 665, 6 ERC 1388, M.D. Fla. (holding bulldozers and dumptrucks constitute point sources); Wash. Wilderness Coal. v. Hecla Mining Co., 870 F. Supp. 983, 40 ERC 1134, E.D. Wash. (finding that tailings ponds are point sources); Cmty. Ass’n for Restoration of Env’t v. Sid Koopman Dairy, 54 F. Supp. 2d 976, 48 ERC 1763, E.D. Wash. (concluding that dairies are concentrated animal feeding operations and are thus not exempt from the definition of point source). and “waste” in the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (“RCRA”). ⁹United States v. ILCO, Inc., 996 F.2d 1126, 37 ERC 1105, 11th Cir. (defining solid waste to include things that “[s]omebody has discarded” even if the discarded item can be recycled) (emphasis in original). In these cases, the government benefited from the deference given to agency interpretations of its own statutes in civil matters. ¹⁰Id.; see also Chevron U.S.A. Inc. v. Natural Res. Def. Council, Inc., 467 U.S. 837, 21 ERC 2049. These definitions then carried over to criminal cases. ¹¹United States v. Plaza Health Labs., Inc., 3 F.3d 643, 37 ERC 1265, 2d Cir. (finding that a person does not constitute a point source); United States v. Law, 979 F.2d 977, 4th Cir. (per curiam), cert denied, 507 U.S. 1030 (including a water collection and treatment system within the definition of a point source). The clarity established by civil case law supported the government’s ability to successfully defend the general intent standard needed to establish a “knowing” criminal violation, and the reliance on simple negligence to support a prosecution for “negligence.” ¹²See, e.g., United States v. Alghazouli, 517 F.3d 1179, 2008 BL 43471, 9th Cir. (requiring “only that the defendant know the facts constituting the violation for a CAA violation”); United States v. Ho, 311 F.3d 589, 55 ERC 1298, 5th Cir., cert. denied, 539 U.S. 914, 57 ERC 1896 (same); United States v. Hayes Int’l Corp., 786 F.2d 1499, 24 ERC 1282, 11th Cir. (stating that it is not a defense to a RCRA prosecution that the defendant did not know the waste was a “hazardous waste within the meaning of the regulations”); United States v. Weitzenhoff, 35 F.3d 1275, 38 ERC 1365, 9th Cir., cert denied, 513 U.S. 1128, 40 ERC 1160 (stating that Clean Water Act (“CWA”) violation does not require knowledge that the discharges violate the NPDES permit); United States v. Hanousek, 176 F.3d 1116, 48 ERC 1303, 9th Cir. (holding that negligence under public welfare statutes, such as the CWA, requires only ordinary negligence); United States v. Ortiz, 427 F.3d 1278, 61 ERC 1521, 10th Cir. (“[A]n individual violates [the negligent discharge provision] of the CWA by failing to exercise the degree of care that someone of ordinary prudence would have exercised in the same circumstance.”).

These precedents have served the government’s enforcers well, allowing them to pursue what CID Director Parker refers to as “core cases” with a robust set of legal definitions and standards of proof. However, with the government’s stated intention to pursue new categories of cases, “analytically-driven” cases ¹³See Steven P. Solow and Anne M. Carpenter, The State of Environmental Criminal Enforcement: A Survey of Developments in 2013, Bloomberg Bna, Daily Environment Report, at 5-6 (Apr. 11, 2014); see 14 DEN 70, 04/11/2014. and cases derived from catastrophic incidents, the question arises as to whether the prior legal precedents will provide support for these efforts. The answer appears to be in the affirmative for data-driven cases—at least if they follow in the path of the recent renewable identification number (“RIN”) fraud prosecutions. ¹⁴See, e.g., United States v. Gunselman, No. 5:12-cr-00078-C, (N.D. Tex. sentence entered Mar. 29, 2013) (sentence of 188 months in prison, 36 months supervised release, $175,000 fine and $54,973,137.50 in restitution); United States v. Hailey, No. 1:11-cr-00540-WDQ (D. Md. sentence entered Feb. 22, 2013) (sentence of 151 months in prison, 36 months supervised release and $42,196,089.78 in restitution). These “analytically-driven” cases rely on “computer forensics” to analyze “large volumes of electronic data.” ¹⁵See Steven P. Solow and Anne M. Carpenter, The State of Environmental Criminal Enforcement: A Survey of Developments in 2012, Bloomberg Bna, Daily Environment
Report, at 32 (Mar. 15, 2013); see 51 DEN B-1, 03/15/2013 (Interview with Douglas Parker). EPA’s Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance has an “Enforcement Targeting & Data Division” that appears to be dedicated to this effort. ¹⁶See EPA, Organization Chart for the Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance (OECA), http://www2.epa.gov/aboutepa/organization-chart-office-enforcement-and-compliance-assurance-oeca. Though utilizing these new investigative techniques, the cases brought thus far contain the typical emblems of criminality—false statements, fraud and the like, that reflect the exercise of prosecutorial discretion in the use of a broad scope of potential liability. ¹⁷See Interview with Deborah Harris, Chief, ECS, infra (stating a focus for ECS will be on violations that involve “undermining of the Clean Air Act renewable fuels credit markets caused by fraudulent credit activity”.) Thus, for example, companies that purchased fraudulent RINs were not themselves the subject of criminal prosecution, but did face civil enforcement. ¹⁸See, e.g., Letter from Phillip A. Brooks, EPA, to John D. Pickering, Sunoco, Inc. (R&M) regarding Notice of Violation of Renewable Fuels Standards (Nov. 7, 2011), http://www2.epa.gov/sites/production/files/documents/sunoco.pdf (citing the company for purchasing invalid RINs from Clean Green Fuels, LLC, Rodney Hailey’s company).

However, the pursuit of criminal prosecution related to workplace safety matters raise significant legal questions and concerns.

Prior to becoming ECS chief, Deborah Harris wrote about using environmental laws to enforce worker safety obligations, and an increased enforcement coordination with the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (“OSHA”) is a product of her efforts. ¹⁹See Deborah L. Harris, Achieving Worker Safety Through Environmental Crimes Prosecutions, United States Attorney’s Bulletin 58, 58 (July 2011). Such cases do not focus on corporate compliance with the pollution control statutes. Instead, these are cases aimed at criminally enforcing the success or failure of people to implement behavioral goals, growing out of somewhat ambiguous agency directions to use “appropriate hazard techniques,” “such steps as are necessary,” and “good engineering practices.” ²⁰See
42 U.S.C. §§7412(r)(1), (7); 42 C.F.R. Part 68. Civil enforcement of such standards (we will refer to these safety-related provisions as “narrative” as opposed to “technical” standards) present the government with wide discretion in defining what steps meet, or fail to meet, these requirements. But in the criminal context, notions of fair notice and lenity create significant challenges for enforcement. Notably, there is a developing interest in the Supreme Court related to the exercise of prosecutorial discretion in the use of broad legal constraints for criminal enforcement. As discussed below in the Yates case, in which prosecutors sought a 20 year felony Sarbanes-Oxley conviction for the dumping of undersized fish by a commercial fisherman, the court indicated its concern over prosecutorial overreaching. ²¹Yates v. United States, 135 S. Ct. 1074, 2015 BL 48342. Further, in a recent statement respecting the denial of certiorari, Justice Scalia posed the rhetorical question as to whether “a court owes deference to an agency’s interpretation of a law that contemplates both criminal and administrative enforcement.” ²²Douglas F. Whitman v. United States, 135 S. Ct. 352, 2014 BL 316474. Justice Scalia noted his own prior precedent in positing an answer, that “[d]eferring to the prosecuting branch’s expansive views of these statutes ‘would … replac[e] the doctrine of lenity with a doctrine of severity.’ ” ²³Id. These issues are discussed below.

Analytically Driven Cases

The use of data to identify potential criminal activity is not new to the enforcement of environmental crime. As noted in last year’s article, the use of regulatory data to identify environmental criminal activity began in the 1990’s with the comparison of EPA-issued “allowances” and U.S. Customs Service import information to help identify smugglers of ozone-depleting substances. ²⁴Steven P. Solow and Anne M. Carpenter, The State of Environmental Criminal Enforcement: A Survey of Developments in 2013, Bloomberg BNA Daily Environment Report, at 6 (Apr. 11, 2014); see 14 DEN 70, 04/11/2014. As we noted, with the growth of renewable fuels markets, EPA used data analysis to identify perpetrators of RIN fraud. ²⁵Id.; see also Bruce Pasfield and Elise Paeffgen, EPA’s Enforcement of RIN Fraud Violations Starts to Bring Stability Back to the Market, Bloomberg BNA (Apr. 30, 2013).

What is new is the government’s efforts to use a wider data set to seek out potential targets of criminal enforcement. Parker stated at the March 2015 White Collar Crime Conference that EPA-CID would review and compare a variety of publicly available data that many businesses are required to report. Specifically, Parker referenced Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) reporting requirements to investors, which the government can then compare against tax or royalty payments for similar activities. Publicly described growth of operations in areas the government considers ecologically sensitive, may also trigger further inquiry. Whether such comparisons will lead to viable cases, or wild goose chases, may depend upon what kind of data discrepancy or other factors are used to trigger a criminal investigation.

How should companies respond? The most obvious step is to review and assess the data used to support reporting obligations with other publicly released information. This may be more easily said than done. Many of the large companies subject to environmental regulations have complex and technical operations that subject them to a variety of regulatory obligations with differing systems for compliance. In order to compare the data, a company must have a clear accounting of each data storage and generation system used by the company, what the data is used for, and how the systems interact (or fail to interact) with one another.

How should attorneys who represent such companies respond? It is worth noting that the revisions to the Model Rules of Professional Responsibility adopted in August 2012, created, for the first time, an ethical obligation for attorneys to stay abreast of technological changes. ²⁶Model Rules of Prof’l Conduct R. 1.1 cmt. 8 (stating “[t]o maintain the requisite knowledge and skill, a lawyer should keep abreast of changes in the law and its practice, including the benefits and risks associated with relevant technology …”) (emphasis added). Thus, as the government begins in earnest to use data to trigger and investigate claims of environmental crimes or fraud, it is increasingly important for counsel, in-house and outside, to understand how their clients collect, store and report on their data. Lawyers evaluating potential claims against a client must understand that providing contradictory public information may itself be a source of criminal liability, or it may focus the attention of regulators on company operations.

Further, before a client issues a public report, it is important to understand the provenance of the information relied upon. Lawyers should ask their clients whether information has been reconciled against information stored in other company data. To dip briefly into the weeds: Do the company’s data generation and storage systems have inter-system data communication and validation features? Are employees using the various data storage systems for their designed purposes? Are data security measures in place to prevent unauthorized access or alteration of the data? As the government becomes more data savvy and begins to utilize data to assess possible targets for investigation, internal efforts to mirror such analyses may become prudent.

Catastrophic Incidents and Worker Safety

Environmental regulatory violations and worker safety concerns may appear connected in the instance of catastrophic accidents. Cases such as United States v. Motiva Enterprises, LLC, ²⁷No. 1:05-cr-00221 (D. Del. guilty plea entered Mar. 16, 2005) (Motiva pleaded guilty to negligent endangerment under the Clean Air Act and illegal discharge under the Clean Water Act in connection with an explosion and the collapse of a highly corroded sulfuric acid tank at its Delaware refinery, which led to the death of one worker, injuries to other workers and a discharge into the Delaware River. The company was sentenced to three years of probation and a fine of $10 million.). the McWane cases, ²⁸United States v. Atl. States Cast Iron Pipe Co., No. 3:03-cr-00852 (D.N.J. jury verdict entered Apr. 26, 2006) (Atlantic States, a division of McWane, Inc. and four corporate officials were convicted on multiple felony counts of the Clean Water Act, Clean Air Act and Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (“CERCLA”), conspiracy to violate the water act and air act, false statements and obstruction. Evidence at trial established a history of environmental violations, workplace injuries and fatalities, and activities intended to obstruct justice.); United States v. Union Foundry Co., No. 2:05-cr-00299 (N.D. Ala. guilty plea entered Sept. 6, 2005) (Union Foundry, a division of McWane, Inc., was sentenced to pay a criminal fine of $3.5 million and three years of probation in connection with an accident at the Union Foundry plant, where an employee was killed while working on a conveyor belt that did not have a safety guard mandated by OSHA regulations. The company pleaded guilty to a willful violation of the OSHA regulation and knowing violations of RCRA for allowing employees to treat hazardous waste at the facility without a permit.). See also United States v. Tyler Pipe Co., No. 6:05-cr-00029 (E.D. Tex. guilty plea entered Mar. 22, 2005) (a division of McWane Inc. pleaded to a felony false statement and knowing violations of the Clean Air Act for operating its facility without notifying authorities of a major modification); United States v. McWane, Inc., No. 2:05-cr-00811 (D. Utah guilty plea entered Feb. 9, 2006) (A Utah division of McWane pleaded guilty to making false statements and was sentenced to pay a $3 million fine; the company’s vice president and general manager were sentenced to serve 12 months in prison for violating the Clean Air Act); United States v. McWane, Inc., No. 2:04-cr-00199 (N.D. Ala. jury verdict entered June 10, 2005) (The company and corporate officials were convicted of illegally discharging process wastewater through storm drains into a nearby stream in violation of the Clean Water Act and of making false statements to the EPA to conceal the discharges. The company was sentenced to a $5 million fine and five years of probation.). and United States v. W.R. Grace, ²⁹434 F. Supp. 2d 879, D. Mont. (The company and several employees were indicted for violations of the Clean Air Act associated with the release of asbestos from a vermiculite mining operation. Many of the charges were dismissed before trial and no defendant was convicted.). are a hybrid of traditional “core” cases and the government’s stated effort to leverage existing environmental statutes to address worker safety concerns.

In the event of a major environmental incident, it should be anticipated that EPA-CID will initiate at least a preliminary criminal investigation into the causes and circumstances of the event. ³⁰Doug Parker, Environmental Enforcement, Panel at the American Bar Association’s Twenty-Ninth Annual White Collar Crime Conference (Mar. 4, 2015). To support this effort, EPA-CID is working on developing rapid response teams of subject matter experts to deploy to a variety of environmental incidents, from pipeline releases to refinery explosions. ³¹Id.

Logically, an increased emphasis on worker safety has led ECS and EPA-CID toward increased coordination and cooperation with OSHA. ³²See Deborah L. Harris, Achieving Worker Safety Through Environmental Crimes Prosecutions, United States Attorney’s Bulletin 58, 58 (July 2011). To this goal, ECS has provided training to hundreds of OSHA inspectors, informing them how to look for possible environmental violations when conducting safety inspections. The basic premise of this approach is the belief that companies with worker safety violations are more likely to have environmental violations. ³³Id.; see also Interview with Deborah Harris, Chief, ECS, infra. Such coordination increases the reach of EPA and ECS, allowing them to do more with fewer resources. Additionally, ECS has now received formal authorization to receive all referrals for criminal violations of the OSH Act, the Migrant and Seasonal Agricultural Worker Protection Act, and the Atomic Energy Act. ³⁴Alston & Bird LLP, Trends and Predictions for Environmental Enforcement in 2015 2 (Jan. 6, 2015), http://www.alston.com/Files/Publication/e2c65812-3f29-4ab8-b8a2-ae5d68bcb89f/Presentation/PublicationAttachment/db80a465-a5f1-4dad-9d80-aeb2844bdf48/G-15-048%20Trends%20and%20Predictions.pdf; see also Interview with Deborah Harris, Chief, ECS, infra. This may increase the likelihood of companies being investigated, and possibly prosecuted for environmental violations following an investigation for worker safety violations. ³⁵Deborah L. Harris, Achieving Worker Safety Through Environmental Crimes Prosecutions, United States Attorney’s Bulletin 58, 58 (July 2011).

With an increased focus on workplace-safety-related investigations, the government may be colliding with the safety-related missions of the National Transportation Safety Board and the U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board. ³⁶See Steven P. Solow and Anne M. Carpenter, The State of Environmental Criminal Enforcement: A Survey of Developments in 2013, Bloomberg Bna, Daily Environment Report, at 4-5 (Apr. 11, 2014); see 14 DEN 70, 04/11/2014. As noted in last year’s article, the criminal investigations of these incidents may, in certain circumstances, also risk undermining the efforts of federal safety agencies to perform their work. ³⁷Id.

In addition, the environmental statutory provisions used to enforce worker safety in the context of environmental incidents are the Clean Air Act’s General Duty Clause (“GDC”) and Risk Management Program, ³⁸42 U.S.C. §§7412(r)(1), 7412(r)(3); 40 C.F.R. §68.130, Tables 1- 4. as well as the act’s endangerment provisions, and Title 18 conspiracy charges. The GDC and Risk Management Program provisions, as described below, do not have the same level of statutory clarity as the pollution control measures that have made up the “core cases” brought in the past.

Clean Air Act General Duty Clause and Risk Management Provisiona

The GDC is designed to prevent and minimize the release of hazardous or extremely hazardous substances. ³⁹42 U.S.C. §7412(r)(1). It imposes a general duty to identify hazards, to take steps to prevent releases, and to take steps to mitigate the consequences of any release. ⁴⁰Id. EPA has released little guidance on compliance with the GDC, but the available guidance indicates that compliance with industry and government standards is the hallmark of establishing compliance with the GDC. ⁴¹Envtl. Prot. Agency, Guidance for Implementation of the General Duty Clause: Clean Air Act Section 112(r)(1), EPA 550-B00-002 (May 2000); EPA Office of Emergency Management, The General Duty Clause, EPA 550-F-09-002 (Mar. 2009). Because of the lack of clarity regarding the exact contours of the GDC, alleged violation of the GDC has not historically subjected a company to criminal prosecution. The GDC is, however, a potential source of criminal liability when no release to the ambient air has occurred because of the prophylactic nature of the provision. ⁴²In re Am. Acryl, N.A., L.L.C., No. CAA-06-2011-3302, at 4-5 (EPA ALJ June 2, 2011) (citing S. Rep. No. 101-228 (1989), reprinted in 1990 U.S.C.C.A.N. 3385, 3591) (the GDC objective is “prevention of accidental releases,” and “[s]ystems and measures which are effective in preventing accidents are preferable to those which are intended to minimize the consequences of a release”).

