Page 10 The Skanner December 21, 2016
News
Emergency Managers Charged Over Flint’s Lead-Tainted Water
Former key city officials charged with four crimes, including conspiracy and misconduct in office
FLINT, Mich. — A
criminal investigation
of Flint’s lead-contam-
inated water turned to
former key officials at
City Hall on Tuesday as
Michigan’s attorney gen-
eral announced charges
against four people ac-
cused of keeping resi-
dents on a contaminated
system that caused the
crisis.
Darnell Earley and Ger-
ald Ambrose separately
were
state-appointed
emergency
managers
in Flint in 2014-15 when
the city was using the
Flint River as a source
of drinking water. Am-
brose also served earlier
as a financial adviser to
the troubled town.
They were charged
with four crimes, includ-
ing conspiracy and mis-
conduct in office. How-
ard Croft, Flint’s former
public works director,
“
AP PHOTO/CARLOS OSORIO
By ED WHITE
Associated Press
Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette addresses a news conference, Tuesday, Dec. 20, 2016, in Flint,
Mich., where he charged two former State of Michigan Emergency Managers, Darnell Earley and Gerald
Ambrose, with multiple 20-year felonies for their failure to protect the citizens of Flint from health
hazards cased by contaminated drinking water. Schuette also charged Earley, Ambrose and Flint city
employees Howard Croft and Daugherty Johnson with felony counts of false pretenses and conspiracy
to commit false pretenses in the issuance of bonds to pay for a portion of the water project that led to
the crisis.
Flint to $85 million in
bonds to join a new re-
gional water pipeline to
Lake Huron while at the
needed to sell bonds
to clean up a lagoon,
Schuette said, but the
money went as the city’s
share to Kareg-
nondi Water Au-
thority to build
the
pipeline,
which still is un-
der construction.
“This case is a classic
bait-and-switch. ... The
lime sludge lagoon was
not an emergency,” said
special prosecutor Todd
Flood.
During a news con-
ference, there was no
This case is a classic bait-and-
switch. The lime sludge lagoon
was not an emergency
and Daugherty John-
son, the former utilities
director, were charged
with conspiracy and
false pretenses.
Attorney General Bill
Schuette said Earley and
Ambrose
committed
same time using a city
water plant that was not
equipped to properly
treat the river water be-
fore it went to roughly
100,000 residents.
They claimed that
debt-burdened
Flint
allegation by Schuette
that Earley and Ambrose
personally gained from
the bond deal or by keep-
ing the Flint River as the
source of water for Flint
while the pipeline was
being constructed.
Flint’s water system
became
contaminated
with lead because water
from the river wasn’t
treated for corrosion for
18 months, from April
2014 to October 2015.
The water ate away at a
protective coating inside
old pipes and fixtures, re-
leasing lead.
Schuette said the inves-
tigation has revealed a
“fixation on finances and
balance sheets” in Flint
during that period.
“This fixation has cost
lives,” he said, noting
that 12 people died from
Legionnaires’
disease,
which has been linked by
experts to the river wa-
ter. “This fixation came at
the expense of protecting
the health and safety of
Flint. It’s all about num-
bers over people, money
over health.”
Earley, Ambrose and
Croft could not immedi-
ately be reached for com-
ment. They didn’t appear
in court Tuesday.
Johnson is “going to
plead not guilty and
we’re going to stand by
that,” attorney Edwar Ze-
ineh said.
Lansing Mayor Virg
Bernero released a state-
ment, defending Am-
brose as a “man of the
highest character who
would never knowing-
ly endanger the public
health.”
The latest charges
bring to 13 the number
of people who have been
charged in the investiga-
tion of Flint water and
the Legionnaires’ out-
break. The other nine are
eight current or former
state employees and a
water plant employee.
Perhaps the most sig-
nificant catch so far: Cor-
rine Miller, Michigan’s
former director of dis-
ease control, pleaded no
contest to willful neglect
of duty in September.
She said she was aware
of dozens of cases of Le-
gionnaires’ in the Flint
area around the same
time the city changed
its water source, but she
didn’t report it to the gen-
eral public.
“The investigation has
continued to go up and
go out. ... We are not at
the end,” said former FBI
agent Andy Arena, the
lead investigator.
Meanwhile, tests show
Flint’s water quality is
improving, although res-
idents are urged to drink
tap water only if it’s first
run through a filter.
Shipping cont’d from pg 9
National Retail Federation, an industry
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FedEx expects volume to rise about 10
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