Life on the lam for junk man ends in arrest

After being on the lam for over two years, Harry Smith Jr. of Meddybemps, an environmental criminal listed on Maine's Most Wanted List, was apprehended on the morning of November 3 at a salvage business in Everett, Mass. Smith has been facing jail time for felony hazardous waste crimes and probation violations related to his failure to comply with a court-ordered cleanup of tire stockpiles. The cost for cleaning up the Smith junkyards and the Eastern Surplus site that was owned by Harry Smith Sr. amounts to nearly $20 million, with the final tally still undetermined, since additional cleanup and remediation may be necessary.

In July 2003, the Superior Court in Washington County ordered Harry Smith Jr., 65, to serve six months in jail for violating probation linked to criminal convictions concerning tire stockpiles at his junkyards in Meddybemps. At the time of his probation revocation, Smith was also free on post-conviction bail following his convictions in February 2003 for hazardous waste crimes committed at the same junkyards in Meddybemps. He was sentenced to one year on the hazardous waste crimes but appealed the convictions to the Maine Supreme Judicial Court. The court denied his appeal on December 2, 2003, and he was ordered to serve his one-year sentence. So far, he has failed to serve either the six-month sentence for the probation violation or the one-year sentence for the hazardous waste crimes.

Smith is now in the custody of law enforcement officials in Massachusetts and was scheduled to be arraigned in Chelsea District Court on November 15. Maine Attorney General Steven Rowe will seek to have Smith returned to Maine and will likely charge Smith with additional crimes related to his failure to report to jail. Assistant Attorney General Leanne Robbin says the AG's office wants "to send a message that there will be more time to serve for those who choose not to."

Rowe comments, "Through some fabulous police work and a bit of good luck, Smith is finally behind bars where he belongs. Let all who might flaunt our environmental laws and ignore our court orders take note of what our system promises for you."

Smith's capture was spearheaded by Attorney General Detective Charles "Chick" Love with assistance from the Portland office of the U.S. Marshals Service. Robbin says that authorities had heard rumors that Smith was fishing in Argentina or living in Central America. Chick Love had developed tips about Smith's location and heard that he was living with his son in Everett, Mass., and working there. The U.S. Marshals Service found him at the salvage yard. "It turned out he was south of the border, but not that far south," comments Robbin.

She says there's no doubt that Smith was receiving some help in evading authorities. "There are some folks in the Meddybemps area who view him as a hero against the government," she notes. "We believe that they were in contact with him. It takes more than one person to hide in plain sight and to hide as long as he did."

Salvage transferred to Baileyville
The Maine Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) has confirmed that salvage from Harry Smith's south yard was being transferred to a junkyard in Baileyville, according to William Butler, an environmental specialist with the DEP. It's estimated that about 50 open-top 30-cubic-yard containers that were in Meddybemps are at the Baileyville junkyard. He says the Baileyville junkyard is owned by Tony Leavitt and Gregg Smith, two of Harry Smith's sons. At one point the salvage was being transferred to a salvage yard in Nova Scotia, according to records from Tony Leavitt, Butler says. According to Canadian officials, that yard was authorized to receive the salvage.

Although the DEP has not conducted any on-site inspections of the Baileyville junkyard, the DEP did conduct a flyover of the Baileyville and Meddybemps sites on July 21, but Butler says, "Nothing jumped out dramatically." Although there was a car crusher on a trailer at Baileyville, there were no vehicles. "It looks like a transferring location," says Butler. As of October 15, a change in state law requires that junkyard owners and operators must remove mercury switches from vehicles and recycle them. The change in the junkyard law gives the DEP and municipalities greater control over junkyards.

Junkyards are regulated by municipalities, not the DEP, so unless hazardous waste is mixed in it is difficult for the DEP to monitor the junkyards or take any enforcement action. Butler cannot say whether there is any hazardous waste at the site because the DEP has not conducted any on-site inspections. He is also unsure if the junkyard has a permit from the municipality, since he has not heard back from James Moffitt, the code enforcement officer for Baileyville and Meddybemps. Moffitt says the junkyard has been in place for a long time and was permitted at one time. He does not believe that there is any hazardous waste at the site and says he does not know where the salvage is coming from or whether any is being transferred to Canada. Moffitt declines to make any further comment about the junkyard.

Cleanup costs
The DEP is completing its remedial investigation and a feasibility study of the Smith junkyard, looking for evidence of contaminated groundwater, surface water or soil, according to Kathy Howatt, project manager with the DEP for the Meddybemps cleanup. Possible contamination of Hatton Brook, which runs into the Dennys River, has also been examined. A report is due by the end of December, and the DEP is working with the U.S. Department of Justice and the Defense Reuse and Marketing Office in coordinating the investigation. Much of the waste at the Eastern Surplus site, which was operated by Smith's father, and the Harry Smith Jr. junkyard sites was military surplus purchased from the Department of Defense.

A risk assessment, to consider the risk to human health any chemicals pose, will be done in the spring. The DEP will then recommend how much more cleanup of the junkyard should be undertaken. The state agency plans by the end of the year to remove the remaining 100,000 tires in Smith's north, south and Cooper yards. In 1995, the DEP had counted 1.6 million tires in the junkyards.

The DEP's task is only for the removal of any chemicals, not solid waste, and the department is fairly confident that all of the hazardous waste has been removed. The sites have been subject to three different environmental cleanups by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the DEP. Also, the junkyard is now closed, so no new waste is coming in.

Robbin comments that Smith "has cost a lot of taxpayer money, and nothing has been contributed by Mr. Smith." The Department of Defense has contributed $14 million to the cleanup of the Eastern Surplus site, with $12 million to the Environmental Protection Agency and $2 million to the DEP. Additionally, the removal of hazardous waste at the Smith junkyard in 1991 cost $1.2 million, another $3 million was spent in 2001-2003 for hazardous waste removal, and approximately $700,000 is being spent on removal of hazardous waste at the Charlotte Smith house and for the current remedial investigation and risk assessment of the Smith junkyards. Almost all of the DEP's costs have been reimbursed by the Department of Defense, with the state presently having $180,000 in unreimbursed costs.

Harry Smith has not had to pay any of the cleanup costs, since he has asserted that he is unable to contribute. Although the DEP can place a lien on his property, the agency cannot take property and sell it. Howatt says the DEP will place a lien on the property after it has finished expending funds on the cleanup.

Until the DEP determines how much more remediation is required at the Smith junkyards, there is no estimate of what the total cost will be for the cleanup.