In conjunction with the GDC, the Risk Management provisions requires the development of a risk management plan (“RMP”) to prevent, detect, and correct accidental releases of hazardous substances for owners and operators of facilities that possess more than a threshold quantity of a hazardous or extremely hazardous substance. ⁴³42 U.S.C. §7412(r)(7)(B)(ii); 40 C.F.R. Part 68; Accidental Release Prevention Requirements, 61 Fed. Reg. 31,667, 31,672 (June 20, 1996). The RMP must include a process to analyze the potential effects of accidental release, an emergency response program, and procedures for mechanical integrity, management of change, process operation, incident investigation, and training. ⁴⁴Accidental Release Prevention Requirements, 61 Fed. Reg. 31,667, 31,672 (June 20, 1996); 42 U.S.C. §7412(r)(7)(B)(ii). EPA promulgated regulations setting forth the requirements of an RMP, which mirror the OSHA Process Safety Management (“PSM”) Regulations, with certain modifications to reflect EPA’s jurisdiction under the Clean Air Act. ⁴⁵See 40 C.F.R. Part 68; 61 Fed. Reg. 31672 (June 20, 1996).

The GDC imposes a broad compliance obligation on owners and operators of certain regulated substances, but neither the statute nor any implementing regulations clarify the scope or prescribe the requirements of this duty. ⁴⁶According to the EPA, the GDC is a “prophylactic measure, imposed upon all owners/operators of stationary sources who produce, process, handle or store ‘extremely hazardous substances,’ regardless of whether a ‘release’ has occurred and/or has directly caused injury or damage.”In re Am. Acryl, N.A., L.L.C., No. CAA-06-2011-3302 (EPA ALJ June 2, 2011) (citing S. Rep. No. 101-228 (1989), reprinted in 1990 U.S.C.C.A.N. 3385, 3591). Within the context of a GDC enforcement, due process would presumably require that prosecutors be able to establish that the conduct that would be a crime had been clearly disclosed such that a defendant had notice of the statute’s scope. ⁴⁷42 U.S.C. §7412(r)(1); see also, Bouie v. City of Columbia, 378 U.S. 347; United States v. Lanier, 520 U.S. 259 (as a general matter, due process bars courts from applying a novel construction of a criminal statute to conduct that neither the statute nor any prior judicial decision fairly disclosed to be within its scope, even if clarity “may be supplied by judicial gloss on an otherwise uncertain statute”); Kolender v. Lawson, 461 U.S. 352 (The void for vagueness doctrine requires a criminal statute to “define the criminal offense with sufficient definiteness that ordinary people can understand what conduct is prohibited and in a manner that does not encourage arbitrary and discriminatory enforcement.”). While there does not appear to have been any published criminal prosecutions of the GDC, there have been negotiated plea agreements for violations of the RMP and its implementing regulations, most notably United States v. BP Products North America Inc. ⁴⁸No. 4:07-cr-00434 (S.D. Tex. guilty plea entered March 12, 2009) On March 23, 2005, an explosion at the BP Texas City Refinery occurred after thousands of gallons of hydrocarbons were released from a “blowdown stack” during the startup of an unleaded gasoline refining unit called the Raffinate Splitter. See id. at Plea Agreement Statement of Facts (“SOF”). When the vapor reached an idling truck, it exploded. See id. Prior to the explosion, the Company had placed temporary trailers for contract employees only 150 feet from the blowdown stack. Id. ¶ 1. As a result of the blast, 15 contract workers were killed and more than 170 individuals were injured. Id. In March 2009, BP pleaded guilty to a one-count violation, under 42 U.S.C. §7413(c)(1), of 40 C.F.R. §§68.73(b) and 68.87(b)(2) (regulations promulgated under the Risk Management Program (RMP) provision). Section 68.73(b) requires that an “owner or operator shall establish and implement written procedures to maintain the on-going integrity of process equipment” and Section 68.87(b)(2) requires that an owner or operator must warn contractors working on or adjacent to a “covered process” of the “known potential fire, explosion, or toxic release hazards related to the contractor’s work and the process.”

Perhaps recognizing the legal constraints on enforcing ill-defined narrative standards criminally, in the three instances where DOJ has brought criminal charges based on a violation of RMP regulations, it has alleged clear-cut violations of those regulations. In United States v. BP Products North America Inc., for example, DOJ secured a guilty plea based on BP Products’ admitted failure “to establish and implement specific written instructions for operators and supervisors and to ensure that alarm systems and process safety components in the ISOM unit were operating correctly, see 40 C.F.R. §§ 68.69(a), 68.73(b).” ⁴⁹610 F. Supp. 2d 655, 2009 BL 50489, S.D. Tex.. Notably, in accepting the guilty plea over certain victims’ protests, the district court explained that, “[w]hen BP Products signed the plea agreement, it would have been the first company criminally convicted of knowing violations of the Risk Management Plan regulations of the Clean Air Act.” ⁵⁰Id. at 662. For these reasons, the District Court found that there were “risks to the government” if it was forced to go to trial, including the possibility that it might “not be able to prevail.” ⁵¹Id.

Similarly, in United States v. Hershey Creamery Co., DOJ charged Hershey Creamery Co. with one violation of the RMP—specifically, that the company failed to develop any RMP and then falsely certified to EPA that it had an RMP in place. ⁵²See Information at ¶¶  15-18, United States v. Hershey Creamery Co., No. 1:08-cr-00353 (M.D. Pa. Sept. 24, 2008), ECF No. 1. The company pleaded guilty based on these facts.

Finally, in United States v. Roberts Chemical Co., DOJ charged Roberts Chemical Co. with one violation of the requirements of the RMP based on allegations that the company had, among other things, failed to develop and implement any RMP. ⁵³Information at ¶  7, United States v. Roberts Chem. Co., No. 1:14-cr-00094 (D.R.I. July 21, 2014), ECF No. 1. As in Hershey Creamery, the company pleaded guilty based on these facts.

When the government has ventured beyond alleging violations of clear-cut requirements even outside the criminal context, it has faced enforcement difficulties. For example, in Secretary of Labor v. BP Products North America, Inc., the Secretary of Labor alleged that BP Products did not follow “recognized and generally accepted good engineering practice” when it failed to comply with certain recommended practices that called for “an inlet pressure drop of not more than 3%.” ⁵⁴No. 10-0637 (OSHRC directed for review Sept. 16, 2013). In a detailed decision, an administrative law judge noted that, during the PSM rulemaking, the department permitted employers “flexibility to achieve compliance by use of internal standards, as well as by adhering to industry codes and standards.” ⁵⁵Id. In the enforcement action before her, however, the ALJ explained that the Department of Labor was impermissibly trying to adopt a prescriptive standard: “By insisting compliance with §1910.119(d)(3)(ii) can only be achieved by following the 3% rule (which is not mandatory even under the cited codes), the Secretary has impermissibly adopted a prescriptive standard.” ⁵⁶Id. Because the secretary’s enforcement position would “improperly impose[] a requirement on employers not found in the cited standards,” the ALJ vacated the citation. ⁵⁷Id. at 18.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office did not charge BP Products criminally based on its alleged failure to implement the 3% rule, perhaps recognizing that, because this alleged failure did not constitute a clear-cut violation of the RMP regulations, it would have been inappropriate to charge BP Products criminally for such a violation.

Clean Air Act Endangerment Provisions

At first glance, the endangerment provisions of the Clean Air Act seem like a source of enforcement authority for worker safety obligations. However, by design, Congress provided limited protection to employees. The Act’s knowing endangerment provision provides felony liability for the knowing release of certain regulated substances into the ambient air, thereby knowingly placing another person in imminent danger of death or serious bodily harm at that time. ⁵⁸42 U.S.C. §7413(c)(5). The statute, however, provides as an affirmative defense that the release was “freely consented to by the person endangered” if it was a reasonably foreseeable hazard of an occupation, business, or profession. ⁵⁹42 U.S.C. §7413(c)(5)(C).

Additionally, under both the knowing and negligent endangerment provisions, the release must be to the ambient air. ⁶⁰42 U.S.C. §7413(c)(5)(A); 42 U.S.C. §7413(c)(4). “Ambient air” is defined as “that portion of the atmosphere, external to buildings, to which the general public has access.” ⁶¹40 C.F.R. §50.1(e). EPA has construed this definition to exclude the air over land that is blocked from public access by a fence. ⁶²See Hibbing Taconite Co., PSD Appeal No. 87-3, 5-6 (Envtl. Prot. Agency July 19, 1989), available at
http://www.epa.gov/ttn/nsr/psd1/pdf/p8_39.pdf. To use the endangerment provisions to enforce worker safety obligations, the prosecutor would be required to show that those endangered were outside the fence-line of the facility. However, if the government can make the requisite showing, a first offense of knowing endangerment is punishable by up to 15 years in prison and a fine under Title 18, ⁶³42 U.S.C. §7413(c)(5)(A). while a first offense of negligent endangerment is punishable by up to 1 year in prison and a fine under Title 18. ⁶⁴42 U.S.C. §7413(c)(4). The penalties for each double for a second offense. ⁶⁵42 U.S.C. §7413(c)(5)(A); 42 U.S.C. §7413(c)(4) .

Klein Conspiracy Charges

Another method of leveraging worker safety obligations in a criminal case is the use of the defraud prong of 18 U.S.C. §371, or so-called Klein conspiracy charges. The government can allege that a company violating worker safety obligations was engaged in a conspiracy to defraud the United States by obstructing the lawful functions of OSHA and EPA. ⁶⁶Deborah L. Harris, Achieving Worker Safety Through Environmental Crimes Prosecutions, United States Attorney’s Bulletin 58, 61 (July 2011). This would allow the government to prosecute both supervisors, as well as employers, and to combine environmental and worker safety violations in one indictment. ⁶⁷Id.

Attorney-Client Privilege and Reporting Obligations for Workplace Safety Incidents

By regulation, companies governed by OSHA’s PSM program are required to conduct an investigation of “each incident which resulted in, or could reasonably have resulted in a catastrophic release of highly hazardous chemical in the workplace.” ⁶⁸29 C.F.R. §1910.119(m). The investigation team is required to prepare a report including analysis of the “factors that contributed to the incident” and “recommendations resulting from the investigation.” ⁶⁹29 C.F.R. §1910.119(m)(4)(iv-v). Given the statute’s requirement that the report be shared with affected personnel, including contract employees, production of such a report would be inconsistent with the maintenance of the attorney-client privilege. ⁷⁰29 C.F.R. §1910.119(m)(6).

The approach most likely to protect the privilege is to carefully separate the privileged and regulatory investigations, creating separate teams for each. There is, however, support for the attorney-client privilege covering investigations conducted with a single team. On June 27, 2014, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit reversed a district court ruling finding that the attorney-client privilege did not apply to employee communications during an internal company investigation because the investigation was not conducted for the “primary purpose” of seeking legal advice. ⁷¹In re Kellogg Brown & Root, Inc., 756 F.3d 754, 2014 BL 180217, D.C. Cir.. The D.C. Circuit had held that, despite the fact that the investigation “was undertaken to comply with Department of Defense regulations that require defense contractors … to maintain compliance programs and conduct internal investigations into allegations of potential wrongdoing,” the investigation was still subject to the privilege. ⁷²Id. at 758. The D.C. Circuit found that the privilege will apply if “obtaining or providing legal advice was one of the significant purposes of the attorney-client communication.” ⁷³Id.

The D.C. Circuit’s opinion, however, has not been followed in other federal circuits. ⁷⁴See, e.g., Wultz v. Bank of China Ltd., No. 11-cv-1266, 2015 BL 17294 (S.D.N.Y. Jan. 21, 2015). Further, setting up a review to be covered by the privilege does not mean that the privilege will not subsequently be waived based on how information is shared. A recent decision from the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York found a waiver of the attorney-client and work-product protections when attorneys voluntarily shared direct quotes from interviews conducted under the attorney-client privilege with the SEC. ⁷⁵Gruss v. Zwirn, 296 F.R.D. 224, 2013 BL 366853, S.D.N.Y.. The court also held the voluntary sharing of the protected work product resulted in a waiver of protections for not only the interview memoranda generated as part of the investigation, but also the attorneys’ handwritten interview notes. ⁷⁶Id. at 229-30.

Trends in Environmental Crime: Prosecutions of Individual Corporate Officers

There has been some recent criticism regarding what has been characterized as the low number of individual prosecutions in connection with the investigation and prosecution of large corporate entities, ⁷⁷See generally Rena Steinzor, Why Not Jail? Industrial Catastrophes, Corporate Malfeasance, and Government Inaction, (2015). including by a sitting federal judge. ⁷⁸Jed S. Rakoff, The Financial Crisis: Why Have No High-Level Executives Been Prosecuted (2014), available at
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2014/jan/09/financialcrisis-why-no-executive-prosecutions/. Earlier this year, Professor Brandon Garrett of University of Virginia law school conducted an empirical analysis of this question and found that only 34 percent of the cases of corporate non-prosecution or deferred prosecution agreements resulted in individual criminal charges. ⁷⁹James B. Stewart, In Corporate Crimes, Individual Accountability is Elusive, N.Y. Times, Feb. 19, 2015, http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/20/business/

in-corporate-crimes-individual-accountability-is-elusive.html?smprod=nytcore-ipad&smid=nytcore-ipad-share&_r=0#. Meanwhile, DOJ officials have stressed that it is the policy of DOJ to pursue individual wrongdoers contributing to corporate crime. ⁸⁰Jonathan S. Feld & Kara B. Murphy, Corporate Cooperation: What it Now Means for Companies and Employees, Business Crimes Bulletin, Jan. 2015, at 1-2; see also U.S. Dep’t of Justice, United States Attorneys’ Manual 9-28.200 (2008) (stating “[p]rosecution of a corporation is not a substitute for the prosecution of criminally culpable individuals within or without the corporation.”); Interview with Deborah Harris, Chief, ECS, infra. In the context of environmental crime, however, there have been several high-profile prosecutions of both corporate employees and their corporations over the past several years, most notably in the context of the Deepwater Horizon incident.

Be Careful What you Say

It is well-known that what a person or company says or does in response to an investigation can be as much a source of liability as the underlying subject of the investigation. Recent case developments exhibit the hazards of making public statements in the wake of catastrophic incidents, particularly for individual corporate officials. An example of this liability is the indictment of former BP executive David Rainey for certain statements made to Congress regarding the volume of oil spilling from the Macondo well following the Deepwater Horizon incident in 2010. As discussed more fully below, Rainey testified before Congress that the best estimate of the flow was 5,000 barrels of oil per day (“bpd”) despite his alleged knowledge that the estimated rate of flow from the well was almost 20 times that volume. ⁸¹Indictment at 10, United States v. Rainey, No. 2:12-cr-00291-KDE-DEK (E.D. La. indictment filed Nov. 14, 2012). Significantly, Rainey’s liability with regard to the incident is predicated on these post-facto statements regarding the incident as opposed to any conduct leading to the incident itself.

A more recent example of criminal liability for statements made following a major environmental incident can be found in the indictment of Massey Energy CEO, Donald Blankenship. ⁸²Indictment at 41-42, United States v. Blankenship, No. 5:14-cr-00244 (S.D.W. Va. indictment filed Nov. 1, 2014). On April 5, 2010, an explosion at Massey Energy’s Upper Big Branch Mine (“UBB”) in West Virginia killed twenty-nine individuals. ⁸³Id. at 31. In the days following the incident, Blankenship issued statements on behalf of Massey Energy to shareholders that read “media reports suggesting that the UBB tragedy was the result of a willful disregard for safety regulations are completely unfounded.” ⁸⁴Id. at 32-33. Further, the statement read, “[w]e do not condone any violation of [Mine Safety and Health Administration] regulations, and we strive to be in compliance with all regulations at all times.” ⁸⁵Id. The indictment alleges that, beginning in April 2009, Blankenship received daily reports of mine safety violations at each of Massey Energy’s mines, which included the nature of the violations, the fines likely to be associated with those violations, and the most violated provisions for each mining group. ⁸⁶Id. at 15-17. The indictment also alleges that Blankenship was so focused on the production of coal from the UBB that he instructed an executive of the UBB to forgo required safety measures, including roof and wall supports, maintaining proper ventilation, and cleaning up combustible dust that built up on surfaces, each of which constitutes a violation of MSHA regulations. ⁸⁷Id. at 20-21. On the basis of his alleged knowledge, the indictment charges Blankenship with one count of false statements and one count of securities fraud for the public statements he made in the wake of the mine explosion. ⁸⁸Id. at 41-42.

BP Individual Prosecution Update

While the prosecutions against the corporations involved with the Deepwater Horizon incident have been resolved, most of the cases against individuals for crimes related to the incident or the incident response remain pending.

In this space last year, it was reported that Kurt Mix, a former engineer for BP, had been convicted of obstruction of justice for deleting text messages regarding the rate at which oil was spilling from the Macondo well. ⁸⁹See Steven P. Solow and Anne M. Carpenter, The State of Environmental Criminal Enforcement: A Survey of Developments in 2013, Bloomberg BNA Daily Environment Report, at 10 (Apr. 11, 2014). After the conviction, Mix’s attorneys interviewed members of the jury regarding their deliberations and discovered that one jury member overheard a statement in the elevator of the courthouse and later told other members of the jury that the statement caused her to lean toward voting guilty. ⁹⁰Id. at 4. The district court interviewed the jurors and found enough evidence to support a finding that the improper statement by the juror was conveyed to other jurors after the jurors were deadlocked on the verdict. ⁹¹Id. at 14. Thus, the court ordered a new trial because the jury did not render its verdict based “solely on the evidence and arguments presented in court.” ⁹²Id. at 29. The government has taken an interlocutory appeal from this order. ⁹³United States v. Mix, No. 2:12-cr-00171-SRD-SS (E.D. La. notice of appeal filed July 11, 2014).

