The pesticide company has agreed to plead guilty to 30 environmental crimes, including two felonies for having a banned Chemical on Maui.
The plea agreement requires Monsanto to pay $12 million in fines.
“Monsanto is a serial violator of federal environmental laws,” U.S. Attorney Tracy Wilkison said in a statement. “The company repeatedly violated laws related to highly regulated chemicals, exposing people to pesticides that can cause serious health problems.”
At the state capitol Monsanto kept saying they were following agricultural safety practices by the label, because the label is the law,” activist Klayton Kubo of Waimea Kaua’i told Organic Consumers Association. “Now we know that they were lying. What else is the agro chemical industry lying about?"
The federal criminal pleas are a turning point. Finally, the Department of Justice has stepped in to prosecute Monsanto’s crimes because the State of Hawaii has been so corrupt and failed at protecting the health of people living in communities surrounded by poisonous fields of GMOs. Now, Hawaii’s politicians and regulators can no longer lie, claiming that these chemicals are safe or that they did everything they could to protect the people.
Ten years ago, the Organic Consumers Association donated to support the creation of a film about Hawaii being the world’s research lab for experimental GMO and pesticide testing. The film was the first to reveal that Kamehameha Schools was leasing land to Monsanto.
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