EDITORIAL: You Can Pollute and Lie, and You Won’t Go to Jail in RI
Wednesday, June 21, 2023
In Rhode Island, it is okay to dump crap in a poor neighborhood and pile it up as high as two stories.
— It's okay.
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It can be illegal to dump the material — a clear-cut violation of the law. On Tuesday morning Judge John McConnell gave Dennis Ferreira no jail time, no home confinement, no nothing.
— No worries.
It doesn’t matter if the neighbors [victims of the dumping] were trying to live the American dream in a tough neighborhood.
— Blah, blah. They should know better than to live in a poor neighborhood.
Are we going to get uptight if one of the adjacent homes next to the pile — piled with the approval of the State Department of Transportation — was a pregnant woman and her small children?
— Really, are we going to worry about that? We have roads to build, contracts to dole out, and campaign donations to collect.
Are we really going to sweat it that in one of the other homes, the pregnant granddaughter needed to move out because of the material?
— Contaminated material, schmaterial.
Does it really matter that the guy who got caught dumping it, lied repeatedly to federal investigators?
— Meh, what's a little fib here or there?
It really does not matter that the federal law for these violations provides for years in jail and the sentencing guideline is 6-12 months in jail.
— But prosecutors came down hard (LOL) asking for home confinement for four months. Well, there is nothing good to binge on Netflix anyways. Ferrerira could have been stuck watching “Emily in Paris” over and over.
— Judge McConnell wiped even the home confinement away. The admitted liar got nada, nothing, not even a date with Netflix.
After all, this was a $410 million project, and the company which this guy worked for barely made a nickel.
— And let's be serious, these people who live next to the piles, whose homes were covered, whose grape plants died, whose kids were exposed, could not use their yards for years are kind of poor, and nobody, not the DOT or the Feds, and certainly not the judge, really give a crap.
These victims don’t matter. We just proved it.
An editorial is the opinion of a publication — specifically, the ownership.
While based on facts and news reporting, it is an opinion intended to discuss critical community issues. Often, the opinion is written with the intention of positive change.
GoLocal editorials have sparked conversations, change, and even the naming of a bridge.
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