March 28, 2006

Richard Everts, former Vice President of Corporate Development for World Waste Services, Inc., pled guilty on March 14, before Judge James Giddings in 30th Circuit Court for Ingham County to a felony charge of Uttering and Publishing. The criminal investigation was initiated by the Department of Environmental Quality’s Office of Criminal Investigations when DEQ staff suspected the submission of a fraudulent $2 million Letter of Credit as part of the financial assurance required for a solid waste landfill operating license application.

Financial assurance is required for all landfills in the state to ensure that money is available to cover the cost of proper closure and postclosure monitoring and maintenance activities at the landfill and to ensure that these costs are not passed to the taxpayers if the landfill owner or operator becomes insolvent.

A sentencing hearing is scheduled for May 3, 2006. Uttering and Publishing has a maximum sentence of 14 years in prison.

Editor’s note: DEQ news releases are available on the department’s Internet home page at www.michigan.gov/deq.

“Protecting Michigan’s Environment, Ensuring Michigan’s Future”

Revised March 28, 2006 by Pat Watson