Guilty pleas in non-criminal Mégantic-related charges
Several former employees and executives of the Montreal, Maine and Atlantic (MMA) railway pleaded guilty Monday to non-criminal offenses under the federal Railway Safety and Fishries acts in Lac-mégantic. The charges are connected to the Lac Mégantic rail accident that killed 47 people in the summer of 2013. Each has been sentenced to the maximum $50,000 fine, while MMA was ordered to pay $1 million for the Fisheries offense. $250,000 will be transferred to victims of the accident via the Fonds d’avenir de la Ville de Lac-mégantic. Tom Harding and Jean Demaitre, two of three employees acquitted last month of criminal charges in the affair, joined EX-CEO Robert Grindrod, Transport Director Lynne Labonté, and MMA Canada executives Kennerh Strout and Mike Horan as the six former employees charged with failing to apply the minimum number of hand brakes on a train and properly testing their effectiveness. The charges carry a maximum penalty of six months in jail and fines of up to $50,000 per defendant.
The Crown also accused the same six former MMA employees, as well as Richard Labrie, an EX-MMA employee and rail traffic controller, and the Canadian and American entities of the nowdefunct railway of polluting fish habitats when the crude oil flowed into Lac Mégantic and the Chaudière River. Those charges carry a maximum fine of $1 million per defendant but no jail time.
On Dec.1, 2017, Crown and defence attorneys reached a plea deal to settle the charges, pending judicial approval, which happened Monday.
In the early hours of July 6, 2013, a parked freight train carrying six million litres of crude oil rolled downhill into Lac-mégantic, leading to the explosion that also took out a major part of the town's downtown core.
This past January, Harding, Demaître and Labrie were acquitted of charges of criminal negligence causing death in the tragedy.
MMA had 'weak safety culture'
In its 2014 report into the derailment, Canada's Transportation Safety Board determined that no one individual or factor caused the derailment.
The report did chastise MMA for what it called a "weak safety culture" and criticized Transport Canada for not adequately regulating the company.