Last year’s article also reported that the Rainey prosecution was stayed pending resolution of the government’s appeal to the Fifth Circuit of the district court’s dismissal of the count regarding obstruction of Congress (18 U.S.C. §1505). ⁹⁴United States v. Rainey, No. 2:12-cr-00291-KDE-DEK (E.D. La. order staying appeal Feb. 25, 2014). In 2012, Rainey was charged with one count of obstruction of Congress and one count of making false statements regarding the flow rate from the Macondo well. See Indictment at 12-13, United States v. Rainey, No. 2:12-cr-00291-KDE-DEK (E.D. La. indictment filed Nov. 14, 2012). On July 23, 2014, the Fifth Circuit issued an order reinstating the obstruction charge against Rainey. ⁹⁵Id. at 1. The district court had previously dismissed the charge finding that the indictment failed to charge an essential element of the offense, i.e. that Rainey knew of an inquiry or investigation being conducted by the relevant congressional subcommittee. ⁹⁶Order and Reasons at 20, United States v. Rainey, No. 2:12-cr-00291-KDE-DEK (E.D. La. order entered May 20, 2013) (“under section 1505, an indictment must allege the following essential elements: (1) that an inquiry or investigation [was] being had by either House, or any committee of either House or any joint committee of the Congress, (2) that the defendant knew of the pending inquiry or investigation; and (3) that the defendant corruptly … endeavor[ed] to influence, obstruct, or impede … the due and proper exercise of the power of inquiry under which [such] inquiry or investigation [was] being had” (internal citations omitted)). The district court also found that a reading of the statute based on the legislative history, as well as the application of the rule of lenity, did not include congressional subcommittees (the inquiry was conducted by the Subcommittee on Energy and Environment of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce). ⁹⁷Id. at 37. The Fifth Circuit, however, found that the indictment, as initially issued, alleged sufficient knowledge of the Subcommittee’s investigation, ⁹⁸Id. at 22. and that the statutory text is clear that a subcommittee of either house is included within “any committee of either House.” ⁹⁹Id. at 6, 18.

Finally, last year’s article reported that the case against Robert Kaluza and Donald Vidrine was stayed pending the outcome of the appeal of the district court’s dismissal of 11 counts of seaman’s manslaughter (18 U.S.C. §1115) against the men. ¹⁰⁰Steven P. Solow and Anne M. Carpenter, The State of Environmental Criminal Enforcement: A Survey of Developments in 2013, Bloomberg BNA Daily Environment Report, at 9 (Apr. 11, 2014). Liability under the statute covers “[e]very captain, engineer, pilot, or other person employed on any steamboat or vessel.” ¹⁰¹18 U.S.C. §1115 (‘‘[e]very captain, engineer, pilot, or other person employed on any steamboat or vessel, by whose misconduct, negligence, or inattention to his duties on such vessel the life of any person is destroyed … shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both.’’ On March 11, 2015, the Fifth Circuit affirmed the district court’s dismissal of counts finding that Kaluza and Vidrine, who both served as well-site leaders, were not covered by the phrase “other person employed” on the vessel. ¹⁰²United States v. Kaluza, 780 F.3d 647, 2015 BL 65703, 5th Cir..

Like the district court, the Fifth Circuit rejected the government’s argument that the plain meaning of the statutory language was clear, and applied ejusdem generis to determine the scope of the phrase. ¹⁰³Id. at 658, n. 29 (stating “[e]jusdem generis instructs that, where general words follow specific words in an enumeration describing a statute’s legal subject, the general words are construed to embrace only objects similar in nature to those objects enumerated by the preceding specific words.” (citations omitted)). Note that the Fifth Circuit declined to decide whether the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act (43 U.S.C. §1333(a)(1)) extends federal law (including seaman’s manslaughter) to the Outer Continental Shelf, where the drilling vessel was located, and found that a determination on this issue was not necessary because the court possessed subject matter jurisdiction under 43 U.S.C. §1349(b)(1). Section 1333 extends federal law to the subsoil, seabed and installations erected thereon, whereas 1349 provides jurisdiction over cases and controversies arising out of the operation of exploration and production activities from minerals in the soil and seabed. Thus, relying on the specific classes set forth in the statutory phrase, as well as the statute’s legislative history, the court concluded that the statute is limited to individuals involved in the “marine operations, maintenance, or navigation of the vessel.” ¹⁰⁴Id. at 661 (rejecting the government’s argument that, similar to a well site leader, a “captain, engineer, [or] pilot” were employed “in service of the vessel,” “in a position of authority or with a substantial degree of responsibility for the safety of the vessel,” or involved with the “operation, equipment, or navigation” of the vessel). Finally, citing to the recent Supreme Court case Yates v. United States, the court held that the district court did not err in applying the rule of lenity to resolve any remaining ambiguity in favor of the defendants. ¹⁰⁵Id. at 669, n. 105 (citing Yates v. United States, 135 S. Ct. 1074, 2015 BL 48342 (stating that legislative effect can clarify the meaning of statutes).

Significant Appellate Cases

Yates v. United States

The United States Supreme Court recently held that 18 U.S.C. §1519, the obstruction provision of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, did not apply to the destruction of undersized fish. ¹⁰⁶Yates v. United States, 135 S. Ct. 1074, 1079, 2015 BL 48342. John Yates, a commercial fisherman, was convicted of violating the provision, which subjects anyone who “knowingly alters, destroys, mutilates, conceals, covers up, falsifies or makes a false entry in any record, document, or tangible object” to a penalty of up to 20 years in prison. ¹⁰⁷Id. at 1078. During an inspection of Yates’ vessel, the Miss Katie, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission determined that ¹⁰⁸The officer of the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission was deputized to enforce federal law on behalf of the National Marine Fisheries Service. Id. 72 red grouper were below the regulated size of 20 inches. ¹⁰⁹Id. at 1079. The officer left the fish in a sealed container on the ship. ¹¹⁰Id. Four days later, upon re-inspection of the fish, the officer determined that the fish in the container were now above the sizes recorded upon inspection. ¹¹¹Id. at 1080. A crew member then informed the officer that he had thrown the undersized fish overboard and replaced them with slightly larger fish, at Yates direction. ¹¹²Id. Yates was sentenced to 30 days in prison and 3 years of supervised release as a result of the conviction. ¹¹³Id. at 1080–81

Upon review of the case, the Supreme Court found that “tangible object” under 18 U.S.C. §1519 is limited to those objects that are “used to record or preserve information.” ¹¹⁴Id. at 1088–89. This reading of the statute may well impact the use of this particular provision to many types of evidence found in environmental criminal cases. However, the limit will not have a large impact on prosecutions, given that there are similar restrictions in §1512(c) and separate criminal penalties in the environmental statutes for falsifying or tampering with monitoring devices or methods. ¹¹⁵See, e.g., 33 U.S.C. §1319(c)(4), 42 U.S.C. §7413(c)(2)(C).

United States v. Certified Environmental Services

The Second Circuit reversed the convictions of Certified Environmental Services Inc. (“CES”) and employees, Nicole Copeland and Elisa Dunn, for prosecutorial misconduct and improper exclusion of defendants’ evidence of their good-faith belief that their actions complied with state law. ¹¹⁶753 F.3d 72, 2014 BL 146749, 2d Cir.. The defendants were charged with conspiracy, violations of the asbestos National Emissions Standards for Hazardous Air Pollutants (“NESHAPs”), mail fraud, and false statements for allegedly falsifying final air sampling data after a “rip-and-run” asbestos removal. ¹¹⁷Id. at 83-84. Defendants alleged in their appeal that 1) the prosecutor had engaged in illegal bolstering of witness testimony and Brady violations for the failure to provide the defense with an EPA Agent’s handwritten interview notes in a timely manner, and 2) the judge improperly excluded correspondence between employees of the company and state regulators seeking clarification on monitoring required for the removal. ¹¹⁸Id. at 85-94.

The government conceded on appeal that during the opening and rebuttal closing statements, the prosecutor engaged in impermissible bolstering of an immunized witness, referenced facts not in evidence and referenced the consequences of a guilty verdict. ¹¹⁹Id. at 87-88, 95. The court found, however, that if a Brady violation did occur, the district court remedied any prejudice by permitting the defense to recall the EPA Agent to impeach his testimony with the interview notes. ¹²⁰Id. at 93.

The court also found that the exclusion of testimony and documentary evidence of communications between a CES air monitoring supervisor and a state Department of Labor employee regarding monitoring requirements was improper. ¹²¹Id. at 88-89. The government argued that the statements were inadmissible hearsay and that they were irrelevant. ¹²²Id. at 89. The court, however, found that the statements were not hearsay (as they were offered to prove defendants’ state of mind), the evidence was relevant under Federal Rule of Evidence 401, and it was an abuse of discretion to exclude the evidence. ¹²³Id. at 89-90.

United States v. Tonawanda Coke Corp.

Tonawanda Coke Corp., which was convicted in 2013 of Clean Air Act and RCRA violations, has appealed its conviction and sentence in the matter. ¹²⁴Brief of Appellant at 1, United States v. Tonawanda Coke Corp., No. 14-1091 (2d Cir. brief filed Mar. 3, 2015). The appeal addresses whether Tonawanda can be subject to criminal penalties for “actively managing” hazardous waste (coal tar sludge) placed in a tank by a previous owner prior to the wastes being classified as hazardous under RCRA. ¹²⁵Id. at 8-9. The company argues that the RCRA convictions must be overturned because the company lacked fair notice that the behavior was proscribed by the statute. ¹²⁶Id. at 2. The government alleges that Tonawanda actively managed the waste by covering the surface of the coal tar sludge with coke breeze, removing parts of tanks and disturbing the sludge, and removing sludge from around the tanks and placing it in the coal field. ¹²⁷Id. at 9. The government also previously presented testimony in the case that companies have an affirmative duty to investigate and address material in tanks on property that they acquire. Id. at 37. The defendant, however, asserts that the plain meaning of “active management” does not include the complained-of activities, and that EPA has never defined “active management” to specifically encompass those activities. ¹²⁸Id. at 34-35.

The appeal also addresses whether Tonawanda is subject to criminal penalties for the illegal disposal of coal tar sludge in the coal field, as they assert it was placed there for the purpose of recycling. ¹²⁹Id. at 38. Coke byproducts that are recycled are excluded from the definition of solid waste under a provision that “is conditioned on there being no land disposal of the wastes from the point they are generated to the point they are recycled to coke ovens or tar recovery or refining processes, or mixed with coal tar.” ¹³⁰40 C.F.R. §261.4(a)(10). The government asserts that Tonawanda’s process is not subject to the exclusion because it involved the placement of the coal tar in coal piles on the land, thus constituting “land disposal.” ¹³¹Brief of Appellant at 14, United States v. Tonawanda Coke Corp., No. 14-1091 (2d Cir. brief filed Mar. 3, 2015). Conversely, Tonawanda argues that the recycling process began when they placed the material on the coal piles (as opposed to in), and thus no “disposal” occurred. ¹³²Id. at 39.

In the appeal, Tonawanda also argues that the indictment improperly charged the illegal storage of hazardous waste, which occurred outside the statute of limitations. ¹³³Id. at 48. The district court has held that the illegal storage of hazardous waste constituted a continuing offense for which the statute of limitations does not begin to run until the last date of the illegal activity. ¹³⁴Id. The defendants argue that the concept of “active management” does not imply a continuing offense. ¹³⁵Id. at 53.

Finally, the defendants argue that the community service payments to fund evaluative studies of the impact of emissions from the facility on the surrounding community are not sufficiently tied to the offenses and interfere with ongoing state civil litigation. ¹³⁶Id. at 59, 66.

A decision in this case may have impacts on the scope of the definition of solid waste and of recycling exclusions. Further, the duties that attach to subsequent purchasers of land on which the previous owner stored hazardous wastes in tanks may be defined by this case.

Let’s Do The Numbers

As in prior years, DOJ ECS has assisted in the identification of relevant cases for the article’s review of criminal environmental cases in various stages of disposition. This year’s review covers 152 cases related to criminal violations of federal law involving pollution or degradation of air, water, or public lands (“pollution cases”). ¹³⁷This compares to 195 pollution cases tracked in various stages of disposition in 2013, and 247 in 2012. The authors also reviewed data on 112 cases related to criminal violations of federal wildlife protection laws such as the Lacey Act. Overall, 159 cases, including both pollution and wildlife cases, were charged in 2014. ¹³⁸This compares to 410 cases in 2013, and 385 cases in 2012.

The 264 cases tracked in 2014 involved 365 defendants, 253 of which were sentenced during the 2014 calendar year resulting in a combined total of over 134 years in prison, approximately $38.5 million in fines, and more than $28 million in restitution payments. Of the 365 defendants, 286 pleaded guilty and 27 proceeded to trial on their charges. Of the 27 defendants that stood trial, four were acquitted on all charges. ¹³⁹United States v. Bradley, No. 1:13-cr-20622-TLL-CEB (E.D. Mich. guilty verdict entered Dec. 2, 2014) (Co-defendant Gerald Essex was acquitted on charges under the CAA asbestos work practice standards.); United States v. Katzeek, No. 1:13-cr-00007-TMB (D. Alaska verdict entered Feb. 7, 2014) (John Katzeek, a big-game hunting guide, and his clients Brian Hicken, Kenneth Cox and Tyler Antal were acquitted on charges of conspiracy to violate and violations of the Lacey Act for hunting mountain goats without appropriate state authorizations; Katzeek was convicted on one count of violation of the Lacey Act for reporting false information to the state regarding the hunt and was sentenced to four years of probation and a $2,000 fine). For the remaining defendants, 10 had their charges dismissed, and 42 remain pending resolution.

Excluding wildlife cases, 17.5 percent of the defendants in the 2014 active pollution cases were located in Region 4 and 16.5 percent were located in Region 5. Regions 1, 7, and 8 had the lowest percentages of overall non-wildlife defendants with 3.8 percent, 2.4 percent, and 2.8 percent respectively.

Set forth below is a review of select parameters that appear to influence EPA’s enforcement decisions in relation to the criminal environmental cases. Cynthia Giles, the EPA Assistant Administrator for the Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance, has previously stated that the agency will target criminal enforcement efforts at cases that involve large or significant enterprises, death or serious injury, multiple locations, or cases impacting vulnerable populations. Using the data garnered from the environmental criminal cases tracked for 2014, excluding wildlife cases, we examine the number of corporate versus individual defendants and the nature of cases involving death or serious injury.

Corporate Defendants

Based on the data for 2014, a total of 60 defendants in federal criminal pollution cases were companies, while 151 were individuals. Corporate defendants, therefore, constituted 28 percent of total tracked defendants in 2014 pollution cases, similar to the 30 percent (71 defendants) seen in 2013. Of these 2014 corporate defendants, approximately 88 percent (53 defendants) were identified as privately owned, and 2 percent (1 defendant) was identified as publicly traded. This is compared to 2013, in which approximately 80 percent (64 defendants) of the corporate defendants were identified as privately owned, while approximately 14 percent (11 defendants) were identified as publicly traded.

Further, approximately 65 percent of the corporate defendants, or 39 companies, employed under 100 employees; approximately 13 percent of corporate defendants, or 8 companies, employed between 100 and 1,000 employees; and approximately 6 percent or 4 corporations, employed over 1,000 employees. This is compared to 2013, in which approximately 63 percent of the corporate defendants, or 50 companies, employed under 100 employees; approximately 7 percent of corporate defendants, or 6 companies, employed between 100 and 1,000 employees; and approximately 23 percent or 18 corporations, employed over 1,000 employees. Reliable information on this parameter was not available for 15 percent or 9 companies from our 2014 review, and 6 percent or 4 companies from our 2013 review.

Death or Serious Injury

Based on our 2013 survey, six pollution cases, involving seven defendants, addressed violations involving death or serious injury.

In United States v. Egan, et al., ¹⁴⁰No. 1:10-cr-00033 (N.D. Ill. guilty verdict entered June 9, 2014). the government indicted the captain of a petroleum barge, Dennis Michael Egan, as well as the corporate owner and operator of the barge, Egan Marine Corp., for seaman’s manslaughter under 18 U.S.C. §1115 in connection with a 2005 explosion on board the barge that killed Alexander Oliva and caused the release of oil into the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal. The barge was carrying clarified slurry oil, a petroleum refining byproduct. In preparation for offloading the clarified slurry oil, defendants directed Oliva to use an open flame from a propane-fueled torch to heat a cargo pump on the deck of the barge, in contravention of Coast Guard regulation. The flame ignited hydrocarbon vapors from the barge’s cargo tanks, causing the explosion that killed Oliva and damaged the barge, thereby allowing the release of the clarified slurry oil into the water. Both Egan and the company were convicted of seaman’s manslaughter and violation of the Clean Water Act, 33 U.S.C. §§1321(b)(3), 1319(c)(1)(A) and are awaiting sentencing.

