Area Recycling Companies Accused Of Sending Hazardous Waste To Landfill

By Rachel Cromidas in News on Dec 20, 2016 8:02PM

The owner of an area recycling company has been charged with fraud and tax evasion after federal prosecutors found he was taking hazardous electronic waste that was intended to be recycled and illegally sending it to landfill instead.

Brian Brundage, owner of Gary, Indiana's EnviroGreen Processing LLC, has been charged with five counts of income tax evasion, four counts of mail fraud and two counts of wire fraud, according to the U.S. attorney's office of the Northern District of Illinois. Each count of income tax evasion carries a sentence of up to five years in prison, and wire fraud and mail fraud counts each carry a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.

Brundage, 45, was also previously the owner of Chicago Heights' Intercon Solutions Inc., another recycling company that he also allegedly used to commit fraud. He was arrested this morning.

His companies promised their clients, which included some governmental bodies, to recycling hazardous materials safely; but instead, they allegedly resold the materials, which included batteries and glass containing hazardous levels of lead, oversees or dumped them in landfills. He also is accused of using company money to pay for gambling and childcare and writing them off as business expenses on Intercon's tax returns.

Brundage "caused thousands of tons of e-waste and other potentially hazardous materials to be landfilled, re-sold to customers who shipped the materials overseas, or stockpiled," a statement from the Justice Department says.

The improper recycling had been going on for over a decade, according to the U.S. attorney's office, and Brundage allegedly knew the materials were going to be shipped overseas and/or landfilled illegally. The statement also says that Intercon was publicly accused of shipping hazardous waste to Hong Kong in 2011, but Brundage allegedly destroyed business and shipping records to cover this up.

[HT CBS]