A foreign-flagged ship’s chief engineer, Kirill Kompaniets, was found guilty of delaying justice and pouring nearly 10,000 gallons of oil-contaminated bilge water overboard in American seas off the coast of New Orleans last year.
A crew member initially alerted the Coast Guard about the unlawful activity on social media.
Kompaniets was given a sentence of one year and one day in jail, a $5,000 fine, a $200 special assessment, and six months of supervised release by the Honorable Nannette Jolivette Brown.
Engine room flooding was caused by repair procedures to fix an issue with the outflow of clean ballast water.
While the ship was in an anchorage near the Southwest Passage off the coast of Louisiana, Chief Engineer Kompanietes and a subordinate engineer disposed of the oily bilge water overboard after the leak had been stopped.
The oily-water separator and oil content monitor that the ship was obliged to have were not employed, and the discharge was not noted in the Oil Record Book, a log that ships are required to keep.
In addition, Kompaniets was accused of obstructing justice by making many attempts to hide the unlawful discharge.
The following acts of obstructing justice were acknowledged by Kompaniets in a joint factual statement submitted to the court along with his guilty plea:
(1) lying to the Coast Guard about the cause and nature of a hazardous condition, concealing that the vessel’s engine room had flooded and that oil-contaminated bilge water had been discharged overboard;
(2) destroying the computer alarm printouts for the time of the illegal discharge that were sought.
According to Assistant Attorney General Todd Kim of the Justice Department’s Environment and Natural Resources Division, “The purposeful poisoning of U.S. waterways and the willful cover-up are severe criminal violations that will not be condoned.”
“Prosecutions like this one should send a strong message to anyone who would break the law and jeopardise our priceless natural resources,” the prosecutor said.
U.S. Attorney Duane A. Evans for the Eastern District of Louisiana said that the defendant in this case “deliberately ignored protocols meant to safeguard the environment from contamination and then sought to cover his activities.”
The declaration made today highlights that both our office and our federal colleagues are determined to hold responsible for any those whose illegal activity endangers our environment and endangers the general people and the ecosystem.
With assistance from District 8 of the U.S. Coast Guard and the Coast Guard Criminal Investigative Service, the criminal prosecution is being handled by Assistant U.S. Attorney G. Dall Kammer for the Eastern District of Louisiana and Senior Litigation Counsel Richard A. Udell of the Environment and Natural Resources Division. The inquiry is still ongoing.