A careless decision made by two employees ended up costing their company tens of thousands of dollars in fines.
Two employees of JPG Plumbing and Mechanical Inc. were found guilty after dumping a truck's worth of grease and pollutants into a manhole that connected to the drinking water reservoir, WUSA9 reported.
The employees illegally dumped the truck's contents to avoid "taking the two-hour round trip to the Blue Plains Wastewater Treatment Facility in Washington, D.C., for proper disposal," per WUSA9.
The manhole connects to Ashton Pond and a storm drain system that connects to the Triadelphia Reservoir, which supplies drinking water for over half a million Maryland residents. Dumping pollutants into the water isn't just bad for the environment; it poisons the water supply.
A Montgomery County resident witnessed the dumping and reported it to Montgomery County officials, who launched an investigation. The entire thing was caught on a surveillance camera of a 7-Eleven.
Illegal dumping is the deliberate disposal of waste at a nonapproved location. Illegal dumping includes littering, burning or burying waste, and "dumping chemicals, pesticides, used automotive fluids and other pollutants into storm drains, into waterways, or on the ground," according to Montgomery County's Department of Environmental Protection.
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The minimum penalty for illegal dumping in Maryland is $500. Both employees pleaded guilty and received probation and $1,000 to $2,000 fines, payable to the Maryland Clean Water Fund, WUSA9 reported. JPG Plumbing and Mechanical was not criminally charged but received fines and citations and was responsible for the cleanup of the pond, which cost nearly $70,000.
Maryland Attorney General Anthony Brown hopes this incident is never repeated. "Illegally dumping toxic waste into our waterways is not just reckless—it's an outright betrayal of the responsibility businesses and their employees have to our communities," Brown said, per WUSA9. "This kind of lawlessness endangers public health, harms our environment, and will not be tolerated."
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