In United States v. Myre, ¹⁴¹No. 3:14-cr-00027-CWD (D. Idaho sentence entered Aug. 19, 2014). the supervisor for Dakota Southern Railroad, John Myre, pleaded guilty to negligent endangerment under the Clean Air Act, 42 U.S.C. §§7412(b)(1), 7413(c)(4)), for the release of lead compounds into the ambient air as a result of his instruction that employees use acetylene torches to cut steel beams that were painted with lead paint. One employee was hospitalized with acute lead poisoning as a result, and the other workers were found to have high levels of lead in their bloodstreams. Myre was sentenced to three years of probation, a $3,000 fine, and $8,332.31 in restitution to the Idaho Industrial Commission and the facilities that treated the injured employee. He is also required to perform 90 hours of community service, and to attend and complete an OSHA class on safety standards involving lead paint.

Last year’s article discussed United States v. Port Arthur Chem. and Envtl. Servs., LLC, ¹⁴²No. 1:12-cr-00042-MAC-KFG (E.D. Tex. sentence entered Oct. 28, 2013). and United States v. Thomas, ¹⁴³No. 1:13-cr-00109-MAC-KFG (E.D. Tex. indictment entered Nov. 6, 2013). which involved the prosecution of a company and two of its executives for violations of RCRA, the Occupational Safety and Health Act, and Title 18 in connection with the transportation of hazardous wastewater tied to the death of two employees in December 2008 and April 2009. The company, Port Arthur Chemical and Environmental Services, recovered hydrogen sulfide for resale from spent caustics, which resulted in wastewater that had to be disposed of as a hazardous waste. Employees of the company were allegedly instructed to transport this waste without provision of personal protective equipment. Previously, in 2013, the company’s former president Matthew Bowman pleaded guilty to OSHA and false statement charges, and was sentenced to 12 months in prison, 12 months supervised release, and a $5,000 fine. In 2014, Ryan Christopher Thomas, the company’s former director of logistics, pleaded guilty to falsifying the hazardous waste manifests that accompanied the wastewater, in order to make the shipments appear non-hazardous. Thomas was sentenced to 12 months of probation and a $500 fine. The charges against the company were dismissed without prejudice in 2014.

In United States v. Pacific Gas & Electric, ¹⁴⁴No. 3:14-cr-00175-TEH (N.D. Cal. indictment entered Apr. 1, 2014). the company was indicted for violation of the Pipeline Safety Act, 49 U.S.C. §60123, for failing to properly inspect and repair natural gas pipelines. Deficiencies in one of the pipelines resulted in the San Bruno explosion on Sept. 9, 2010, that killed eight people and injured 58 others.

As noted above, the indictment of Donald Blankenship for conspiracy to violate mine safety regulations, conspiracy to defraud the Department of Labor and MSHA, false statements and securities fraud relate to the 2010 explosion at the Upper Big Branch Mine that took the lives of 29 miners. ¹⁴⁵No. 5:14-cr-00244 (S.D.W. Va. indictment entered Nov. 13, 2014).

Vulnerable Populations

In the EPA’s Plan EJ 2014, the agency sets forth a “roadmap for integrating environmental justice into its programs, policies, and activities.” ¹⁴⁶Envtl. Prot. Agency, EJ Plan 2014 at i, available at http://www.epa.gov/compliance/ej/resources/policy/plan-ej-2014/plan-ej-2011-09.pdf. The plan’s implementing steps for achieving this goal include a joint effort with DOJ “to benefit affected communities through use of community service [including environmental compliance plans] and the Crime Victims’ Rights Act (CVRA) in criminal actions.” ¹⁴⁷Id. at 67. In 2014, the resolution in 7 percent of pollution cases required the implementation of an environmental compliance plan, and 11 percent required the completion of community service hours. In two cases of note, the DOJ employed the act to leverage restitution to communities affected by defendants’ violations.

In United States v. Citgo Petroleum Corp., ¹⁴⁸No. 2:06-cr-00563 (S.D. Tex. sentence entered Feb. 5, 2014); No. 14-40128 (5th Cir. appeal filed Feb. 12, 2014). Citgo Petroleum Corp. and Citgo Refining & Chemicals Co., LP (collectively “Citgo defendants”) were convicted in 2007 of violation of the Clean Air Act for failing to operate an oil-water separator with required emission controls to prevent the release of benzene. Sentencing was postponed from 2007 to 2014 while the sides presented evidence for the court to consider in the determination of whether individuals in the affected community qualified as crime victims eligible for an award of restitution under the CVRA. The court ruled against awarding restitution because neither the community members nor the government could show a causal connection between the complained of injuries and the alleged exposure, ¹⁴⁹United States v. Petroleum Corp., No. 2:06-cr-00563, 2014 BL 121052 (S.D. Tex. Apr. 30, 2014). but sentenced the Citgo defendants to a combined $2,045,000 fine, which the companies have appealed. ¹⁵⁰No. 14-40128 (5th Cir. appeal filed Feb. 12, 2014).

As noted above, in United States v. Tonawanda Coke Corp., ¹⁵¹No. 1:10-cr-00219-WMS-HKS (W.D.N.Y. sentence entered Mar. 19, 2014). Tonawanda Coke Corp. was convicted of violation of the Clean Air Act and RCRA for emitting coke oven gas via a pressure relief valve (an emission source not reported in the facility’s Title V permit), operating quench towers without baffle systems, instructing an employee to conceal violations of the Title V permit when interviewed by EPA, storing benzene at the facility without a RCRA permit and spreading decanter tank tar sludge on a coal field without a RCRA permit. The government attempted to use the CVRA as a means to obtain restitution for the residents of the Tonawanda and Grand Island area, however, the court rejected this request because the residents are currently litigating the company’s liability for these issues in state court. ¹⁵²United States v. Tonawanda Coke Corp., 5 F. Supp. 3d 343, 2014 BL 71521, W.D.N.Y.. But the court did require the company to spend $12.2 million on evaluative studies of the impact of the emissions on the surrounding communities as a community service obligation. ¹⁵³United States v. Tonawanda Coke Corp., No. 1:10-cr-00219-WMS-HKS (W.D.N.Y. judgment entered Mar. 26, 2014). The company was also sentenced to 5 years of probation and a $12.5 million fine. The company has appealed the conviction and sentence.

Cases of Note for 2014

Like other sources, our data on environmental criminal cases may be incomplete. Our sources, among others, include the websites of EPA-CID and DOJ ECS, as well as Bloomberg BNA’s Daily Environment Report, and the always useful Environmental Crimes Blog of Walter James, accessible at http://www.environmentalblog.typepad.com. The cases listed below are in various stages of disposition and the information provided in each case summary reflects the status of the matter as of Dec. 31, 2014. Note that this year’s article excludes summaries of wildlife prosecutions.

Act to Prevent Pollution from Ships (“APPS”)/Vessel

1. United States v. Anselm, No. 5:13-cr-00262-GTS (N.D.N.Y. sentence entered May 5, 2014); No. 14-1755 (2d Cir. appeal filed May 13, 2014).

• Mark Anselm pleaded guilty to false statements, illegal possession and use of a falsified merchant marine license, and aggravated identity theft for illegally piloting the “Ronald J. Dahlke” without a merchant marine license in Lake Ontario, causing the vessel to run aground, and using the falsified merchant marine license to seek employment.
• Anselm was sentenced to 84 months in prison and 36 months of probation.
• Anselm has appealed the sentence.

2. United States v. Leuterio, No. 3:14-cr-00038-VLB (D. Conn. sentence entered May 23, 2014); United States v. Odjfell Asia II Pte. Ltd., No. 3:14-cr-00039-VLB (D. Conn. sentence entered May 23, 2014).

• Ramil Leuterio, second assistant engineer aboard the M/T Bow Lind, pleaded guilty to knowingly failing to maintain an accurate oil record book while in the Port of New Haven in November 2012.
• Odjfell Asia II Pte. Ltd., owner and operator of the M/T Bow Lind, pleaded guilty to the same charge and was sentenced to three years of probation, a $900,000 fine and $300,000 in community service payments. The company is also required to implement an environmental management plan.
• Leuterio was sentenced to three months in prison.

3. United States v. Arab Ship Mgmt. Ltd., No. 1:14-cr-00016-GMS (D. Del. sentence entered May 20, 2014).

• Arab Ship Management, Ltd., operator of the M/V Neameh, pleaded guilty to one count of knowingly failing to maintain an accurate oil record book. The violation was discovered during a Coast Guard inspection in the Delaware Bay because the 15 parts per million alarm sounded any time the oil water separator was turned on and the Coast Guard was presented with two oil record books with different information.
• The company was sentenced to two years of probation, a $375,000 fine and restitution of $125,000 to the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation. The company’s vessels are not permitted to call on U.S. ports for the duration of the probation.

4. United States v. Mercator Ship Mgmt., S.A., No. 1:14-cr-20195-MGC (S.D. Fla. sentence entered Oct. 8, 2014).

• Mercator Ship Management, S.A., operator of the M/V Caribbean Jade, pleaded guilty to two counts of knowingly failing to maintain an accurate oil record book for bypassing the oil water separator when making an overboard discharge and failing to properly record this in the oil record book.
• The company was sentenced to five years of probation and a $600,000 fine. The company is also required to implement an environmental compliance plan with oversight by an independent auditor.

5. United States v. Herm. Dauelsberg GmbH & Co. KG, No. 2:14-cr-00200-GW (C.D. Cal. sentence entered Apr. 24, 2014).

• Herm Dauelsberg GmbH & Co. KG, operator of the M/V Bellavia, pleaded guilty to one count of knowingly failing to maintain an accurate oil record book for bypassing the oil water separator and failing to record overboard discharges of approximately 120,000 gallons of oily bilge.
• The company also pleaded guilty to knowingly failing to report a hazardous condition on the vessel, namely a hull fracture of a fuel oil tank, which occurred nearly three years before the Coast Guard inspection.
• The company was sentenced to three years of probation, a $1,000,000 fine and a $250,000 community service payment to the Channel Islands Natural Resources Protection Fund.

6. United States v. Marquez, No. 1:14-cr-00034-GMS (D. Del. sentence entered July 21, 2014); United States v. Castano, No. 1:14-cr-00035-GMS (D. Del. sentence entered July 21, 2014); United States v. Pac. & Atl. (Shipmanagers) Inc., No. 1:14-cr-00036-GMS (D. Del. sentence entered July 24, 2014).

• Pacific & Atlantic (Shipmanagers) Inc., technical manager of the M/V Bulk Victory, pleaded guilty to one count of knowingly failing to maintain an accurate oil record book and one count of obstruction of justice for illegal discharges from the vessel made when the sample line of the oil water separator was closed, so as not to trigger the oil content monitor. On the date of the Coast Guard’s inspection the oil record book presented by crewmembers did not match the logs or automatic electronic records created when the oil water separator was used.
• Sofronio Guino Marquez, chief engineer on board the vessel, pleaded guilty to one count of knowingly failing to maintain an accurate oil record book for the illegal discharges. He was sentenced to two years of probation.
• Ismael Aguillon Castano, first engineer on board the vessel, who alerted the Coast Guard to the illegal discharges, pleaded guilty to one count of knowingly failing to maintain an accurate oil record book for the discharges. He was sentenced to one year of probation.
• The company was sentenced to three years of probation, a fine of $500,000 and the M/V Bulk Victory is banned from calling on U.S. ports during the probation.

7. United States v. Vidad, No. 1:14-cr-00505-CCB (D. Md. guilty plea entered Nov. 14, 2014).

• Noly Torato Vidad, Chief Engineer of the M/V Selene Leader, pleaded guilty to one count of knowingly failing to maintain an accurate oil record book and one count of obstruction of justice for tearing pages from tank logs, instructing other employees to lie to the Coast Guard, and lying to the Coast Guard.

8. United States v. Noble Drilling (U.S.) LLC, No. 3:14-cr-00114-RRB (D. Alaska sentence entered Dec. 19, 2014).

• Noble Drilling (U.S.) LLC, operator of the M/V Noble Discoverer and the Mobile Operated Drilling Unit Kulluk, pleaded guilty to five counts of knowingly failing to maintain an accurate oil record book for failing to record overboard discharges in the oil record books for both vessels. The company also pleaded guilty to one count of violating the Non-Indigenous Aquatic Nuisance Prevention & Control Act for failing to maintain ballast records and two counts of violating the Ports & Waterways Safety Act for operating the M/V Noble Discoverer with a damaged propulsion shaft.
• The company was sentenced to four years of probation, an $8.2 million fine and community service payments of $2.5 million to the International Arctic Research Center, $1 million to the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation and $500,000 to the Arctic Research Consortium of the United States. The company is also required to implement an environmental compliance plan with oversight by an independent auditor.

9. United States v. Carbofin, S.P.A., No. 8:14-cr-00500-VMC-TGW (M.D. Fla. guilty plea entered Dec. 9, 2014); United States v. Messore, No. 8:14-cr-00501-JDW-EAJ (M.D. Fla. guilty plea entered Dec. 10, 2014); United States v. Giano, No. 8:14-cr-00508-SDM-TGW (M.D. Fla. guilty plea entered Dec. 11, 2014).

• Carbofin, S.P.A, owner and operator of the M/T Marigola, pleaded guilty to three counts of failing to maintain an accurate oil record book for illegal overboard discharges of sludge and oil that were not recorded in the oil record book.
• Alessandro Enrico Messore, second assistant engineer aboard the vessel, and Carmelo Giano, chief engineer aboard the vessel, each pleaded guilty to one count of failing to maintain an accurate oil record book for the illegal discharges.

10. United States v. Marine Managers Ltd., No. 2:14-cr-00118-CJB-SS (E.D. La. sentence entered Oct. 2, 2014); United States v. Fafalios, No. 2:14-cr-00128-SRD-KWR (E.D. La. guilty verdict entered Dec. 16, 2014).

• Marine Managers Ltd., operator of the M/V Trident Navigator, pleaded guilty to failing to maintain an accurate oil record book, obstruction of justice for illegal overboard discharges from the vessel and for presenting a falsified oil record book to the Coast Guard.
• The company was sentenced to three years of probation, an $800,000 fine, a $100,000 community service payment to the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation and is required to retain a court-appointed monitor for the duration of probation.
• Matthaios Fafalios, chief engineer aboard the vessel, was convicted of one count each of failing to maintain an accurate oil record book, obstruction of justice and witness tampering for illegal overboard discharges, concealing tank logs from the Coast Guard and instructing subordinates to lie to the Coast Guard.

CWA/Water Cases

11. United States v. Mix, No. 2:12-cr-00171-SRD-SS (E.D. La. new trial ordered June 12, 2014).

• Kurt Mix, a former engineer for BP, was convicted of obstruction of justice for deleting text messages with his supervisor regarding the rate of oil released from the Macondo well, which were requested by authorities as part of the investigation into the incident.
• Mix was acquitted of a second count of obstruction for allegedly deleting other communications involving exchanges with his supervisor and a contractor.
• The district court ordered a new trial in the matter on June 12, 2014, on grounds of juror misconduct.

12. United States v. Badalamenti, No. 2:13-cr-00204-JCZ-SS (E.D. La. sentence entered Jan. 21, 2014).

• Anthony Badalamenti, former cementing technology director for Halliburton, pleaded guilty to destruction of evidence for personally directing subordinates to delete cementing computer simulations created during the company’s investigation of the spill.
• Badalamenti was sentenced to one year of probation, a $1,000 fine and 100 hours of community service.

13. United States v. Upstate Labs. Inc., No. 5:13-cr-00229-GTS (N.D.N.Y. sentence entered Jan. 8, 2014).

• Upstate Laboratories Inc. pleaded guilty to mail fraud for sending false laboratory reports to customers after receiving water and soil samples from the customers for analysis.
• The company was sentenced to five years of probation and a $150,000 fine.

14. United States v. Light, No. 2:13-cr-00208-EAS (S.D. Ohio sentence entered Mar. 11, 2014); United States v. Oxford Mining Co., No. 2:14-cr-00260-EAS (S.D. Ohio sentence entered Dec. 16, 2014).

• Roy Wayne Light pleaded guilty to making false statements for reporting on monthly operating reports that Oxford Resource Partners, LP, a coal supplier, was in compliance with permit limits for total suspended solids, iron and manganese, when Light knew that sampling results indicated violations of the applicable permit limits.
• Oxford Mining Co. pleaded guilty to the negligent discharge of pollutants in violation of the CWA for failure to oversee Light in his role as director of environmental compliance.
• Light was sentenced to 12 months of probation and a $5,000 fine.
• Oxford was sentenced to 12 months of probation, a $500,000 fine and $75,000 in community service payments to both the Ohio EPA and the National Park Foundation.

15. United States v. Barnett, No. 2:12-cr-00378-TC (D. Utah sentence entered Jan. 22, 2014).

• Slade Barnett, Jr., principal agent of the bio-diesel production company Denali Industries Inc., pleaded guilty to the knowing unpermitted discharge of a pollutant in connection with Barnett’s instruction of employees to discharge waste grease and oil into the Timpanogos Special Services District, and his subsequent false statements made to the District to conceal the discharges.
• Barnett was sentenced to 48 months of probation and $15,000 in restitution to the Timpanogos Special Services District, the city and a homeowners association.

16. United States v. Miller, No. 1:12-cr-00093-LG-RHW (S.D. Miss. dismissed Apr. 23, 2014); United States v. Miller, No. 1:13-cr-00091-LG-JMR (S.D. Miss. sentence entered Apr. 17, 2014).

• William “Rusty” Miller was charged with 10 counts of unpermitted filling of wetlands and one count of negligent discharge in violation of the CWA for filling wetlands without a permit from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and for draining large portions of property to lower the water table for development.
• The government later indicted Miller on one count of knowing unpermitted discharge of fill material in violation of the CWA. Miller pleaded guilty to this charge and the government dismissed the earlier indictment.
• Miller was sentenced to nine months in prison, 12 months of probation including six months of home confinement, a $15,000 fine and $19,246 in restitution to two individuals.

