L.A. is home to heavy industry — and more federal deals not to prosecute polluters than anywhere else

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Federal prosecutors in L.A. made far more deals to not prosecute corporate polluters like Exide than any other district, according to a Times analysis.

In 2015, federal prosecutors in Los Angeles made a deal with the CEO of one of Southern California’s most dangerous industrial facilities, a battery recycling plant that had contaminated thousands of nearby homes with lead dust.

“If you’re the classic U.S. attorney, you want to convict an individual of a serious crime. That gives rise to accountability and deterrence,” said John Coffee, a Columbia University law professor who has written about the drawbacks of these deals. “Deferred prosecution and nonprosecution agreements don’t do that.”The federal Environmental Protection Agency has historically opposed these agreements.

maintained by Syracuse University’s TRAC project. Three of the eight agreements were made in the last two years.Though these types of agreements can be used to entice corporate boards to assist the government in pursuing criminal charges against executives, none of the Central District cases resulted in enforcement against business owners or high-level employees.

Residents in the contaminated neighborhoods near Exide initially agreed with prosecutors’ strategy, believing it was the only way to close the plant after decades of neglect by California environmental regulators, said Msgr. John Moretta of Resurrection Catholic Church in Boyle Heights, where some churchgoers believe their health problems are a result of exposure to neurotoxins from Exide.

In one case that did receive public scrutiny, Trump administration Justice Department officials reportedly intervened in 2019 to block prosecutors from charging the agrochemical giant Monsanto with a felony, according to, a nonpartisan organization based in Washington. Although Monsanto had been accused of illegally spraying a toxic pesticide in Hawaii, a conflict of interest in the Hawaii federal prosecutor’s office led to the case being handled by prosecutors in the Central District.

 

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