ELR Citation: ELR 20543
No(s). 85-6005 (2d Cir. Jun 3, 1985)

The court holds that individual corporate officers may be personally liable for the corporation's operation of an industrial waste disposal service in violation of §13 of the Rivers and Harbors Appropriation Act. In this appeal from a district court judgment against Pollution Abatement Services and its corporate officers for the firm's discharge of refuse into Wine Creek, and for its storage of thousands of drums of highly toxic chemicals, including PCB's, pesticides, and hydrocarbons, on the banks of the creek, which flows into Lake Ontario, the court rules that since appellants' activities fell within the proscriptive ambit of criminal provision of the Act, they were properly held civilly liable. In light of clear congressional intent to hold individuals liable for violations of the Act, the court finds no reason to allow the corporate form to shield from liability corporate officers who were personally involved in or directly responsible for statutorily proscribed activity. This comports with the court's prior expansive constructions of remedial environmental statutes.

Counsel for Plaintiff
Maria A. Iizuka
Land and Natural Resources Division
Department of Justice, Washington DC 20530
(202) 633-2701

Counsel for Defendants
Leonard H. Amdursky
Amdursky, Duell and Pelky
26 East Oneida St., Oswego New York 13126
(315) 343-6363

Before Kearse and Mishler,^* JJ.