17. United States v. Brightwell, No. 1:13-cr-00315-JEB (D.D.C. sentence entered Sept. 23, 2014); United States v. B&P Envtl., LLC, No. 1:13-cr-00298-JEB (D.D.C. sentence entered Nov. 6, 2014); United States v. Anderson, No. 1:13-cr-00046-JEB (D.D.C. sentence entered Nov. 6, 2014).

• Patrick Brightwell was indicted for conspiracy, false statements, witness tampering and substantive CWA violations in connection with dumping waste generated as part of a waste removal project performed by B&P Environmental, LLC, for the National Park Service. Brightwell allegedly instructed employees to dump waste removed from sewer systems into a stormwater inlet that fed the Potomac River, fraudulently invoiced the National Park Service for the waste removal services and instructed employees to lie to investigators about the unpermitted discharges.
• Brightwell pleaded guilty to one count each of knowing unpermitted discharge and filing false claims and was sentenced to 10 months in prison, 36 months of probation and restitution in the amount of $270,667 to the Department of Interior Restoration Fund.
• The company pleaded guilty to a negligent unpermitted discharge for the same activities and was sentenced to 36 months of probation and a $20,000 fine.
• Earl Anderson, a driver for the company, pleaded guilty to a negligent unpermitted discharge for the same activity and was sentenced to 24 months of probation.

18. United States v. Lupo, No. 4:13-cr-00113-DCN (N.D. Ohio sentence entered Aug. 5, 2014); United States v. Goff, No. 4:14-cr-00111-DCN (N.D. Ohio sentence entered July 7, 2014).

• An oilfield waste disposal services company, Hardrock Excavating LLC, the company’s owner Ben Lupo and employee Michael Guesman were indicted for the knowing unpermitted discharge of a pollutant for the release of wastewater containing brine and drilling mud from a tank into a storm drain on several occasions between November 2012 and January 2013.
• Guesman pleaded guilty to the charge and was sentenced to three years of probation and 300 hours of community service.
• Lupo pleaded guilty to the charge and was sentenced to 28 months in prison and a $25,000 fine.
• Hardrock Excavating is scheduled for trial in 2015.
• Mark Goff, employee of Hardrock Excavating, pleaded guilty to the knowing discharge of waste liquids from oil and gas activities into a stormwater drain in violation of the CWA.
• Goff was sentenced to three years of probation and 300 hours of community service.

19. United States v. Egan, No. 1:10-cr-00033 (N.D. Ill. guilty verdict entered June 9, 2014).

• Dennis Michael Egan, the captain of petroleum barge EMC-423, and Egan Marine Corporation, the owner and operator of the barge, were convicted of negligent manslaughter for a 2005 explosion on board the barge that killed one employee and the negligent discharge of oil for the subsequent oil spill into the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal.
• Sentencing is scheduled for 2015.

20. United States v. French Gulch Nev. Mining Corp., No. 2:10-cr-00255-GEB (E.D. Cal. guilty plea entered Oct. 16, 2014).

• Kiedock Kim, mill superintendent of the French Gulch Mine, which was located partly on federal lands, pleaded guilty to one count of depredation of federal property and one count of negligent discharge in violation of the CWA. Kim ordered the discharge of liquid wastes from the mining operation that contained lead and arsenic into a leach field on the federal lands causing $107,160 in clean-up costs and also discharged tailings into a nearby creek from a pipe system.
• Outstanding charges remain against co-defendants French Gulch Nevada Mining Corporation, Bullion River Gold Corporation and President/CEO Peter Martin Kuhn.

21. United States v. NH Envtl. Grp. Inc., No. 2:11-cr-00177-PPS-PRC (N.D. Ind. sentence entered May 16, 2014); United States v. Holmes, No. 2:13-cr-00140-PPS-PRC (N.D. Ind. sentence entered March 14, 2014); United States v. NH Envtl. Grp. Inc., No. 2:13-cr-00141-PPS-PRC (N.D. Ind. sentence entered March 14, 2014); United States v. Grad, No. 2:10-cr-00126-JTM-APR (N.D. Ind. sentence entered May 22, 2014).

• Tierra Environmental and Industrial Services (“Tierra”), Tierra’s owner Ronald Holmes, and Tierra’s manager Stewart J. Roth were indicted for violations of the CWA stemming from unpermitted discharges of wastewater into the sewer system. According to the indictment, the defendants conspired to transport the wastewater to a closed facility owned by Holmes and discharged the wastewater directly from the closed facility into the sewer system.
• Roth pleaded guilty on April 13, 2012, to a knowing violation of the CWA and was sentenced to two years of probation and a $4,000 fine.
• Holmes pleaded guilty to a negligent violation of the CWA and was sentenced to four years of probation, a $30,000 fine and 100 hours of community service.
• The company also pleaded guilty to a negligent violation of the CWA and was sentenced to four years of probation, a $70,000 fine and restitution totaling $100,000 to the City of Hammond and the Hammond Sanitary District.
• Thomas Grad, operations manager for Tierra, pleaded guilty to a knowing violation of the CWA for his role in directing the illegal disposal and transporting the waste for illegal disposal. He was sentenced to one year of probation and a $1,000 fine.

22. United States v. Barber, No. 3:13-cr-05288-RJB (W.D. Wash. sentence entered Mar. 18, 2014).

• James Barber, the operator of a wastewater treatment facility in Mount Rainier National Park, was indicted for the negligent unpermitted discharge of pollutants in connection with his alleged bypass of the facility’s treatment system and the release of 200,000 gallons of sewage into the Nisqually River.
• After Barber withdrew a guilty plea in the initial filing, the government dismissed the charges against Barber and re-indicted Barber on a felony violation, for which Barber was convicted.
• Barber was sentenced on March 18, 2014, to 12 months of probation and a $15,000 fine.

23. United States v. Johnson, No. 2:13-cr-00270-SSV-KWR (E.D. La. sentence entered June 11, 2014); United States v. Hebert, No. 2:13-cr-00271-EEF-JCW (E.D. La. sentence entered Apr. 24, 2014).

• Leonard Johnson, supervisor of a company that performed toxicity tests on produced water from oil and gas operations in the Gulf, pleaded guilty to one count of false statements in violation of the CWA for providing false sample results to clients for use in Discharge Monitoring Reports (“DMRs”).
• Martha Hebert, owner of the company, pleaded guilty to misprision of a felony for failing to report and concealing Johnson’s illegal behavior.
• Johnson was sentenced to three years of probation, a $250 fine and is barred from being employed in produced water toxicity testing.
• Hebert was sentenced to two years of probation, a $10,000 fine and is barred from being employed in produced water toxicity testing for five years.

24. United States v. N. Pac. Seafoods, Inc., No. 3:14-cr-00011-RRB (D. Alaska sentence entered Mar. 11, 2014).

• North Pacific Seafoods, Inc., pleaded guilty to a negligent violation of the CWA for a release of 40 pounds of ammonia from the refrigeration system to the local publicly owned treatment works (“POTW”) that interfered with the proper operation of the POTW and caused an excess of pH limitations specified in the POTW’s NPDES permit.
• The company was sentenced to three years of probation, a $150,000 fine, restitution of $5,000 to the POTW and a $50,000 community service payment to the City of Kodiak. The company is also required to implement an environmental compliance plan.

25. United States v. Pullyblank, No. 3:13-cr-00198-TJM (N.D.N.Y. guilty plea entered Sept. 15, 2014); United States v. Clements, No. 3:14-cr-00331-TJM (N.D.N.Y. guilty plea entered Sept. 15, 2014).

• Mark Pullyblank, William Clements and Crane-Hogan Structural Systems were indicted for the unpermitted discharge of pollutants in connection with defendants’ hydro-demolition activities at parking garages, which allegedly removed layers of concrete and caused the release of concrete slurry into storm drains that feed the Susquehanna River.
• Pullyblank and Crane-Hogan Structural Systems each pleaded guilty to a knowing violation of the CWA for the discharges.
• Clements pleaded guilty to a negligent violation of the CWA for the discharges.

26. United States v. Mouton, No. 6:13-cr-00135-RTH-CMH (W.D. La. sentence entered Aug. 19, 2014).

• Robbie Mouton and his company Robbie’s Gauging Service were each charged with one count of negligent unpermitted discharge of produced water and crude oil into the Vermillion River.
• Mouton pleaded guilty to the charge and was sentenced to a $10,000 fine.
• The government dismissed the charge against the company.

27. United States v. Caldwell, No. 3:13-cr-05308-BHS (W.D. Wash. sentence entered Apr. 14, 2014); United States v. Dingus, No. 3:13-cr-05410-BHS (W.D. Wash. sentence entered Jan. 27, 2014).

• Ray Caldwell and All Out Sewer and Drain Service, Inc. (“All Out”) were charged with a knowing violation of the CWA, mail fraud and false statements for the unpermitted discharge of sewage and industrial waste from the company’s pumping business to a POTW, for records sent to the county that falsely reported the volume of sewage pumped to avoid surcharges and for false statements to investigators regarding the illegal discharges.
• Randy Dingus pleaded guilty to a knowing violation of a pretreatment standard for his role in pumping the sewage via a flexible hose into a covered portal.
• Caldwell and All Out were convicted on all counts after a bench trial.
• Caldwell was sentenced to 27 months in prison, three years of probation, a $250,000 fine jointly and severally with the company, and $689,216.28 in restitution jointly and severally with the company to the POTW, county and city.
• All Out was sentenced to three years of probation.
• Dingus was sentenced to 30 days in prison, one year of probation including 60 days of electronic monitoring, a $15,000 fine and is required to complete 40 hours of community service.

28. United States v. Luther, No. 7:14-cr-00004-F (E.D.N.C. guilty plea entered Sept. 29, 2014).

• David Wayne Luther pleaded guilty to a negligent violation of the CWA and a knowing violation of the Rivers and Harbors Act for “prop washing” in an effort to dredge a canal for the building of a docking facility in violation of the permit issued for the docking, which was occurring in a primary nursery area for oysters.

29. United States v. Procino, No. 1:13-cr-00081-RGA (D. Del. sentence entered Feb. 27, 2014).

• Procino Plating, Inc. pleaded guilty to the knowing discharge of electroplating process wastewater in violation of the facility’s industrial user permit, which authorized only the discharge of chemical etching process wastewater.
• Patrick Henry Procino also pleaded guilty to the storage of 450 gallons of hazardous waste at the facility without a permit.
• Procino Plating, Inc., was sentenced to five years of probation, and Procino was sentenced to one year of probation and a $50,000 fine.

30. United States v. Conopco, Inc., No. 3:13-cr-00223-RNC (D. Conn. sentence entered Apr. 3, 2014).

• Conopco, Inc., doing business as Unilever Home & Personal Care USA, pleaded guilty to a knowing violation of the CWA in connection with the bypass of the facility’s wastewater treatment system and the failure to timely notify the state environmental department of the bypass upon discovery.
• The company was sentenced on April 3, 2014, to 36 months of probation and a $1,000,000 fine.

31. United States v. Brad Foote Gear Works, Inc., No. 1:13-cr-00760 (N.D. Ill. sentence entered Feb. 19, 2014).

• Brad Foote Gear Works, Inc., pleaded guilty to the knowing unpermitted discharge of untreated etching process wastewater into a POTW on at least 300 occasions between 2007 and 2011.
• The company was sentenced on February 19, 2014, to a fine of $1.5 million.

32. United States v. Nadel & Gussman Rockies LLC, No. 2:13-cr-00211-ABJ (D. Wyo. sentence entered Jan. 31, 2014); United States v. Cartaya, No. 2:13-cr-00219-ABJ (D. Wyo. sentence entered Apr. 25, 2014).

• Nadel and Gussman Rockies, LLC, pleaded guilty to a negligent unpermitted discharge of 113 barrels of crude oil from a tank battery serving the company’s oil and gas production operation.
• Hugo Cartaya, a contractor to the company, pleaded guilty to one count of false statements on documents required under the CWA and one count of false statements for falsely reporting to the National Response Center, as well as agents for the Environmental Protection Agency and Bureau of Land Management, that he did not know the source of the oil spill.
• The company was sentenced to three years of probation, a $357,500 fine, $430,500 in restitution and $212,000 in community service payments to the Yellowstone Park Foundation and the Grand Teton National Park Foundation. The company is also required to implement a regulatory compliance plan.
• Cartaya was sentenced to three years of probation, a fine of $10,000 and 250 hours of community service.

33. United States v. Hidey, No. 1:13-cr-00462-PAG (N.D. Ohio sentence entered May 2, 2014).

• James Hidey, a rig manager for Great Plains Exploration, LLC, pleaded guilty to the unpermitted discharge of pollutants in connection with the release of brine from tanks on oil drilling sites into a sewer catch basin that fed Beecher Brook and led to the Chagrin River.
• Hidey was sentenced on May 1, 2014, to 24 months of probation and a $2,000 fine.

34. United States v. Bunnell, No. 1:13-cr-20863-KMM (S.D. Fla. sentence entered Feb. 25, 2014).

• Richard Bunnell pleaded guilty to two knowing violations of the Rivers and Harbors Act for building two docks in Key Biscayne without first obtaining a permit from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
• He was sentenced to five years of probation including six months home detention, a $175,000 fine and a $50,000 community service payment to the South Florida National Parks Trust.

35. United States v. Dies, No. 3:13-cr-00161-SDD-SCR (M.D. La. guilty plea entered Sept. 2, 2014).

• Roger J. Dies pleaded guilty to violation of the CWA and obstruction of justice in connection with the unpermitted discharge of wastewater to a local water treatment plant in violation of an industrial user permit held by Dies’ business Baton Rouge Tank Wash.

36. United States v. XS Platinum, Inc., No. 3:14-cr-00103-SLG-DMS (D. Alaska indictment entered Nov. 18, 2014).

• XS Platinum, Inc., Bruce Butcher (chief executive officer), Mark Balfour (executive vice president), Robert Pate (general manager), James Slade (chief operating officer) and James Staeheli (plant operator) were indicted for conspiracy to violate the CWA, substantive violations of the CWA and false statements for alleged unpermitted discharges from the company’s platinum mine.

37. United States v. Witt-Hird, No. 2:14-cr-00216 (S.D.W. Va. guilty plea entered Nov. 13, 2014).

• Bonita Witt-Hird, an employee of a wastewater treatment plant engineering firm, pleaded guilty to one count of false statements on documents required under the CWA for submitting, to the state, approximately 80 DMRs that contained falsified sampling data on behalf of clients.

38. United States v. Capano, No. 1:14-cr-00053-SLR, (D. Del. indictment entered Sept. 23, 2014).

• Joseph Capano and his company, Riverbend Community LLC, were charged with conspiracy to violate the CWA for allegedly engaging in earth-moving activities in a wetland and continuing such operations after receiving a cease-and-desist order from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Capano was also charged with three counts of false statements for allegedly lying to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers regarding the status of construction activity.

39. United States v. Xplor Energy SPV-1, Inc., No. 2:14-cr-00202-SSV-KWR (E.D. La. guilty plea entered Nov. 18, 2014).

• Xplor Energy SPV-1, Inc. pleaded guilty to one count of knowing unpermitted discharge in violation of the CWA for discharges of produced water from an offshore drilling platform operated by the company.

40. United States v. Shelton, No. 5:14-cr-00189 (S.D.W. Va. guilty plea entered Oct. 9, 2014).

• John W. Shelton, an employee of a laboratory testing company, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to violate the CWA for tampering with water samples required for reporting under the CWA. Shelton admitted to diluting samples, substituting samples and failing to comply with preservation and transportation requirements for the water samples.

41. United States v. Trans Energy, Inc., No. 5:14-cr-00043-JPB-JES (N.D.W. Va. guilty plea entered Oct. 1, 2014).

• Trans Energy, Inc., an oil and gas drilling operator, pleaded guilty to three counts of the negligent discharge of fill material into waters of the United States in violation of the CWA. The defendant admitted to the discharges in connection with the construction of impoundments for use in hydraulic fracturing operations.

42. United States v. Faria, No. 3:14-cr-00149-AWT (D. Conn. guilty plea entered July 8, 2014).

• Thomas H. Faria, president of an over-the-counter pharmaceutical manufacturer, pleaded guilty to the knowing discharge of a pollutant without an industrial pretreatment permit between 1986 and July 2011. Faria admitted knowing that the facility lacked the required permit.

43. United States v. White, No. 1:14-cr-00225-BYP (N.D. Ohio guilty plea entered Sept. 3, 2014).

• The Kelly Plating Co. and the facility’s pretreatment operator, Thomas White, each pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to violate the CWA and one count of knowing violation of the CWA for bypassing the pretreatment system at the facility between January 2012 and May 2012.

44. United States v. Williams, No. 1:14-cr-00087-WMS (W.D.N.Y. sentence entered Sept. 3, 2014).

• Leo Williams, owner of Lycoming Construction Services, pleaded guilty to the negligent discharge of water used for dust suppression into waters of the United States in violation of the CWA.
• Williams was sentenced to one year of probation and a $25,000 fine.
• See also United States v. Lycoming Constr. Servs., LLC, No. 1:14-cr-00040-WMS (W.D.N.Y. sentence entered Sept. 3, 2014), infra.

45. United States v. Colfax Treating Co., No. 1:14-cr-00110-DDD-JDK (W.D. La. sentence entered July 31, 2014).

• Colfax Treating Co., a wood treating facility, pleaded guilty to negligent violation of a pretreatment standard for exceeding the daily limit for pentachlorophenol in June 2008.
• The company was sentenced to a $15,000 fine.

46. United States v. Waste Mgmt. of Haw., Inc., No. 1:14-cr-00468-SOM-BMK (D. Haw. indictment entered Apr. 30, 2014).

• Waste Management of Hawaii, Inc., Joseph R. Whelan (general manager) and Justin H. Lottig (environmental protection manager) were indicted for conspiracy, false statements and a knowing discharge in violation of the CWA in connection with changes to the company’s stormwater diversion system from an expansion of the facility that allegedly resulted in the discharge of raw sewage and the intermingling of storm water with solid waste.

