Man pleads guilty to dumping more than 250,000 tires in Maryland

An Anne Arundel County man who illegally dumped and dumped more than 250,000 used tires near the Potomac River in Western Maryland has pleaded guilty to 17 environmental charges, Maryland Attorney General Anthony Brown said Friday.

Michael Osei, a 48-year-old Hanover resident, was charged in April with leaving tires packed in tractor-trailer containers and strewn across an industrial property in Allegany County, creating a fire hazard and jeopardizing local air and water quality. . Osei pleaded guilty to the crimes, all misdemeanors, last week in Allegany County District Court.

“It is frankly shocking that any company would be so reckless as to jeopardize the health of Marylanders in this way,” Brown said in a statement. press release. “Sentences like this are necessary to protect the environment and send a clear message that businesses must legally recycle and dispose of used tires. We simply will not tolerate such irresponsible behavior.”

The investigation found that in 2021, county officials granted Osea a preferential lease on property in Westernport, near the West Virginia border, to establish a facility to recycle used, damaged and defective tires. Osei said the plant will employ up to 50 people and that it has already secured contracts worth millions of dollars to ship tires overseas.

But since the facility began operating in July 2021, according to the press release, “few, if any, tires have been removed.”

Maryland Department of Environment inspectors first visited the site in October of that year and noted 10,000 to 15,000 used tires stored outside in piles. Proper disposal of scrap tires is regulated by Maryland law to minimize health and environmental risks.

The facility also did not have permits. Inspectors contacted the state fire marshal’s office, fearing a “significant fire hazard.”

The fire chief repeatedly ordered Osei to stop operating the facility between fall 2021 and spring 2022. It eventually left the facility in September 2022, leaving behind hundreds of thousands of scrap tires. County officials have since begun clearing them out.

“Non-compliant tire collection sites pose a significant fire hazard to our Fire Department employees, the public and first responders,” Acting State Fire Marshal Jason Mowbray said in a news release. “Across our country there have been examples of fires that these properties can create that highlight the true danger.”

Osei is scheduled to be sentenced by Judge Jeffrey Getty on December 17, 2024.