Etcher Family Farms, a livestock operation in southeastern Iowa, has been fined $50,000 after the owner and an employee pled guilty to charges of violating the Clean Water Act while discharging manure, according to a Feb. 28 announcement from the Department of Justice.
Scott Allen Etcher and Benjamin Allen McFarland of New London, Iowa, were sentenced by U.S. District Court Judge Stephanie M. Rose on Feb. 26 after pleading guilty to Discharge of a Pollutant. Etcher Family Farms was sentenced to five years of organizational probation, a $50,000 fine, and a $400 special assessment payable to the Crime Victims’ Fund.
According to the DOJ, McFarland “negligently discharged agricultural waste pollutants” to land via an umbilical hose on or about July 22, 2015, at the Etcher Family Farms facility in New London, resulting in runoff to an unnamed tributary to Big Creek.
The incident, which was reportedly done under the supervision of the farm’s owner and operator, Scott Etcher, was investigated by the Iowa Department of Natural Resources and the Environmental Protection Agency. Both Etcher and McFarland pled guilty on Oct. 25, 2018.