Prosecuting Individuals for Environmental Crimes Under The U.S. Clean Air Act

• In Event: Green Criminology #3 - Responding to Environmental harms and crimes

Abstract

Air pollution crimes involving significant harm or culpable conduct may be remedied through criminal prosecution. Yet we know very little about how individuals have been prosecuted historically for such crimes under the U.S. Clean Air Act. We utilize content analysis of 2,728 environmental crime prosecutions stemming from U.S. EPA criminal investigations, 1983-2021 and select out all Clean Air Act prosecutions of individuals for analysis. Our findings show that 253 prosecutions or 65 percent of total Clean Air Act prosecutions involve individuals exclusively, who were cumulatively sentenced to pay $327 million in monetary penalties, serve 386 years of incarceration, and 709 years of probation. Monetary penalties are heavily weighted towards outliers, with 86 percent of the monetary penalties ascribed to five large-penalty cases and 62 percent of these prosecutions centered on asbestos crimes. We conclude with suggestions to increase resources in order to broaden the scope of criminal enforcement to deter environmental crimes.

Authors

• josh ozymy, University of Nevada, Reno

• Melissa Jarrell Ozymy, University of Nevada, Reno