Citgo Oil Company Pollutes Poor Neighborhood, Nitwit U.S. District Judge let\'s them Skate
Pollution Is a Violent Crime! Companies Like BP and Cito should have their high level employees Jailed for Life Or Given Death Penalty
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/05/08/environmental-racism-is-real-and-this-judgment-proves-it.html
The corporation doesn?t have to pay compensation for pollution it caused in Texas. But pollution is a violent crime?and should be prosecuted as such.
A shameful court decision in Texas shows why we need to see pollution for what it is: violence, usually against poor and vulnerable people.
The situation is Erin Brockovich stuff. A Citgo refinery bordering Corpus Christi?s poor, largely minority Hillcrest neighborhood was illegally allowing benzene and other pollutants to escape its tanks. A jury found it guilty, not just civilly, but criminally. This unusually severe judgment was the first criminal conviction of a refinery operation under the Clean Air Act. With the support of the Justice Department, the victims sought what victims of ordinary crime expect when possible: restitution from the wrongdoer to make them whole.
U.S. District Judge John D. Rainey decided Wednesday that victims of Citgo?s criminal?literally criminal?pollution will receive no restitution. Citgo won?t have to pay any of the $55 million that the Justice Department had requested.
The money would have gone to compensate the victims, pay for future health screenings, and in some cases relocate households. Instead, Citgo will pay only a $2 million fine that is the legal minimum for its criminal violation of the Clean Air Act. This was the first time an oil refinery had been held criminally liable under the Act.
Benzene causes cancer, thins the blood to cause symptoms resembling hemophilia, and damages fetuses exposed to it. Because a jury found Citgo a criminal under the Clean Air Act, 800 Hillcrest residents qualified as crime victims. Normally that means that, when the criminal has money, a court will order payments to make the victim whole, or as close as possible.
Citgo has money, to put it mildly. The Justice Department estimates it earned $1 billion in profits?and of course many times that in gross revenue?from the law-breaking refinery when the violation was active. Judge Rainey argued that calculating the victims? damages would take too long?even though the victims have already waited since the jury first returned a ?guilty? verdict in 2007, and would rather get compensation later than a lump of coal and a pat on the back now.
Environmental laws are still seen too often as ?regulation??government telling you how to do your business?rather than core legal protections that everyone deserves. Benzene makes people sick, shortens lives, and harms future generations. If Citgo had hired thugs to beat people up in Hillcrest, we?d know that was a crime of violence. If Citgo had poisoned its neighbors, Ã la Game of Thrones, we wouldn?t doubt its criminality. Here, ?all it did? was to violate a criminal law by poisoning its neighbors slowly. That should be enough.
Sometimes violence is slow. That?s one of the core lessons of ecology. Poisons can
The corporation doesn?t have to pay compensation for pollution it caused in Texas. But pollution is a violent crime?and should be prosecuted as such.
A shameful court decision in Texas shows why we need to see pollution for what it is: violence, usually against poor and vulnerable people.
The situation is Erin Brockovich stuff. A Citgo refinery bordering Corpus Christi?s poor, largely minority Hillcrest neighborhood was illegally allowing benzene and other pollutants to escape its tanks. A jury found it guilty, not just civilly, but criminally. This unusually severe judgment was the first criminal conviction of a refinery operation under the Clean Air Act. With the support of the Justice Department, the victims sought what victims of ordinary crime expect when possible: restitution from the wrongdoer to make them whole.
U.S. District Judge John D. Rainey decided Wednesday that victims of Citgo?s criminal?literally criminal?pollution will receive no restitution. Citgo won?t have to pay any of the $55 million that the Justice Department had requested.
The money would have gone to compensate the victims, pay for future health screenings, and in some cases relocate households. Instead, Citgo will pay only a $2 million fine that is the legal minimum for its criminal violation of the Clean Air Act. This was the first time an oil refinery had been held criminally liable under the Act.
Benzene causes cancer, thins the blood to cause symptoms resembling hemophilia, and damages fetuses exposed to it. Because a jury found Citgo a criminal under the Clean Air Act, 800 Hillcrest residents qualified as crime victims. Normally that means that, when the criminal has money, a court will order payments to make the victim whole, or as close as possible.
Citgo has money, to put it mildly. The Justice Department estimates it earned $1 billion in profits?and of course many times that in gross revenue?from the law-breaking refinery when the violation was active. Judge Rainey argued that calculating the victims? damages would take too long?even though the victims have already waited since the jury first returned a ?guilty? verdict in 2007, and would rather get compensation later than a lump of coal and a pat on the back now.
Environmental laws are still seen too often as ?regulation??government telling you how to do your business?rather than core legal protections that everyone deserves. Benzene makes people sick, shortens lives, and harms future generations. If Citgo had hired thugs to beat people up in Hillcrest, we?d know that was a crime of violence. If Citgo had poisoned its neighbors, Ã la Game of Thrones, we wouldn?t doubt its criminality. Here, ?all it did? was to violate a criminal law by poisoning its neighbors slowly. That should be enough.
Sometimes violence is slow. That?s one of the core lessons of ecology. Poisons can
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