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8/21/2024
WT Staff
 August 21, 2024 324 pm PDT
CWA CrimeBox
Environmental Crimes Historic Conviction: Fiscal Year 2007; Case ID# CR_1284(California)
Winding up your metal plating business? Don't do this!
One of 72 Clean Water Act Criminal Prosecutions in the State of California (from 1989-2023)
The defendants in this case is are a metal plating company, and the owner of the company (our regular readers will likely guess what is coming next, did you already skip to the end and see this involves jail time?)
Process water in metal plating collects controlled contaminant heavy metals that must be removed from the wastewater stream prior to flushing down the public sanitary sewer system. The national pollutant discharge permitting system calculates the total pollutant loading coming from all point sources into a receiving water body. The permit holders are allowed to discharge to a maximum amount of contaminant to ensure the receiving water body is not overburdened. Adherence to the discharge permits is the basis of the Clean Water Act and environmental protection.
Circumstances have a way of changing. The defendant closed up shop, left with the clean up of the process water tank, decided to flush the untreated contents down the biffy. That is certainly one way to end a career, the business and its owner convicted on a charge of knowing violation of the Clean Water Act and a charge operating in violation of a discharge permit. The defendants were sentenced to federal fines, years of probation and the owner got to wear a striped jumpsuit for three months.
Prison: 3 months; Federal Fines: $55,000; Special Assessment: $500; Probation: 84 months
CWA CrimeBox briefs are compiled from EPA Criminal Enforcement records.
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