Wiley Sanders Truck Lines, Inc., Hazardous Materials Transport, California 2024
LOS ANGELES - A trucking company has been ordered to pay $3 million for illegally transporting hazardous, lead-contaminated plastic battery chips from the now-closed Exide Technologies battery recycling facility in Vernon to a company in Bakersfield.
Wiley Sanders Truck Lines, Inc., which is based in Troy, Alabama, was ordered Monday to pay the money as part of a sentence that placed the company on probation for three years.
United States District Judge Percy Anderson imposed the sentence, describing the company’s conduct as “an environmental disaster for Vernon and the surrounding area.”
As part of the sentence, Judge Anderson ordered Wiley Sanders to pay a $1.5 million fine – the statutory maximum – and a $1.5 million community service payment to the Exide Residential Assistance Fund established by the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health to support residents affected by lead contamination near the facility.
On February 25, the company pleaded guilty to three felony counts of illegal transportation of hazardous materials.
The company admitted in its plea agreement that, on three occasions between November 2013 and March 2014, it willfully and recklessly transported a total of 128,840 pounds (64.42 tons) of lead-contaminated plastic chips from Vernon to Bakersfield.
Wiley Sanders specifically admitted knowing that the trailers it used to transport the battery plastic chips did not contain any lining or inner packing material to prevent liquids and semi-solids from leaking through cracks and other openings in the trailers.
Because of its conduct, lead-contaminated residue leaked out of the trailers when Wiley Sanders drivers transported the battery chips from Vernon to Bakersfield. Wiley Sanders truck drivers occasionally transported the semi-trailers on public roads before the plastic chips had dried, despite the fact that the lead-contaminated chips and resulting lead-contaminated liquid residue would leak out of the trailers.
There is no known safe level of lead in human blood.
In 2015, Exide Technologies reached an agreement with the United States government that called for the battery manufacturing company to close its recycling facility in Vernon and pay an estimated $50 million to clean-up the site and surrounding neighborhoods which have been affected by environmental toxins for decades.
Key Facts
- State: California
- Category: Public Corruption|Environmental Crime|White Collar Crime
- Source: DOJ Press Release â†â€â€
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