U.S. District Court Judge John T. Fowlkes Jr. of the Western District of Tennessee sentenced DiAne Gordon, 61, of Memphis, Tennessee, to 36 months in prison followed by two years’ supervised release as a result of her fabrication of discharge monitoring reports required under the Clean Water Act.
According to the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), Gordon also submitted said fraudulent documents to state regulators in Tennessee and Mississippi. Gordon was the co-owner and chief executive officer of Environmental Compliance and Testing (ECT), which considered itself a full-service environmental consulting firm offering sampling and testing of stormwater, process water and wastewater.
Gordon has been ordered Gordon to pay restitution in the amount of $222,388 and was sentenced to 26 months in prison, receiving an additional 10 months’ incarceration "on the probation revocation for having engaged in the criminal conduct while on supervision," reported the DOJ.
“Today’s sentence appropriately reflects the harm caused by Gordon’s betrayal of her position of trust and her fraud upon her customers, the regulatory authorities, and the citizens of Tennessee and Mississippi,” said Assistant Attorney Todd Kim of the Justice Department’s Environment and Natural Resources Division, reported the DOJ.
According to the DOJ, often times concrete companies hired ECT to take samples and analyze them to determine if it complies with Clean Water Act permit requirements.
"Gordon claimed to gather and send the samples to a full-service environmental testing laboratory. The alleged results were memorialized in lab reports and chain of custody forms submitted to two state agencies, Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality (MDEQ) and the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation (TDEC), to satisfy permit requirements," stated the DOJ. "In reality, Gordon fabricated the test results and related reports. She even forged documents from a reputable testing laboratory in furtherance of her crime. Gordon then billed her clients for the sampling and analysis. Law enforcement and regulators quickly determined that Gordon created and submitted, or caused to be submitted, at least 405 false lab reports and chain of custody forms from her company in Memphis to state regulators since 2017."
“The Clean Water Act ensures that water quality is maintained throughout the United States,” said U.S. Attorney Joseph C. Murphy Jr. for the Western District of Tennessee. “Correct and accurate test results of discharges into rivers and stream and the honest reporting of those results to regulatory authorities are important parts of the Act’s regulatory framework. Without accurate test results and reporting of those results, the Clean Water Act will not work as Congress intended. Because honest reporting of this data is so important to the functioning of the Act, our office will vigorously prosecute individuals who falsely report test results.”
The Environmental Protection Agency Criminal Investigation Division’s (EPA-CID) Southeast Area Branch investigated the case, with help from MDEQ and TDEC.
“Today’s sentence should be a reminder to those who choose to undermine the public’s confidence in our nation’s water quality for their own financial gain will be vigorously prosecuted,” said Special Agent in Charge Charles Carfagno of EPA-CID. “We commend the assistance of our state partners with the Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality and Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation for their substantial assistance throughout this investigation.”
