The Charleston Gazette-Mail’s Ken Ward Jr. reported the sentencing of Freedom Industries’ former president Gary Southern on Wednesday. In addition to one month of prison time, Southern was also given a $20,000 fine for charges related to the January 2014 spill. Under federal guidelines, the recommended sentence was 24 to 30 months and a fine of up to $300,000.
“This defendant is hardly a criminal,” U.S. District Judge Thomas E. Johnston said after handing down the sentence, according to Ward. “I stand by that statement.”
Judge Johnston on Freedom’s Gary Southern: ‘Like the others, this defendant is hardly a criminal. I stand by that statement.”
In August of last year, Southern pled guilty to environmental crimes, including violating a Clean Water Act permit and negligent discharge of a pollutant. That pollutant, a coal-cleaning chemical called crude MCHM, spilled from one of the company’s rusty, neglected tanks into the Elk River in January 2014, contaminating drinking water for 300,000 people. More than 100 people sought medical treatment for issues they believed were related to coming in contact with contaminated water.