The Monaco-based shipping company Sea World Management & Trading Incorporation has been found guilty of intentionally and illegally polluting US waters, resulting in a fine of nearly two million euros. The company pleaded guilty to throwing waste overboard and unlawfully discharging oil into the sea near the Texas coast, while the captain of the ship (the Sea Faith) Edmon Fajardo entered a similar plea. Fajardo was sentenced to six months in prison and fined over \u20ac1,700 for commanding his crew to carry out the infringements.<\/p>\n
The incidents in question took place in March of last year, when Fajardo ordered members of his ship\u2019s crew to discharge bilge water and oily residues into the sea on five different occasions. None of the discharges passed through the ship\u2019s monitoring equipment, which assures that it is compliant with pollution legislation, and neither were they logged in the ship\u2019s Oil Record Book. Both of those transgressions broke US federal law and resulted in Fajardo and Sea World\u2019s conviction.<\/p>\n
Furthermore, it also transpired that Fajardo ordered his crew to throw unwanted rubbish overboard as well, including used oil drums, empty paint cans, batteries, plastics and oily rags. All of the items can cause serious damage to the flora and fauna in the surrounding waters and none of those discharges were properly recorded either, though it is believed that all of the above incidents took place in the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea between the 10th March and the 18th March 2017. The charges came to light after a collaborative investigation between the US Coast Guard\u2019s Investigative Service, the US Coast Guard\u2019s Corpus Christi Sector and the Criminal Investigation Division of the Environmental Protection Agency.<\/p>\n