Yesterday the criminal trial of the W.R. Grace & Co. and various responsible corporate officers began in U.S. District Court in Missoula, Montana. The trial is one of the most-watched environmental prosecutions by the Justice Department in recent memory, as it involves allegations of release of asbestos into Libby, Montana over the last several decades. Law professors and law students at the University of Montana School of Law are running this very interesting blog tracking the trial.
An extremely important crime victims’ rights issue has come up during the case, which will be resolved this week by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit: Are persons who have been endangered by an environmental crime sufficiently “harmed” to obtain rights under the Crime Victims’ Rights Act?
According to the indictment, over more than three decades, defendant W.R. Grace & Company mined vermiculite ore containing asbestos and released asbestos into the air around Libby. The indictment alleges a conspiracy to knowingly endanger persons in Libby as well as several substantive endangerment counts under the Clean Air Act, 42 U.S.C. § 7413(c)(5)(A).
The Crime Victims’ Rights Act extends its rights to all “victims” of federal offenses, which it defines as persons “directly and proximately harmed as the result of the commission of a federal offense.” 18 U.S.C. § 3771(e). In a pre-trial ruling, however, the U.S.District Judge presiding over the trial concluded that the charges involved mere