47. United States v. Cent. Feeders, Inc., No. 4:14-cr-03042-RGK-CRZ (D. Neb. sentence entered June 5, 2014).

• Central Feeders, Inc., operator of a concentrated animal feeding operation, pleaded guilty to negligent discharge of livestock waste in violation of the CWA between April 2011 and April 2012.
• The company was sentenced to three years of probation and a $20,000 fine.

48. United States v. Powell, No. 9:14-cr-00020-JCL (D. Mont. sentence entered July 9, 2014).

• Brent Powell, owner of B.P. Cattle Company, pleaded guilty to the negligent discharge of dredge material into a water of the United States in violation of the CWA between August 2009 and March 2010 after having received a cease-and-desist order from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
• Powell was sentenced to three years of probation and a $20,000 fine.

49. United States v. Kearney, No. 6:14-cr-03022-MDH (W.D. Mo. guilty plea entered Dec. 2, 2014).

• Earl Kearney, operator of a wastewater treatment facility, pleaded guilty to two negligent violations of the CWA for falsifying the sampling results for phosphorus in wastewater that was discharged between May 2010 and August 2011.
• As part of the plea agreement, Kearney agreed to never work in wastewater treatment again.

50. United States v. Vaughan, No. 9:14-cr-00009-DWM (D. Mont. guilty plea entered Sept. 17, 2014).

• James Leslie Vaughan pleaded guilty to one count of the knowing discharge of domestic sewage sludge in violation of the CWA for applying sewage sludge to land as a method of disposal without keeping the required records.

51. United States v. Farrell, No. 2:14-cr-00264 (S.D.W. Va. indictment entered Dec. 17, 2014); United States v. Freedom Indus., Inc., No. 2:14-cr-00275 (S.D.W. Va. indictment entered Dec. 17, 2014).

• Owners of Freedom Industries, Inc., Dennis Farrell, William Tis and Charles Herzing, and company chief operating operator Gary Southern were indicted for their alleged roles in the release of 4-methylcyclohexane from a tank into the Elk River in January 2014 that resulted in a “do not use” water advisory being issued to approximately 300,000 residents. The charges include negligent discharge in violation of the CWA, violation of the Rivers and Harbors Act for the discharge of refuse and negligent violation of a NPDES permit. Southern also faces charges for a scheme to defraud in the bankruptcy case.
• Under separate indictment, the company faces charges for negligent discharge in violation of the CWA, violation of the Rivers and Harbors Act for the discharge of refuse and negligent violation of a NPDES permit.

52. United States v. Luquin, No. 3:14-cr-00394-MDD (S.D. Cal. sentence entered July 24, 2014).

• Jorge Luquin, production manager of Pacific Tank Cleaning, Inc., pleaded guilty to one count of the negligent discharge of tank cleaning fluid in violation of the CWA.
• He was sentenced to three years of probation and a $5,000 fine.
• See also United States v. Pac. Tank Cleaning, Inc., No. 3:14-cr-00395-H (S.D. Cal. sentence entered May 27. 2014) infra.

53. United States v. Matson Terminals, Inc., No. 1:14-cr-00911-RLP (D. Haw. guilty plea entered Oct. 21, 2014).

• Matson Terminals, Inc., pleaded guilty to two counts of violating the Rivers and Harbors Act for discharging approximately 233,000 gallons of molasses into Honolulu Harbor while loading the molasses into ships in September 2013.

54. United States v. Calvo, No. 1:14-cr-20883-JEM (S.D. Fla. indictment entered Dec. 3, 2014).

• Jose Miguel Calvo was indicted for violation of the Rivers and Harbors Act for allegedly constructing docks on four homes without obtaining a valid permit from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

Safe Drinking Water Act (“SDWA”)

55. United States v. Stinson, No. 1:12-cr-00012-JHM-HBB (W.D. Ky. sentence entered Jan. 16, 2014).

• Charles L. Stinson and Ralph Dowell, operators of Logsdon Valley Oil Co., pleaded guilty to conspiracy to violate the SDWA for injecting produced water from oil wells into sinkholes without a permit.
• Stinson and Dowell were each sentenced to two years of probation. Stinson was also sentenced to pay a $45,000 fine.
• Logsdon Valley Oil pleaded guilty to violation of the SDWA for the same activities and was sentenced to two years of probation and a $45,000 fine.

56. United States v. Garcia, No. 4:13-cr-00400-DW (W.D. Mo. sentence entered Nov. 24, 2014).

• Manuel Garcia pleaded guilty to false information under Title 18 for communicating a threat to contaminate the water supplies of Kansas City and St. Louis, Mo., as well as Wichita and Topeka, Kan.
• Garcia was sentenced to 24 months in prison, three years of probation and is subject to a curfew.

57. United States v. Wright, No. 1:14-cr-00007-DSC (W.D. Pa. sentence entered Dec. 22, 2014).

• Ronald Wright, a contractor to ARG Resources for the plugging of abandoned underground injection control wells, pleaded guilty to one count of false statements under Title 18 for falsely certifying that the well plugging had been conducted properly.
• Wright was sentenced to six months in prison, three years of probation, including one year of home detention, and $236,524.73 in restitution to his employer, S&T Services & Supply, Inc.

58. United States v. Glamis Dunes Storage, Inc., No. 3:14-cr-01766-WQH (S.D. Cal. guilty plea entered Nov. 19, 2014).

• Glamis Dunes Storage, Inc., a company that operated a storage yard for RVs, and owner, Michael Jay Mamelli Sr., each pleaded guilty to one count of unlawful injection of pollutants in violation of the SDWA for pumping sewage and gray water from an RV holding tank on the property into a leach field and underground septic tanks without a permit. The defendants continued to pump the waste into the underground septic tanks and the leach field after receiving a cease-and-desist order from the county.

59. United States v. Garber, No. 1:14-cr-00114-DLH (D.N.D. guilty plea entered June 16, 2014).

• Nathan Garber pleaded guilty to conspiracy, four counts of violation of the SDWA, two counts of false statements and three counts of obstruction of justice for his role in operating an underground injection well for produced water disposal that failed required mechanical integrity tests.
• Specifically, the defendant attempted to conceal pipe joints that would indicate the packer had been moved, lied about the depth of the packer and allowed injection of produced water into the well when injections were ordered to be stopped by the state agency.

Clean Air Act - Asbestos

60. United States v. Firm Build, Inc., No. 1:10-cr-00285-LJO (E.D. Cal. sentence entered Apr. 8, 2014).

• Patrick Bowman, president of Firm Build, Inc., Rudolph Buendia, III, a construction project site supervisor for the company, and Joseph Cuellar, an administrative manager for the company, each pleaded guilty in 2013 to one count of violation of the asbestos work practice standards for their roles in failing to properly dispose of asbestos waste material that was removed by high school students employed by the company.
• Bowman was sentenced to 27 months in prison, three years of probation and $1,801,832.50 in restitution to the employees jointly and severally with co-defendants.
• Buendia was sentenced to 24 months in prison and three years of probation.
• Cuellar moved to withdraw his guilty plea, and charges against the company are still pending.

61. United States v. Johnson Contracting of WNY, Inc., No. 1:11-cr-00241-RJA-JJM (W.D.N.Y. sentence entered Nov. 6, 2014).

• The following individuals and companies were indicted in 2011 for a scheme to falsely claim that asbestos abatement had been completed at a renovated apartment building:

i. Johnson Contracting of WNY, Inc., and Ernest and Rai Johnson were responsible for the renovation and abatement of asbestos in the building but allegedly failed to remove all of the asbestos and falsely reported that the abatement was complete.

ii. JMD Environmental, Inc. and employees, Evan Harnden, Henry Hawkins, Brian Scott and Chris Coseglia were responsible for inspecting the building and allegedly falsely certified that the abatement was complete.

iii. Government employees Donald Grziebielucha, William Manuszewski and Theodore Lehmann were also responsible for certifying that the abatement was complete but allegedly falsified this certification.

• Coseglia and Scott each pleaded guilty to one count of being an accessory after the fact to false statements and were each sentenced to one year of probation.
• Ernest and Rai Johnson, as well as Harnden, each pleaded guilty to one count of violation of the asbestos work practice standards. Harnden was sentenced to one year of probation, Ernest Johnson was sentenced to two years of probation and Rai Johnson was sentenced to time served and two years of probation.
• Grziebielucha, Manuszewski and Lehmann each pleaded guilty to negligent endangerment and were sentenced to one year of probation.
• Hawkins was sentenced to one year of probation in connection with his 2012 plea to four counts of being an accessory after the fact to false statements.
• Charges against JMD Environmental and Johnson Contracting were dismissed on motion of the government.

62. United States v. Smith, No. 2:11-cr-00082-JRG-HBG (E.D. Tenn. guilty plea entered May 2, 2014).

• Mark Sawyer pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to violate the CAA asbestos work practice standards for salvage and demolition operations that failed to remove all asbestos-containing material from a facility, failed to wet-remove asbestos and failed to properly handle asbestos when it was lowered to a disposal location.
• Co-defendants Newell Smith, Armida Di Santi, Milto Di Santi and Eric Gruenberg previously pleaded guilty to the same charge.

63. United States v. Mills, No. 8:12-cr-00125-TJM (N.D.N.Y. sentence entered Sept. 8, 2014).

• John Mills, owner of a construction company, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy and two counts of failure to notify of a release of a reportable quantity of asbestos. Terrance Allen, the company’s maintenance supervisor, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy and one count of failure to notify of a release of a reportable quantity of asbestos.
• The defendants were alleged to have instructed employees to remove asbestos from the basement of a building without proper training, protective equipment or supervision, and to have disposed of the asbestos waste improperly. In return for their guilty pleas, the government dismissed charges for violation of the asbestos work practice standards and false statements.
• Mills was sentenced to 21 months in prison, two years of probation, a fine of $25,000 and 100 hours of community service.
• Allen was sentenced to 21 months in prison, two years of probation, and 100 hours of community service.

64. United States v. Califco, LLC, No. 3:13-cr-00131-D (N.D. Tex. sentence entered Feb. 27, 2014).

• Califco, LLC, and Jonathan Isaac Shokrian pleaded guilty to failure to notify of the intent to remove asbestos from a facility in connection with abatement work directed by Shokrian, on behalf of Califco, which was performed by day laborers without adequate personal protective equipment and included the removal of floor tile mastic with gasoline, leading to an evacuation of nearby residences.
• Califco was sentenced to five years of probation and a $500,000 fine.
• Shokrian was sentenced to 12 months and one day in prison and a $25,000 fine.

65. United States v. Mayer, No. 3:13-cr-00242-JGC (N.D. Ohio sentence entered Jan. 27, 2014).

• John Mayer and Timothy Bayes were indicted for the improper disposal of asbestos in violation of the CAA in connection with salvage operations in a warehouse boiler room that contained pipes wrapped in asbestos insulation. Mayer oversaw the removal of the insulation without proper wetting and hired Bayes to dispose of the asbestos material, which Bayes dumped at three locations in Toledo.
• Mayer pleaded guilty to the knowing failure to notify of the removal, failure to wet the asbestos material, failure to have a trained on-site representative present during removal and failure to properly dispose of asbestos material. Mayer was sentenced to 12 months and one day in prison, 24 months of probation and a $2,000 fine.
• Bayes pleaded guilty to improper disposal of asbestos and was sentenced to 24 months of probation and a $5,000 fine.

66. United States v. Braswell, No. 4:13-cr-00375-RBH (D.S.C. sentence entered May 21, 2014).

• David Braswell and Cool Cote, Inc., were indicted for violation of the asbestos work practice standards for conducting renovation activities at a condo complex without testing for asbestos. Both defendants allegedly knew of the presence of asbestos before ordering employees to pressure wash the building. Braswell allegedly lied to EPA agents regarding his knowledge of the presence of asbestos.
• Braswell pleaded guilty to one count of violating the asbestos work practice standards and was sentenced to six months in prison, three years of probation, including six months of electronic monitoring, and a $10,000 fine.
• Charges against the company were dismissed by the government.

67. United States v. Bradley, No. 1:13-cr-20622-TLL-CEB (E.D. Mich. guilty verdict entered Dec. 2, 2014).

• Roy Bradley Sr., and Gerald Essex were each indicted on four counts of violation of the CAA asbestos work practice standards for renovation activities that allegedly failed to remove all asbestos-containing material before demolition, allegedly failed to properly handle and dispose of asbestos material and allegedly failed to have a person on site trained in asbestos abatement practices.
• Co-defendant Rodolfo Rodriguez was indicted on one count of making false statements during his grand jury testimony regarding the activities above.
• Essex was acquitted of all charges, but Bradley was convicted on all counts.
• Rodriguez pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 21 months in prison followed by 12 months of probation.

68. United States v. Xu, No. 2:13-cr-00311-TSZ (W.D. Wash. sentence entered Mar. 13, 2014); United States v. Yoo, No. 2:13-cr-00306-TSZ (W.D. Wash. sentence entered Mar. 20, 2014).

• Longwell Company, company president Stanley Xu and Tae Jun Yoo, owner of a construction company, each pleaded guilty to one count of violating the asbestos work practice standards for ordering the removal of, and removing, popcorn ceilings containing asbestos in an apartment complex without following the proper procedure or testing for asbestos prior to removal.
• Xu was sentenced to 15 months in prison, three years of probation, including three months of electronic monitoring, a fine of $159,850 jointly and severally with the company and restitution of $75,000 to the National Environmental Education Foundation jointly and severally with the company.
• Longwell Company was additionally sentenced to three years of probation.
• Yoo was sentenced to three months in prison and three years of probation, including three months of electronic monitoring.

69. United States v. Avery, No. 2:13-cr-00129-HCM-LRL (E.D. Va. sentence entered Jan. 28, 2014).

• Billy J. Avery pleaded guilty to one count of knowingly violating the CAA asbestos work practice standards in connection with abatement work performed by Avery and his company EC&C Environmental, which included the improper bagging, removal and disposal of asbestos waste in roll-off dumpsters that were located on a property leased by Avery’s other company, S.E.A. Solutions, Inc. Avery admitted to storing the asbestos material on site for approximately six months and to storing additional asbestos material in a storage unit at an apartment complex.
• Avery was sentenced to five months in prison, 36 months of probation and a $2,000 fine.

70. United States v. Farmer, No. 8:13-cr-00938-CRI (D.S.C. sentence entered Aug. 19, 2014).

• Scott William Farmer was indicted on eight counts of knowingly violating the CAA asbestos work practice standards and one count of knowing endangerment in connection with demolition operations that were conducted after an inspection by the state agency allegedly alerted Farmer to the presence of asbestos, and allegedly included the failure to conduct an asbestos inspection prior to a salvage operation, to notify the state agency of the operation, to use workers trained in the asbestos abatement, to provide workers with personal protective equipment, to direct employees to properly wet asbestos material prior to removal and to dispose of asbestos material at a waste disposal facility licensed to receive asbestos.
• Farmer pleaded guilty to the charge of knowing endangerment in violation of the CAA and was sentenced to 41 months in prison and 36 months of probation.

71. United States v. Bakshi, No. 2:14-cr-00456-PD (E.D. Pa. indictment entered Aug. 26, 2014).

• Ronen Bakshi, a licensed air project inspector, was indicted on one count of obstruction of justice and one count of wire fraud for allegedly falsifying air sampling data from a church site where he was responsible for overseeing asbestos abatement and entries in a log book describing work he witnessed and for which he billed a nonprofit corporation.

72. United States v. Gattarello, No. 1:14-cr-00353-DCN (N.D. Ohio indictment entered Oct. 1, 2014).

• Christopher Gattarello, owner of a garbage-hauling business, and Robert Shaw Sr., an individual responsible for financial transactions of the company, were indicted for their role in an alleged scheme to defraud a company by selling fake accounts receivable.
• Gattarello and William Jackson Jr., owner of a demolition company for which Gattarello’s company hauled debris, were charged with violation of the CAA for allegedly failing to remove asbestos before conducting demolition activities and failing to properly dispose of asbestos-containing debris.

73. United States v. Lycoming Constr. Servs., LLC, No. 1:14-cr-00040-WMS (W.D.N.Y. sentence entered Sept. 3, 2014).

• Lycoming Construction Services, LLC, pleaded guilty to one count of violation of asbestos work practice standards for failing to appropriately wet asbestos material during removal.
• The company was sentenced to two years of probation, a $100,000 fine and is required to implement a training program on environmental statutes and regulations.
• See also
  United States v. Williams, No. 1:14-cr-00087-WMS (W.D.N.Y. sentence entered Sept. 3, 2014), supra.

74. United States v. Thrower, No. 3:14-cr-03485-H (S.D. Cal. guilty plea entered Dec. 3, 2014).

• Lachele Rene Thrower pleaded guilty to one count of false statements for falsely certifying to the EPA that individuals had received asbestos abatement training.

Clean Air Act - CFC

75. United States v. Williams, No. 2:13-cr-20854-RHC-RSW (E.D. Mich. sentence entered Oct. 24, 2014).

• Terry Williams pleaded guilty to one count of violation of the CAA for releasing refrigerants from HVAC units during scrapping of the units and one count of violation of the CAA asbestos work practice standards for failing to wet asbestos containing material stripped from pipes.
• Williams was sentenced to 27 months in prison and 24 months of probation.

76. United States v. eAir, LLC, No. 1:14-cr-20392-CMA (S.D. Fla. sentence entered June 20, 2014).

• eAir, LLC, pleaded guilty to one count of violation of the CAA for selling refrigeration components that were pre-charged with HCFC-22 in violation of a ban on selling such components in the United States.
• The company was sentenced to five years of probation, a $200,000 fine, a $75,000 community service payment to the Southern Environmental Enforcement Training Fund and reimbursement to Customs and Boarder Protection for the storage and handling of remaining refrigeration components that cannot be sold. The company is also required to implement an environmental compliance plan and hire an independent auditor to conduct annual financial audits.

