By Eric Freedman
The owner of a Northern New York salvage-related company faces prison and a fine after pleading guilty to mishandling hazardous waste, federal officials said.
Brian Davis is scheduled for sentencing on Sept. 25 for violating the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act for treating, storing and disposing of hazardous waste without the required permit.
He pleaded guilty to the charge, which carries a maximum sentence of five years in prison and a $15 million fine. However, under federal sentencing guidelines he is likely to receive no more than 41 months, according to John Duncan, the executive assistant U.S. attorney in Syracuse.
Davis owns Large Car LLC, an Owego company that removes industrial plating equipment for recycling or reuse, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office and the Environmental Protection Agency’s Criminal Investigation Division.
Nobody else has been criminally charged in the case Duncan said.
In announcing the guilty plea, the two agencies said Davis agreed to remove arsenic, chromium, lead, selenium and other hazardous chemicals from a bankrupt facility in Keene, New Hampshire, without a permit and took the materials to his facility in Owego. One employee suffered a slight burn from coming into contact with the hazardous materials.
According to the plea agreement, Davis “knew the waste material had the substantial potential to be harmful to others or the environment, or in other words, that it was not an innocuous substance like water.”
The agencies said he failed to properly label the waste or protect it from repeated freezing and thawing. “Davis also treated and disposed of much of the waste by igniting and evaporating it, mixing it with other materials and shipping it offsite without manifesting it.”
The violations took place from June 2013 through May 2014, the plea agreement said.
In addition to potential prison time and a fine, he will be responsible for cleanup costs, the agencies said. Duncan said Davis is currently cleaning up the site under EPA supervision.
His defense lawyer didn’t return calls seeking comment.