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Washington, DC - Multi-Flow Dispensers, L.P., the company's majority owner, Bernard A. Gottlieb, and general manager, Nicholas Sciarato, have pleaded guilty to conspiring to dump manufacturing waste into the sewer system of Philadelphia in violation of the Clean Water Act, the Justice Department announced today. David Haigh, another Multi-Flow manager, also pleaded guilty to charges of violating the Clean Water Act.

Under the terms of the proposed plea agreement filed in U.S. District Court in Philadelphia, Multi-Flow will pay a $480,000 criminal fine and contribute an additional $100,000 to the City of Philadelphia Water Department's "Cross-Connection Repair Program," which helps reduce pollutants entering rivers and streams from Philadelphia's storm sewers.

Multi-Flow Dispensers, Gottlieb and Scairato admitted to conspiring to violate the Clean Water Act in 1994 by trucking waste in 55-gallon drums from the company's manufacturing plant in Huntingdon Valley, PA, to a leased building located at the former Frankford Arsenal, where the waste was dumped into a drainage pit that they believed led to the city's sewer system. The drainage pit was actually connected to a storm drainage system that led directly to the Frankford Inlet, a tributary of the Delaware River, and not the sewer system. Dumping the waste into either the sewer system or the storm drainage system would have violated the Clean Water Act.

Multi-Flow and its managers admitted that the purpose of the illegal scheme was "to avoid expenses and resources associated with the proper disposal of its production waste," according to documents filed in Court.

The crime were discovered by the City of Philadelphia Water Department on September 13, 1994, when Multi-Flow employees were caught in the act of dumping the company's waste down drains at the Frankford Arsenal.

In the summary filed in court, the defendants admitted that the dumping at the arsenal was part of a routine between 1992 and 1994. Before that time, Multi-Flow had trucked its waste to a company warehouse in Carteret, NJ, where it was dumped into the sewer system without notice to the authorities there.

The investigation of Multi-Flow and the defendants was conducted by the Environmental Protection Agency Criminal Investigative Division and the Federal Bureau of Investigation with assistance from the City of Philadelphia Water Department.

The plea agreement is subject to court approval. Sentencing before U.S. District Judge J.Curtis Joyner is set for June 15 and 16, 1999.

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