Saturday, February 21, 2009

Hellas-based shipping Company, Chief Engineer and Second Engineer Indicted for Covering Up Pollution

A federal grand jury in Newark, N.J., has returned an eight-count indictment charging a Liberian company that manages an oceangoing bulk carrier vessel, M/V Myron N, along with the ship's chief engineer and second engineer for covering up discharges of oil-contaminated waste at sea, the Justice Department announced today.

Dalnave Navigation Inc., a company incorporated in Liberia with offices in Athens, Greece, Chief Engineer Panagiotis Stamatakis and Second Engineer Dimitrios Papadakis, both of Greece, were each charged with conspiracy and violating the Act to Prevent Pollution from Ships (APPS) by failing to maintain an accurate ship record concerning the disposal of oil-contaminated waste. They were also charged with making false statements to U.S. Coast Guard authorities regarding the pumping of oil-contaminated waste overboard and five counts of obstruction of justice concerning the statements made to the Coast Guard. The indictment alleges that between 2004 and September 2008, Dalnave, and more recently through its two senior engineers on the M/V Myron N, Stamatakis and Papadakis, directed subordinate crew members to use a metal pipe to bypass the ship's oil water separator and instead discharge the oil-contaminated waste directly overboard. Thereafter, on Sept. 8, 2008, in the port of Newark, N.J., the defendants presented a fabricated oil record book that failed to disclose prior discharges into the ocean of oil-contaminated waste by the M/V Myron N.
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