Cost of doing business? Monsanto pleads guilty to 30 environmental crimes, agrees to pay measly $12

[rangerrebew]

Cost of doing business? Monsanto pleads guilty to 30 environmental crimes, agrees to pay measly $12 million fine

12/16/2021 / By Ethan Huff

The Monsanto Company agreed to plead guilty to 30 environmental crimes related to the use of a pesticide on cornfields in Hawaii, court documents filed in the state earlier this month show.

Monsanto admitted in a plea agreement that it committed 30 misdemeanor crimes related to the use of a glufosinate ammonium-based product sold under the brand name Forfeit 280. Monsanto also pleaded guilty to two other charges related to the storage of a banned pesticide, which was the subject of a 2019 Deferred Prosecution Agreement (DPA).

After applying the product to corn fields in Oahu back in 2020, Monsanto forced workers to enter the fields during the six-day “restricted-entry interval” (REI) in violation of the law.

The plea agreement says that Monsanto will now have to serve three years of probation (how does a corporation serve probation?) as well as pay a total of $12 million in fines.

https://www.environ.news/2021-12-16-monsanto-guilty-environmental-crimes-fine.html

[catfish1957]

$12M is not a measly fine.  Especically for FIFRA violations.

I've been in that boat a number times 10-30 years ago, and when you look at the level of difficulty, complexity, and add the differences in opinion when comes to regulation interpretation........  Dealing with likes of EPA, and redundant state and local agencies, it is no easy task.  I don't miss it at all.