Feds conducting criminal probe of W.Va. mine blast

[deminks]

Source: Associated Press

WASHINGTON — Federal prosecutors said Friday they are investigating whether there was "willful criminal activity" by the company that operates the West Virginia mine where 29 workers died in an accident last month.

The U.S. attorney's office for the Southern District of West Virginia said in a letter that investigators are looking into actions by the mine's operator, Performance Coal, and its directors, officers and agents.

The letter, obtained by The Associated Press, asks the Labor Department to hold off pursuing dozens of civil cases against Performance for alleged mine safety violations.

Performance is a subsidiary of Massey Energy Co., which owns the Upper Big Branch mine.

Last month, federal law enforcement officials said the FBI had interviewed nearly two dozen current and former employees of Massey in the probe. But the Justice Department declined to publicly confirm there was a criminal investigation.

Read more: http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jxHCZsRXECQX1EL9i-AakghyY9XwD9FMS95O0

[Union Yes]

1. K&R INDICT NOW!

[gratuitous]

2. Oh come on! Hasn't Massey suffered enough?

No.

[salguine]

3. Just for show. Back to business as usual very soon.

[midnight]

4. K&R

[fishwax]

5. k/r

:kick:

[spinbaby]

6. Here's what they're investigating

My contacts in the mining industry tell me that the company had ordered the mine to save time by not building the overcasts that separate incoming from outgoing air flow. They are also rumored to have bribed mine inspectors.

[Turborama]

7. "The company" would mean Blankenship

He should take the biggest blame for what you describe and be given a life sentence in a supermax.



In 2005, Blankenship wrote a memo to employees telling them that maximizing coal production was more important than spending time constructing things like support beams or ventilation shafts:

"If any of you have been asked by your group presidents, your supervisors, engineers or anyone else to do anything other than run coal (i.e., build overcasts, do construction jobs, or whatever) you need to ignore them and run coal."

From...

Investing Daily: http://www.investingdaily.com/id/17176/massey-energy-a-dirty-coal-company.html">Massey Energy: A Dirty Coal Company

[Mnemosyne]

8. But still not investigating the * regime, which is responsible for millions of deaths?

:crazy: