Shipping Company Pleads Guilty to Oil Discharges in Oakland Federal Court
Cargo ship operator Transmar Shipping Co, S.A. pleaded guilty Friday in Oakland to violations that involved dumping oil residue, sludge and other substances into the ocean, federal prosecutors said. Senior U.S. District Judge D. Lowell Jensen sentenced the Greece-based company to pay a $750,000 fine plus a $100,000 community service payment, and ordered it to follow an environmental compliance plan including external audits. The company plead guilty to failing to maintain an Oil Record Book and making a false statement to the U.S. Coast Guard. Dimitrios Dimitrakis, chief engineer aboard the M/V New Fortune, plead guilty to failing to maintain an accurate Oil Record Book, and second engineer Volodymyr Dombrovskyy pleaded guilty to aiding and abetting that failure.
Court documents say that after traveling from South Korea to the Port of Oakland, the New Fortune, a 26,136-gross-ton cargo ship registered in the Marshall Island, was boarded in February by the U.S. Coast Guard for a routine inspection. Inspectors found the crew had been using a magic hose to dispose of the vessels’ oil-containing waste overboard, bypassing the vessel’s pollution prevention equipment. Further investigation by the Coast Guard and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Criminal Investigation Division found waste oil in the vessel’s overboard piping and evidence of false entries made in the vessel’s Oil Record Book, a documentrequired by MARPOL, a treaty ratified and implemented by the United States and other nations.
Dimitrakis held overall responsibility for the engine room, and Dombrovskyy worked under him; they admitted regularly ordering the illegal dumping and falsifying records to cover it up. Dombrovskyy was sentenced to two years probation, a $500 fine, and a $100 special assessment. Dimitrakis is scheduled to be sentenced Sept. 3; the maximum penalty for his crime is six years in federal prison and a fine of up to $250,000.
Filed Under: Crimes • Environmental • News
