5th dumping defendant gets probation, community service

YOUNGSTOWN

A federal judge has sentenced the fifth defendant in the dumping of oil-field waste into a Mahoning River tributary in Youngstown to three years of probation and ordered him to complete 150 hours of community service.

David N. Jenkins, 34, of Warren, who pleaded guilty in July to violating the Clean Water Act, drew the sentence Tuesday from U.S. District Court Judge Christopher A. Boyko in Cleveland, who imposed no fine on him.

Jenkins was sentenced a week before the scheduled release next Tuesday of his boss, Ben Lupo, 66, from the Federal Medical Center, Devens, in Ayer, Mass.

Lupo is completing the 28-month prison term he received after pleading guilty to violating the act. He was fined $25,000.

In a sentencing memorandum, Jenkins’ lawyers – Attys. John McCaffrey and Adrienne B. Kirshner of Cleveland – asked Judge Boyko to consider Jenkins’ acceptance of responsibility for his crime, and the probation sentences two co-defendants received for the same crime.

The memorandum says Jenkins was unaware the storm drain into which the waste was emptied flowed into an unnamed Mahoning River tributary.

Read more about the case in Wednesday's Vindicator or on Vindy.com.