Judge fines environmental lawyer -Biodiesel Case

Judge fines environmental lawyer

Published: December 13, 2005

By AMY LINDBLOM

A Tuolumne County prosecutor has been fined $500 for filing what a judge called a "frivolous" motion in a civil case against the Sierra Railroad.

Superior Court Judge William Polley fined Will Richmond, a circuit environmental prosecutor, for repeatedly seeking a $25,000 sanction against the railroad for failing to use biodiesel fuel in its locomotives.

Polley ruled in July that the deadline for imposing the fine had long passed. Richmond's appealing Polley's decision in August and continuing to seek the fine amounted to harassment, the judge said.

District Attorney Donald Segerstrom has asked the state Attorney General's Office and the Consumer Protection Committee of the California District Attorneys Association to review Polley's order.

The fine is the latest legal wrangling between Richmond — who prosecutes environmental cases for district attorney's offices in several counties, including Tuolumne — and the railroad.

The legal battle began after a diesel fuel spill at Sierra Railroad's yard in Jamestown in 2000. Rather than filing a criminal charge against the railroad's owners, Richmond sought a civil remedy.

In April 2002, Sierra Railroad Company agreed to convert its locomotives to run on biodiesel fuel rather than diesel. If the company failed to do so by July 1, 2003, it would pay a $25,000 fine, the agreement said.

Five days before the time limit was up, five locomotives were converted to run on biodiesel fuel, according to court records. But even with the conversion, the company continued to run locomotives on diesel fuel, because biodiesel fuel was not readily available and cost more than diesel.

Railroad President Mike Hart said the company would use biodiesel fuel once it became economically feasible to do so.

But Richmond said Sierra Railroad did not live up to its agreement, and earlier this year asked Polley to impose the $25,000 fine.

In July, Polley ruled that Richmond asked to have the fine paid too late.

"The $25,000 fine was either due on July 2, 2003 or it was not due at all," he ruled.

Richmond then appealed the ruling and again tried to convince the judge to impose the $25,000 fine.

Hart said the railroad company chose to fight Richmond rather than "giving in to the unreasonable demands of a hostile district attorney."

Sierra Railroad attorney Kimon Manolius argued Richmond's appeal was frivolous and amounted to harassment.

Manolius asked that the prosecutor to be fined the amount of legal fees the railroad company had paid to defend itself — $55,000.

Polley agreed the appeal was frivolous, but on Nov. 22 ordered Richmond to pay only the $500 fine. He said the amount was enough to deter such conduct in the future.

"The $500 in sanctions awarded by Judge Polley do nothing to compensate Sierra for the more than $100,000 it was forced to spend to defend itself and to prove that the D.A. was acting illegally," Hart said yesterday.

Hart called the $500 fine a slap on the wrist.

"That's the type of political cronyism you expect to see in the ‘Dukes of Hazzard,' not in modern day Tuolumne County."

As to the use of biodiesel fuel, which is based on vegetable oil, Hart said there may be a source for palm oil in the Sacramento area and hopes to use it in the near future.

Segerstrom said Polley's sanction is under review by the Attorney General's Office and the state District Attorney's association to determine whether to appeal the sanctions or to propose a new California law to make it illegal to issue sanctions against a prosecutor who seeks a civil rather than criminal remedy.

http://www.uniondemocrat.com/news/story.cfm?story_no=19162