Flint water crisis: charges against low-level state workers draw scrutiny
Source: The Guardian
Flint water crisis: charges against low-level state workers draw scrutiny
Ryan Felton in Detroit
Saturday 30 July 2016 14.36 BST
[font size=1]-snip-[/font]
But while Schuette’s announcement was welcomed by residents of the Rust Belt city, looming questions remain about how prosecutors will be able to prove that the actions of these employees amounted to crimes – particularly while high-level officials have remained as yet untouched.
David Uhlmann, a University of Michigan law professor and chief of the US Department of Justice’s crimes section from 2000 to 2007, said without criminal charges against political leaders in Flint at the time the crisis began, it’s fair to ask whether it’s appropriate for charges only to be brought against low-level employees who carried out “poor decisions maybe by their bosses”.
“The Michigan attorney general continues to pile on charges against career government officials without addressing the fact that the decisions that caused the Flint water crisis were made far above their pay grades,” he said.
Criminal charges against state and local officials for drinking water violations are unusual, Uhlmann said, and most involve civil cases against a municipality. In rare instances where criminal charges have been brought, he added, “the misconduct has involved sewage or wastewater disposal, not drinking water violations”.
[font size=1]-snip-[/font]
Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/jul/30/flint-water-crisis-criminal-charges-state-workers
= new reply since forum marked as read