77. United States v. Eldridge, No. 2:14-cr-00119-JLG-EPD (S.D. Ohio sentence entered Nov. 7, 2014).

• Martin C. Eldridge III, pleaded guilty to violation of the CAA for releasing HCFC-22 into the atmosphere while stealing air conditioning units for the copper parts.
• Eldridge was sentenced to 21 months and 20 days in prison, three years of probation and is required to perform 200 hours of community service.

Clean Air Act

78. United States v. Citgo Petroleum Corp., No. 2:06-cr-00563 (S.D. Tex. sentence entered Feb. 5, 2014); No. 14-40128 (5th Cir. appeal filed Feb. 12, 2014).

• Citgo Petroleum Corp. and Citgo Refining & Chemicals Co. (“Citgo Refining”) were convicted in 2007 of violating the CAA for failing to operate an oil-water separator with required emission controls to prevent the release of benzene. Citgo Refining was also convicted of violating the Migratory Bird Treaty Act for the taking of migratory birds by the tank, which did not have a fixed or floating roof.
• Sentencing was delayed until 2014 while the court determined whether people in the neighborhood qualified as crime victims for an award of restitution.
• Citgo Petroleum Corp. was sentenced to a $1 million fine.
• Citgo Refining was sentenced to a fine of $1,045,000.
• The defendants appealed the sentence. The government initially appealed the failure to award restitution but subsequently moved to dismiss the appeal.

79. United States v. Awan, No. 3:12-cr-00079-FDW (W.D.N.C. sentence entered Jan. 22, 2014).

• Mohammad Hafeez Awan pleaded guilty to conspiracy to violate the CAA for submitting false vehicle emissions inspections between 2010 and December 2011.
• Awan was sentenced to six months in prison, three years of probation, including six months home confinement, a $1,000 fine and 50 hours of community service.

80. United States v. Smith, No. 5:12-cr-00193-F (E.D.N.C. sentence entered Sept. 3, 2014).

• Milton Smith, an emissions inspector, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to violate the CAA and false statements for falsely certifying that 329 vehicles had passed emissions inspections.
• Smith was sentenced to three years of probation.

81. United States v. Matthews, No. 5:12-cr-00263-F (E.D.N.C. sentence entered Sept. 3, 2014).

• Clinton Matthews, an emissions inspector, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to violate the CAA and false statements for falsely certifying that 135 vehicles had passed emissions inspections.
• Matthews was sentenced to three years of probation and a fine of $1,300.

82. United States v. Salmeron, No. 3:12-cr-00261-MOC (W.D.N.C. sentence entered Apr. 3, 2014).

• Pedro Salmeron pleaded guilty to conspiracy to violate the CAA for submitting false vehicle emissions inspections in 2011.
• Salmeron was sentenced to two months in prison, two years of probation, including four months home confinement, a $5,000 fine and 50 hours of community service.

83. United States v. Batista, No. 2:13-cr-00090-LDG-VCF (D. Nev. sentence entered Aug. 6, 2014); United States v. Batista, No. 2:13-cr-00091-APG-GWF (D. Nev. sentence entered May 1, 2014).

• Vehicle emissions inspectors Henry Alberto Batista and Luis Rafael Batista pleaded guilty to making false statements for the submission of false emissions inspections to the Nevada Department of Motor Vehicles between March 2008 and August 2010.
• Henry Alberto Batista was sentenced to six months in prison and three years of probation, including six months home confinement.
• Luis Rafael Batista was sentenced to time served, three years of probation, including four months home confinement, and 40 hours of community service.

84. United States v. Castro, No. 1:13-cr-00229-WO (M.D.N.C. sentence entered Jan. 23, 2014).

• Gonzalo Castro, pleaded guilty to false statements under the CAA for falsely certifying that vehicles had passed emissions inspections.
• Castro was sentenced to one year of probation and a $2,500 fine.

85. United States v. Johnson, No. 3:13-cr-00257-M (N.D. Tex. sentence entered Aug. 18, 2014); No. 14-10966 (5th Cir. appeal filed Aug. 28, 2014).

• Michael Johnson pleaded guilty to one count of wire fraud and one count of false statements on records required under the CAA for operating a scheme to provide false vehicle testing data for U.S. distributors of foreign-made vehicles between 2008 and 2012.
• Johnson was sentenced to 28 months in prison, two years of probation and $354,529 in restitution to the victims of the fraud. He has appealed the sentence.

86. United States v. Jariv, No. 2:14-cr-00006-APG-GWF (D. Nev. guilty plea entered July 22, 2014).

• James Jariv and Natan Stoliar were indicted for conspiracy, money laundering, wire fraud, false statements under the CAA and obstruction of justice for operating a number of businesses engaged in a scheme to sell RIN credits without producing the required biodiesel between 2009 and 2013.
• Stoliar pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy, one count of money laundering, two counts of wire fraud and one count of making false statements under the CAA.

87. United States v. Myre, No. 3:14-cr-00027-CWD (D. Idaho sentence entered Aug. 19, 2014).

• John Myre, supervisor for Dakota Southern Railroad, pleaded guilty to one count of negligent endangerment for releasing lead compounds in connection with his instruction of employees to use acetylene torches to cut steel beams that were painted with lead paint. One employee was hospitalized with acute lead poisoning as a result.
• Myre was sentenced to three years of probation, a $3,000 fine and $8,332.31 in restitution to the Idaho Industrial Commission and the facilities that treated the injured employee. He is also required to perform 90 hours of community service.

88. United States v. Marietta Indus. Enters., Inc., No. 2:13-cr-00252-ALM (S.D. Ohio sentence entered Mar. 28, 2014).

• Marietta Industrial Enterprises, Inc., pleaded guilty to the failure to notify the state environmental agency that a baghouse fan for the company’s medium carbon crushing line had been turned off in violation of the facility’s Title V permit.
• William Scott Elliot, president of the company, pleaded guilty to being an accessory after the fact to the failure to notify the state for his submission of compliance reports that did not indicate the fan was turned off.
• The company was sentenced to 36 months of probation and a fine of $37,500.
• Elliott was sentenced to 12 months of probation and a fine of $5,000.

89. United States v. Ducey, No. 1:13-cr-00189-SEB-TAB (S.D. Ind. guilty plea entered July 29, 2014).

• Craig Ducey, Chad Ducey, Chris Ducey, Joseph Furando, Evelyn Katirina Pattison and Jeffrey Wilson, and their companies, E-Biofuels, LLC (“E-Biofuels”), Caravan Trading Co. and Cima Green, LLC, were indicted for conspiring to sell biofuel they fraudulently claimed to have produced. The defendants used the RIN credits associated with biofuel produced by one company and resold the RIN credits under the name of another company.
• Pattison pleaded guilty to the charge of conspiracy.

90. United States v. Barnes, No. 1:13-cr-00098-TCB-LTW (N.D. Ga. sentence entered Jan. 10, 2014).

• Vehicle emissions inspectors Jerome Clarence Barnes Jr., Seretha Franklin, Ieka Jones and Jared Walker were indicted for conspiracy and violating the CAA in connection with the issuance of false vehicle emissions certificates.
• Barnes, who previously had inspection stations shut down for similar conduct, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and was sentenced to 54 months in prison followed by 36 months of probation.
• Franklin, Jones and Walker each pleaded guilty to one count of violating the CAA. Franklin was sentenced to 36 months of probation and Walker was sentenced to six months in prison followed by 12 months of probation. Jones was sentenced to four months in prison and 12 months of probation.

91. United States v. Tonawanda Coke Corp., No. 1:10-cr-00219-WMS-HKS (W.D.N.Y. sentence entered Mar. 19, 2014).

• Tonawanda Coke Corp., a coke facility, and Mark Kamholz, the facility’s manager of environmental control, were convicted of violating the CAA and Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (“RCRA”) for emitting coke oven gas via a pressure relief valve (an emission source not reported in the facility’s Title V permit), operating quench towers without baffle systems, instructing an employee to conceal violations of the Title V permit when interviewed by EPA, storing benzene at the facility without a RCRA permit and spreading decanter tank tar sludge on a coal field without a RCRA permit.
• Tonawanda Coke was sentenced to five years of probation, a $12.5 million fine and community service projects worth $12.2 million. The company has appealed the conviction and sentence.
• Kamholz was sentenced to 12 months and one day in prison, 12 months of probation, a fine of $20,000, 100 hours of community service and is banned from holding a job where he is responsible for environmental compliance.

92. United States v. Tier NY, LLC, No. 1:14-mj-02096-HBS (W.D.N.Y. guilty plea entered Oct. 28, 2014).

• Tier NY, LLC, pleaded guilty to negligent endangerment for the release of hydrochloric acid gas from the company’s facility while cleaning RCRA-empty vessels in June 2013.

93. United States v. Calumite Co., No. 2:14-cr-00086-JTM-PRC (N.D. Ind. guilty plea entered Aug. 29, 2014).

• Calumite Co. pleaded guilty to two counts of false statements on records required under the CAA for falsely reporting that the differential pressure gauge on the baghouse produced readings in the normal range when the gauge was actually broken and for failing to report the broken gauge.

94. United States v. Beigh, No. 3:14-cr-00065-RRB (D. Alaska sentence entered Nov. 25, 2014); United States v. Morales, No. 3:14-cr-00067-RRB (D. Alaska sentence entered Nov. 12, 2014); United States v. Hampton, No. 3:14-cr-00068-RRB (D. Alaska sentence entered Nov. 12, 2014).

• Bryan Beigh, operator of the powerhouse at the Dutch Harbor facility of Westward Seafoods, pleaded guilty to tampering with a monitoring method required under the CAA for using a magnet and drill to spin the numbers on required water meters to match those reported to the state.
• Raul Morales, powerhouse supervisor at the facility, pleaded guilty to one count of false statements for falsifying the water usage information on reports required under the CAA.
• James Hampton, assistant chief engineer for the powerhouse, pleaded guilty to one count of false statements for showing an EPA inspector the falsified water meter logs and failing to tell the inspector that the system was not being operated as required.
• Beigh was sentenced to three years of probation and a $750 fine.
• Morales was sentenced to 45 days in prison, one year of probation and a $1,000 fine.
• Hampton was sentenced to 70 days in prison, one year of probation and a $1,000 fine.

95. United States v. Roberts Chem. Co., No. 1:14-cr-00094-M-LDA (D.R.I. sentence entered Oct. 6, 2014).

• Roberts Chemical Company, Inc. pleaded guilty to knowingly failing to develop and implement a Risk Management Plan as required under the CAA because the company stored a reportable quantity of ethyl ether.
• The company was sentenced to 5 years of probation, a $200,000 fine, and was required to run a public apology ad in the Providence Journal.

96. United States v. Rivkin, No. 4:14-cr-00250 (S.D. Tex. indictment entered June 19, 2014).

• Philip Joseph Rivkin was indicted for mail fraud, wire fraud, false statements under the CAA and money-laundering for the operation of several businesses that allegedly engaged in fraudulent RIN transactions with renewable fuels that were never manufactured.

Resource Conservation and Recovery Act

97. United States v. McDonald, No. 2:09-cr-00656-SDW (D.N.J. sentence entered Mar. 3, 2014).

• Gordon McDonald, John Bennett and James Haas Jr., were indicted for fraud, conspiracy, money laundering, bid-rigging, filing false tax returns and obstruction of justice in connection with a scheme to rig contracting bids for the remediation of a Superfund site (Federal Creosote).
• Haas pleaded guilty and was sentenced in 2010 to 33 months in prison, three years of supervised release, a $30,000 fine and $53,049.57 in restitution to the EPA Superfund Program.
• McDonald was convicted and sentenced to 168 months in prison, one year of probation, a fine of $50,000 and restitution of $4,304,491.47 jointly and severally with numerous defendants.

98. United States v. We Lend More, Inc., No. 3:11-cr-03327-MMA (S.D. Cal. sentence entered Sept. 2, 2014).

• Raul Gonzalez-Lopez pleaded guilty for his role in transporting and dumping two seven-pound containers of potassium cyanide and one gallon of nitric acid at a landfill.
• Marc Vogel, owner of We Lend More Inc., and the company were convicted in 2012 for the illegal transportation and disposal.
• Vogel and We Lend More, Inc. were each sentenced on June 26, 2012 to three years of probation and Vogel was additionally sentenced to a fine of $25,000.
• Gonzalez-Lopez was sentenced in 2014 to time served.

99. United States v. Lewis, No. 5:12-cr-00077-CAR-CHW (M.D. Ga. sentence entered Mar. 20, 2014).

• Robert Lewis, owner of a waste hauling business, pleaded guilty to one count of illegal storage of hazardous waste for storing hazardous waste in a storage unit facility rather than disposing of the waste.
• Lewis was sentenced to 10 months in prison and two years of probation.

100. United States v. Z-Group, LLC, No. 4:13-cr-00420-BCW (W.D. Mo. guilty plea entered Dec. 10, 2013).

• Z-Group LLC, pleaded guilty to the illegal transportation of hazardous waste for the failure to provide manifests for hazardous waste shipments from the company’s facility to a disposal facility not authorized to receive hazardous waste.
• The company was sentenced to a $50,000 fine and $36,871.32 in restitution to the EPA.

101. United States v. Thomas, No. 1:13-cr-00109-MAC-KFG (E.D. Tex. sentence entered July 14, 2014).

• Ryan Christopher Thomas, the director of logistics for Port Arthur Chemical and Environmental Services LLC (indicted separately), was indicted for allegedly creating shipping manifests indicating that wastewater from the company originated from a different facility.
• Shipments are alleged to have caused the death of two employees in December 2008 and April 2009.
• Thomas pleaded guilty to making false statements and was sentenced to 12 months of probation and a $500 fine.

102. United States v. Cobb, No. 2:13-cr-00019-JPB-JSK (N.D.W. Va. sentence entered Feb. 19, 2014).

• Brian Cobb pleaded guilty to violating RCRA for making false statements about transporting, without a manifest, soil that he knew had tested positive for a high concentration of lead and for representing to the state environmental agency that the soil had not tested positive and was properly transported.
• Cobb was sentenced to 24 months in prison and 36 months of probation.

103. United States v. Action Mfg. Co., No. 2:14-cr-00224-NIQA (E.D. Pa. sentence entered Aug. 27, 2014).

• Action Manufacturing Co. pleaded guilty to violating RCRA for storing 4,570 M608 Explosive Leads without a permit and for transporting military grade explosives without the proper hazardous material paperwork required by Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (“PHMSA”) regulations.
• The company was sentenced to five years of probation and a fine of $1.2 million.

104. United States v. Harcros Chems., Inc., No. 2:14-cr-20070-CM-DJW (D. Kan. sentence entered Sept. 25, 2014).

• Harcros Chemicals Inc., was convicted of violating RCRA for storing hazardous waste without a permit, including methyl methacrylate and ethylenediamine, at laboratory sites owned by the company for more than two years.
• The company was sentenced to two years of probation and a fine of $1.5 million.

105. United States v. Leading Edge Aviation Servs., Inc., No. 4:14-cr-00121-GHD-JMV (N.D. Miss. sentence entered Nov. 4, 2014).

• Leading Edge Aviation Services Inc., pleaded guilty to violating RCRA for storing hazardous waste without a permit for 42 days longer than is permissible.
• The company was sentenced to one year of probation and a fine of $700,000.

Toxic Substances Control Act (“TSCA”)

106. United States v. Pass, No. 7:12-cr-00085-D (E.D.N.C. sentence entered July 17, 2014); No. 14-4626 (4th Cir. appeal filed Aug. 13, 2014).

• Benjamin Franklin Pass and P&W Waste Oil Services Inc., pleaded guilty to violating TSCA for handling and attempting to dilute PCB-contaminated transformer oil without a permit, wire fraud for representing the oil was uncontaminated and then selling it to customers, and false statements for falsely certifying that employees of the company had received Hazardous Waste Operations and Emergency Response training.
• Pass was sentenced to 42 months in prison, three years of probation and $21,912,000.38 in restitution jointly and severally with the company. Pass has appealed the judgment.
• The company was sentenced to five years of probation and is required to develop and implement an environmental compliance plan.

107. United States v. Crevier, No. 1:13-cr-00118-LM (D.N.H. sentence entered Mar. 5, 2014).

• Linda Crevier, owner of several multi-family properties, pleaded guilty to violating TSCA for failing to provide lead warning statements to residents of those properties despite having records that the properties contained lead-based paint.
• Crevier was sentenced to three years of probation, a $1,000 fine and is required to take out an ad in newspapers describing the case and the hazards of lead paint.

108. United States v. Shimshoni, No. 8:13-cr-00355-JSM-TGW (M.D. Fla. sentence entered Nov. 13, 2014); No. 14-15295 (11th Cir. appeal filed Nov. 24, 2014).

• Michael Moshe Shimshoni was indicted on four counts for failing to provide required lead paint hazard warning notices and information to tenants of apartments that he managed and two counts of falsification of records for creating backdated disclosure notices.
• Shimshoni pleaded guilty to one count of failing to provide the required lead paint hazard information and was sentenced to two years of probation, a $2,500 fine, $50,000 in restitution to the EPA and 50 hours of community service. Shimshoni has appealed the sentence.

Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act

109. United States v. Pac. Tank Cleaning, Inc., No. 3:14-cr-00395-H (S.D. Cal. sentence entered May 27, 2014).

• Pacific Tank Cleaning Inc., a company engaged in the business of cleaning industrial tanks and totes, pleaded guilty to one count of failing to notify the appropriate agency when the company released a reportable quantity of corrosive tank cleaning fluid.
• The company was sentenced to three years of probation, a $50,000 fine and $11,238.60 in restitution to the San Diego County Department of Environmental Health Services.
• See also United States v. Luquin, No. 3:14-cr-00394-MDD (S.D. Cal. sentence entered July 24, 2014), supra.

