Boss jailed for dumping waste on land without permission

Evesham Journal 13th December 2007 reported that the boss of a Worcestershire company which illegally dumped 23 loads of waste on land at a farm without permission has been jailed for 18 months.

John Bruce had pleaded guilty at Warwick Crown Court to the unauthorised deposit of controlled waste at a farm in Ryton, near Coventry, without a waste management licence. Bruce, aged 35, of Upper Walcote Farm, Walcote Lane, Drakes Broughton, near Pershore, had also admitted failing to comply with an order disqualifying him from managing a company.

Prosecutor Barry Berlin said that in 2005, Bruce was running two companies, including one called UK Plant 2002 Ltd, and entered into an agreement with Leominster Demolition Ltd to dispose of waste soil and spoil from a site.

In August, 2005, Stephen Postlethwaite, the owner of Ryton Fields Farm, Ryton, saw UK Plant lorries tipping loads of soil on his land - which he had not given permission for. When he challenged one of the drivers as more loads were dumped the following month, the driver called Bruce, who claimed he had been given authority by someone called Robert Cooper.

Based on a fee of £6 to £8 a tonne to have dumped it at an authorised site, the illegal operation had saved Bruce's companies around £3,000.

When Bruce was questioned about his illegal activity he claimed he had been tipped off by Cooper about the site and been told he could tip there no problem.' Mr Berlin said Bruce had been fined £5,000 in 1999 for dumping contaminated waste which included asbestos. And in 2002 he was required to give an undertaking not to deposit waste on land known as Badger Hill - but breached that and was jailed for six months. Of Bruce's latest offences, his barrister Tim Green commented: "The site where it was being deposited was not an area of natural beauty. It was already being used or had been used for the depositing of waste."

He pointed out that the waste being deposited was not hazardous, and said that Cooper did exist.
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