FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE	ENR

MONDAY, JUNE 1, 1998                                                                                                                                   (202) 514-2008

                                                                                                                                                                                  TDD (202) 514-1888




BFI PLEADS GUILTY TO ILLEGAL WASTEWATER DISCHARGES


Trash-Hauling Company Will Pay $1.5M Penalty For Crimes


Committed in D.C.








	WASHINGTON -- Browning-Ferris Inc. (BFI), a subsidiary of one
of the nation's largest trash hauling companies, today pled
guilty to having failed to notify the District of Columbia for
discharging contaminated wastewater from its medical waste
facility into Washington, D.C.'s sewer systems, the Justice
Department announced. 	

	Under a plea agreement filed in U.S. District Court in
Washington, D.C., BFI agreed to pay $1.5 million in penalties and
enact a nationwide program to ensure its medical waste facilities
are complying with environmental laws.

	In the agreement, the Justice Department charges the Maryland
based company with discharging contaminated wastewater from it's
Capitol Processing Plant in violation of the Clean Water Act.  The
Capitol Processing Plant is a medical waste facility located in
Northeast Washington.  	

	"There is no excuse for illegally discharging contaminated
wastewater into the District of Columbia sewer system," said Lois
J. Schiffer, Assistant Attorney General for the Environment and
Natural Resources Division of the Justice Department.  "BFI must
abide by the laws that protect the residents of the District of
Columbia and others from unlawful discharges into sewer systems. 
Since BFI did not abide by these laws, it will have to face the
consequences."       

	"This prosecution should send a clear message that companies
cannot ignore the requirements of federal environmental laws here
in the District of Columbia and expect to get away with it," said
Wilma A. Lewis, U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia.  "Those
who commit environmental crimes in our nation's capital will be
prosecuted and will pay a steep price for their actions."

	According to the plea agreement, between January 27, 1995 and
March 24, 1995, BFI admitted that on three occasions its employees
discharged a combination of rainwater and wastewater from the
medical waste treatment process at the Capitol Processing Plant
into the city's sewer system. It also admitted that it had not
provided advanced notice of those discharges as required by the
federally approved pretreatment program for the District of
Columbia.   

	BFI acknowledged that the wastewater it illegally discharged
had come into contact with treated medical waste in a loading dock
area at the Capitol Processing Facility known as "the trailer pit." 
In pleadings filed with the court, the United States indicated that
there is a dispute about whether the trailer pit also contained
untreated medical waste. The contaminated wastewater was ultimately
treated at the District of Columbia's Blue Plains wastewater
treatment plant and from there discharged into the Potomac River.

	The Clean Water Act requires industrial facilities that
discharge waste into the District of Columbia's sewer system to
notify the District of Columbia of any substantial changes in the
content or volume of the pollutants those facilities discharge. The
notification requirement is part of the city's pretreatment program
that has been federally approved under the Clean Water Act.  Under
a Clean Water Act permit, waste discharged into the sewer system
flows to the Blue Plains sewage treatment plant, which in turn
discharges treated wastewater into the Potomac River. For Blue
Plains and other facilities like it throughout the country to
operate effectively, operators or those facilities must know what
pollutants are being discharged into the sewer system.

	On May 27, Gregory R. Smith, the former plant manager of the
Capitol Processing Facility pleaded guilty to similar charges.
Smith admitted that BFI had illegally discharged waste from the
Capitol Processing Facility from February 1995 until at least April
1996.

	"Protection of this nation's waters is accomplished, to a
greater extent, by treatment plants like Blue Plains.  The Clean
Water Act recognizes the critical importance of these treatment
plants by making it a federal felony to commit illegal discharge
like those made by BFI," said Earl E. Devaney, Director of EPA's
Office of Criminal Enforcement Forensics and Training.   

	BFI is a wholly owned subsidiary of Browning-Ferris Industries
Inc., one of the nation's largest trash hauling companies.  	

	This case is a joint prosecution of the Department of
Justice's Environmental Crimes Section and the United States
Attorney's Office for the District of Columbia. The case is being
investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the
Criminal Investigation Division of the Environmental Protection
Agency. The investigation is continuing.

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