110. United States v. Owyhee Constr. Inc., No. 3:14-cr-00044-EJL (D. Idaho sentence entered May 21, 2014).

• Owyhee Construction Inc., a company engaged in renovating water lines, pleaded guilty to one count of failing to report the release of a reportable quantity of asbestos. Employees of the company cut, crushed and disposed of cement asbestos pipe in sites unpermitted to receive asbestos.
• The company was sentenced to three years of probation, a $100,000 fine and up to $2.5 million in restitution to the EPA for clean-up of the disposal sites. The company was further ordered to implement a compliance and ethics program.

Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act (“FIFRA”)

111. United States v. Villasenor, No. 1:12-cr-00184-AWI-BAM (E.D. Cal. sentence entered July 28, 2014); No. 14-10552 (9th Cir. appeal filed Dec. 16, 2014); United States v. Charles, No. 1:12-cr-00221-LJO-SKO (E.D. Cal. sentence entered Sept. 15, 2014).

• Hernan Cortez Villasenor pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to distribute marijuana and one count of distribution of an unregistered pesticide in conjunction with a marijuana grow operation conducted on federal lands with co-defendants. Villasenor was sentenced to 120 months in prison, five years of probation and $3,328.33 in restitution to the United States Forest Service jointly and severally with co-defendants. He has appealed the judgment.
• Jose Luis Garcia Villa pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to distribute marijuana for his role in the operation. He was sentenced to 46 months in prison.
• Alfonso Cornejo had previously pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to distribute marijuana for his role in the operation and was sentenced to 46 months in prison.
• Marcelina Botello Charles pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to distribute marijuana and one count of distribution of an unregistered pesticide for his role and was sentenced to 50 months in prison, five years of probation and $4,294.33 in restitution.
• Julio Cesar Cornejo pleaded guilty to distribution of an unregistered pesticide, Fosfuro de Zinc (an unregistered rat poison), and possession of a firearm for his role in the operation. He was sentenced to 72 months in prison, 60 months of probation and $4,294.33 in restitution.
• Charges against co-defendants David Arreola and Homero Pacheco Rivera are still pending.

112. United States v. Kieser, No. 2:12-cr-20072-JES-DGB (C.D. Ill. guilty verdict entered Oct. 31, 2014).

• Carl Kieser was convicted by a jury of three counts of mail fraud and one count of illegal use of a registered pesticide for selling a product called Pond Clear Plus that was created by mixing Diuron 80F that was not approved for use on water, and marketing the product as a natural way to clear pond algae and weeds.

113. United States v. Murray, No. 5:13-cr-00068-MTT-CHW (M.D. Ga. sentence entered Aug. 27, 2014).

• Steven A. Murray and Bio-Tech Management Inc. (“Bio-Tech”) pleaded guilty to conspiracy to violate FIFRA, false statements, mail fraud and application of pesticides in a manner inconsistent with the label in connection with the application of the pesticide Termidor indoors and more than twice per year (both in contravention of the labeling).
• Murray was sentenced to 24 months in prison, one year of probation and a $7,500 fine.
• Bio-Tech was sentenced to three years of probation and a $50,000 fine.

114. United States v. New Nautical Coatings, Inc., No. 1:14-cr-20081-UU (S.D. Fla. sentence entered Dec. 5, 2014).

• New Nautical Coatings Inc. (“New Nautical”), Sea Hawk Refinish Line Inc., Erik Norrie (CEO of the companies) and David Norrie (president of the companies) pleaded guilty to conspiracy for the illegal distribution of the unregistered pesticide, Biocop.
• Tommy Craft, national sales manager of New Nautical, and Jason Revie, vice president of New Nautical, each pleaded guilty to one count of illegal use of pesticides for their role in the distribution.
• New Nautical was sentenced to three years of probation, a fine of $1,235,315 and is required to implement a compliance program with oversight by an independent auditor.
• Sea Hawk Refinish Line Inc., was sentenced to one year of probation.
• Erik Norrie was sentenced to three months in prison and one year of probation.
• David Norrie was sentenced to five months in prison and three years of probation.
• Craft and Revie were each sentenced to one year of probation.

115. United States v. Eldridge, No. 1:14-cr-00117-JAW (D. Me. guilty plea entered Nov. 19, 2014).

• Clyde Eldridge pleaded guilty to one count of false statements for lying to EPA agents regarding whether he tracked to whom he sold the pesticide cypermethrin and how much he sold to each customer.

116. United States v. Ricco, No. 3:14-cr-30040-MGM (D. Mass. guilty plea entered Sept. 24, 2014).

• Paul Ricco pleaded guilty to 15 counts of false statements for falsifying producer establishment inspections he was required to complete in his role as an inspector for the Massachusetts Department of Agriculture Resources, which is tasked with enforcing FIFRA.

117. United States v. Geng, No. 1:14-cr-00047-JRH-BKE (S.D. Ga. sentence entered Sept. 11, 2014).

• Chen Zong Geng pleaded guilty to one count of false statements and one count of distribution of an unregistered pesticide for selling a pesticide called C&Z Solutions Roach Killer and lying to EPA agents about the sale.
• Geng was sentenced to five months in prison, three years of probation, including five months of electronic monitoring, and a $3,000 fine.

Transportation

118. United States v. Medchem Corp., No. 3:11-cr-00811-EMC (N.D. Cal. sentence entered Feb. 21, 2014).

• Hasan Ibrahim, owner of Medchem Corp., was convicted of the improper transportation of hazardous materials for attempting to send, via aircraft, improperly labeled boxes containing hazardous materials, including certain chemicals that may not be transported via aircraft.
• The government dismissed the charges against the company.
• Ibrahim was sentenced to 30 days in prison, three years of probation, including five months of home confinement, and 100 hours of community service.

119. United States v. Pac. Gas & Electric Co., No. 3:14-cr-00175-THE (N.D. Cal. indictment entered Apr. 1, 2014).

• Pacific Gas & Electric Co. was indicted on 11 counts of violating the Pipeline Safety Act for failing to comply with regulations requiring threat assessments to segments of pipeline. The alleged violations occurred on a portion of the pipeline that ruptured in 2010 and caught fire killing eight people and injuring 58 others.

120. United States v. Stoner, No. 2:13-cr-20052-MPM-DGB (C.D. Ill. sentence entered Apr. 4, 2014).

• Edna Stoner, a level II radiograph technician, pleaded guilty to making false statements in violation of Title 18 in connection with the creation of false documents that indicated radiographic testing had been performed on pipeline welds.
• Stoner also pleaded guilty to violating the Pipeline Safety Act for the knowing failure to perform required non-destructive testing on pipeline welds.
• She was sentenced to 36 months of probation and a $5,400 fine.

121. United States v. Jones, No. 2:14-cr-00220-RTR (E.D. Wis. guilty plea entered Nov. 14, 2014).

• Randy Jones, an onshore corrosion coordinator for Shell Pipeline Co., pleaded guilty to two counts of violating the Pipeline Safety Act for failing to conduct an annual survey of the pipeline and for failing to take bi-monthly voltage readings and one count of false statements for entering false data into the reports submitted to PHMSA.

Other

122. United States v. Vang, No. 3:12-cr-00732-CRB (N.D. Cal. sentence entered Aug. 6, 2014).

• Chou Vang, Vang Pao Yang and Pao Vang each pleaded guilty to depredation of federal lands, in violation of Title 18, for their role in conducting a marijuana grow operation in the King Range National Conservation Area. In return for their guilty pleas, the government dismissed charges of the manufacture of marijuana with the intent to distribute.

• All defendants were sentenced to eight months in prison, three years of probation, including eight months of electronic monitoring, and $31,265.56 in restitution to the Bureau of Land Management jointly and severally.

123. United States v. Henry, No. 2:14-cr-00055-GW (C.D. Cal. sentence entered Sept. 18, 2014); No. 14-50432 (9th Cir. appeal filed Sept. 24, 2014); United States v. Aguirre, No. 14-50435 (9th Cir. appeal filed Sept. 25, 2014).

• Clifford Eugene Henry Jr., Steven Robert Aguirre and Jonathan Carl Jarrell were convicted of setting and failing to control a campfire, in violation of Title 18, that damaged the Angeles National Forest in January 2014.
• Henry and Aguirre were each sentenced to five months in prison, three years of probation and $9,162,165.51 in restitution to the victims of the forest fire jointly and severally.
• Henry and Aguirre have both appealed their sentences. Jarrell has yet to be sentenced.

124. United States v. Reyna-Chavez, No. 1:14-cr-00161-AWI-BAM (E.D. Cal. indictment entered July 31, 2014).

• Jose Antonio Reyna-Chavez was indicted for one count each of conspiracy to distribute marijuana, manufacture of marijuana, possession of marijuana, depredation of public lands and avoidance of an immigration exam in connection with allegedly conducting a marijuana grow operation in Sequoia National Forest.

125. United States v. Blankenship, No. 5:14-cr-00244 (S.D.W. Va. indictment entered Nov. 13, 2014).

• Donald Blankenship, former CEO of Massey Energy, was indicted for conspiracy to violate MSHA requirements at the Upper Big Branch-South mine, conspiracy to defraud MSHA, false statements and securities fraud for allegedly knowingly allowing ongoing violations of mine safety standards.
• The indictment follows an explosion at the mine in April 2010 that resulted in multiple fatalities.

126. United States v. Chadderdon, No. 1:14-cr-00151-JTN (W.D. Mich. sentence entered Dec. 3, 2014); United States v. Tucker, No. 1:14-cr-00201-JTN (W.D. Mich. guilty plea entered Nov. 6, 2014).

• Allen P. Chadderdon and Dean Preston Tucker each pleaded guilty to falsification of records for creating a false “Storage Tank Certificate of Insurance” to serve as proof of financial responsibility for the operator of an underground storage tank.
• Chadderdon was sentenced to one day in prison, one year of probation, a $20,000 fine and 200 hours of community service.

127. United States v. Galvan, No. 1:14-cr-00225-LJO-SKO (E.D. Cal. indictment entered Oct. 23, 2014).

• Toribio Cruz Galvan was indicted for depredation of federal lands in violation of Title 18, as well as conspiracy to manufacture, manufacture and possession with the intent to distribute marijuana for an alleged marijuana grow operation in Sequoia National Park.

INTERVIEW WITH DEBORAH HARRIS
Chief of DOJ’s Environmental Crimes Section

In April 2014, Deborah Harris was selected to be the new chief of DOJ’s Environmental Crimes Section. Harris replaced Stacey Mitchell, who left ECS to become deputy general counsel of EPA. The interview, conducted via e-mail, is set forth below.

Q. What will ECS be focusing on in the upcoming year?

A. We will continue to focus on our traditional mission of protecting the nation’s people, natural resources and wildlife. We also plan to take a hard look at the threat posed by our aging private infrastructure. We are seeing increasing demands placed on that infrastructure with no corresponding increase in repairs and maintenance, often leading to catastrophic failures.

It has been reported that more than 2,800 significant gas pipeline accidents have been recorded across the country since 1990—a third of them causing deaths and significant injuries. There are more than 210 natural gas pipeline systems made of cast iron, steel and plastic. Twenty-one thousand miles of these run through heavily populated areas. Pipeline leaks are the largest human-caused source of methane, a powerful greenhouse gas, in the United States and contribute to $3 billion worth of lost and unaccounted for natural gas each year.

The Department of Transportation has projected that over the next two decades trains carrying crude oil or ethanol will derail an average of 10 times a year, causing an average of more than $4 million in damage and possibly killing hundreds of people depending on the location of the derailment. In fact, we have had three significant derailments in the past month alone.

Infrastructure failures often lead to gross environmental harm, extensive property damage and death. All too often, it is only after something blows up or someone dies that anyone looks at these facilities. ECS is exploring more proactive approaches. We hope that by focusing on criminal efforts to hide infrastructure failures, we may be able to prevent potential catastrophic events.

Moreover, while supporting efforts to explore new sources of energy, we need to ensure it is done in a responsible manner. ECS will continue to address environmental violations arising in the energy extraction and generation sectors. This includes the undermining of the Clean Air Act renewable fuels credit markets caused by fraudulent credit activity, the illegal take of migratory birds at wind farms erected without due diligence and pollution activity associated with fossil fuel extraction in shale formations across the nation.

Q. Is ECS anticipating a wider role in making cases related to worker safety laws? What kind of training, if any, have OSHA inspectors received regarding environmental law violations, and how many have been so trained?

A. ECS has worked closely with [the Department of Labor] in recent years to develop and implement a Worker Endangerment Initiative recognizing that violations of worker-safety laws frequently involve violations of environmental laws. The OSH Act provides criminal sanctions for only three types of conduct: (1) willfully violating a specific standard, rule or order and thus causing the death of an employee; (2) giving advance notice of an inspection; and (3) making false statements in a document filed or maintained under the Act. Each of these offenses is a misdemeanor punishable by a fine of no more than $10,000 and imprisonment for no more than six months. This is why there are only a handful of reported criminal prosecutions under the OSH Act each year (e.g., three in 2013). This level of enforcement is disturbing, as an average day in the United States is marked by 13 workplace fatalities, nearly 150 deaths from occupational diseases and about 9,000 nonfatal injuries and illnesses. ECS has demonstrated that prosecutors can make enforcement more meaningful by charging other serious offenses that often occur in connection with OSH Act violations—including environmental crimes, false statements, obstruction of justice, witness tampering and conspiracy. With penalties of up to 20 years incarceration, plus significant fines, these felony provisions are much more effective deterrents.

Over the last decade, ECS has trained over 2,000 OSHA inspectors to recognize environmental offenses, as well as the most common Title 18 offenses.

As a result of the relationships forged between DOL and ECS, we agreed to become the point of contact for all OSH Act criminal referrals.

Q. Has the U.S. Attorneys’ Manual been revised to grant ECS authority for new areas of criminal enforcement? If so, what are they?

A. ENRD has proposed that worker safety statutes currently under the authority of the Criminal Division be transferred to ENRD’s ECS so that ECS can work with the U.S. Attorney community to prioritize worker safety crimes.

In addition to worker safety, we are excited to have been given authority to prosecute several statutes that address animal cruelty, specifically: the Animal Fighting Venture Prohibition Act, which addresses crimes involving dog and cock fighting; the Animal Welfare Act, which ensures that animals are not mistreated and are provided with humane living conditions and medical treatment; the Crush Video Statute, which criminalizes the intentional infliction of death or bodily harm to animals for the purpose of creating a video to sell, market or distribute in interstate commerce; and the Horse Protection Act and Humane Slaughter Act.

Q. How is ECS balancing the Executive Order on Wildlife Trafficking with its role as an enforcer of the environmental protection and workplace safety cases?

A. ECS has actually been a leader in focusing resources and attention on wildlife trafficking prosecutions for more than a decade. Since the issuance of the Executive Order, ECS has hired six new prosecutors—a near 20% increase in our numbers prior to that order. Any increase in wildlife prosecutions is more than offset by our recent growth, allowing ECS to ensure that pollution and worker safety crimes continue to be our critical enforcement areas.

Unfortunately, some agencies responsible for investigating and working with us in pollution crimes prosecutions have seen continuing reductions in their funding and staffing. Reversing or stemming that trend is vital to effective pollution protection and prosecution going forward.

Q. How is ECS addressing resource constraints when faced with the potential volume of data responsive to government subpoenas and information requests?

A. We are cognizant of the ever-increasing amount of electronic data frequently maintained by subpoena recipients, and the burdens placed upon them in complying with a subpoena request. With that in mind, ECS first tries to narrow its request to the greatest extent possible without categorically eliminating potentially relevant data. Second, extended subpoena response time frames paired with an ability to provide “rolling” production helps keep the burden on ECS and the responder under control. Third, when a subpoena request creates a particularly onerous burden, we are willing to discuss the matter with counsel and narrow or re-define the request in a way that will ensure that the government receives the data it seeks and minimizes the burdens created by the request. Oftentimes after receiving a subpoena, an entity provides us information about its data storage methodology and systems that allows us to reformulate the request. Finally, by allowing for productions in electronic format, but requiring those electronic productions to be made in a native format (which varies by data type), ECS reduces document handling and reproduction demands placed upon entities, while at the same time receiving data in a way that will allow it to be efficiently utilized. ECS is also continuing to monitor the Department’s exploration of other technology-based methods of easing subpoena compliance burdens (such as predictive coding); however, at this time, we have not identified a suitable technology-based system whose merits outweigh its drawbacks.

Q. Assistant Attorney General Leslie Caldwell of the Criminal Division recently stressed the importance of pursuing individual wrongdoers when corporations are prosecuted, including corporate executives. It appears that environmental criminal prosecutions are predominantly brought against individuals. Are these cases more focused on individuals than other white collar prosecutions?

A. We believe in a two-pronged approach of prosecuting both (1) individuals who commit environmental crimes and (2) corporations who profit from the criminal actions of their employees.

We don’t intentionally focus more on one or the other as we believe prosecuting both is necessary to achieve effective deterrence. Of course it is important to punish individual defendants who commit environmental crimes; however, we believe that it is equally important to hold corporations accountable as they are in the best position to influence employee behavior and put policies in place that deter criminal behavior on the part of their workers. In many if not most of our prosecutions, we find that corporate defendants have failed to implement or enforce effective environmental compliance practices.

We cannot speak to the practices or philosophies of other parts of the Department. We would also note that we do not pick our defendants for the most part—cases are presented to us by the various investigative agencies with whom we work. We would also caution against reading too much into statistics. In most cases, we are dealing with only one corporate defendant and numerous individuals, which can skew the numbers.