Two shipping companies and two engineers were indicted on charges of dumping oily wastewater from a cargo ship heading to Seattle and concealing it from the U.S. Coast Guard.
Two shipping companies and two engineers were indicted on charges of dumping 5,000 gallons of oily wastewater from a cargo ship heading to Seattle and concealing it from the U.S. Coast Guard.
Federal prosecutors said Thursday that the cargo ship M/V Gallia Graeca released the contaminated water over several days in late October as the ship traveled from China to Seattle.
The ship’s operator, Angelakos (Hellas) is a Panama company and its owner, Gallia Graeca Shipping, is based in Cyprus.
Prosecutors say during the ship’s voyage, its oil-water filtering equipment was inoperable. The indictment says when the Coast Guard inspected the ship in November; the engineers ran the equipment in a way that made it appear it was working.
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The companies and engineers were each charged with violating the Act to Prevent Pollution from Ships, falsifying records in a federal investigation an defrauding the government. Each count carries a prison term and a $500,000 fine.