In a plea bargain, Judge Daniel Fisch fined the Haifa oil refinery NIS 1.6 million for two incidents of pollution in the fall of 2003.
Fisch imposed 150 hours of community service on Oil Refineries general manager Yashar Ben-Mordechai without a conviction. The court also required Oil Refineries to sign a NIS 1.6 million guarantee that it would not commit a similar violation in the two years following the current verdict.
In mid-September 2003, two burners used to burn gases on Oil Refineries’ premises malfunctioned. These burners were designed to prevent the emission of dangerous materials. As a result of the malfunction, a thick black cloud, rated category 4, covered the entire Haifa Bay region.
In another incident on the eve of Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement) in early October 2003, a similar malfunction occurred, in which the burners again emitted black polluting smoke that covered the entire bay region.
In his decision, Fisch noted that Oil Refineries’ managers were responsible for taking all possible precautions to prevent these incidents, but had not done so. He ruled that since that the fine imposed was in any case the maximum for these violations, there was no cause for the court to intervene in this matter.
Oil Refineries legal representative Adv. Micha Fettman said that he agreed to the plea bargain, after it was made clear that no criminal intent or negligence was involved.
Published by Globes [online] - www.globes.co.il - on January 11, 2006