National Clothesline

Behzad Kahoolyzadeh, 50-year-old Los Angeles man, was sentenced in Los Angeles Federal Court to 37 months in jail and forced to pay $1.29 million in cleanup costs for his role with AAD Distribution and Dry Cleaning Services, Inc., the U.S. Justice Department announced on Jan. 25.

Kahoolyzadeh, who also goes by the names Behzad Cohen and David Cohen, pleaded guilty in March, 2004, to two counts of illegally transporting hazardous waste and two counts of illegally storing hazardous waste. He also pleaded guilty to one count of conspiring to commit those crimes.

The company, based in Vernon, CA, was one of the largest handlers of perchloroethylene waste in the state until it was shut down in January of 2001.

Before closing its doors, AAD Disposal was suspected of cheating about 300 drycleaners in the western and midwestern United States out of approximately $5 million over a period of five years.

The company charged drycleaners to pick up, treat and arrange for the disposal of perc; however, several key AAD figures worked together to conceal permit violations from city and state inspectors. They routinely loaded perc-filled drums onto trucks before inspections and shipped them off to other facilities that were not equipped to store hazardous waste legally.

Additionally, AAD Distribution employees and owners falsified shipment manifests to cover their tracks.

Already, Hormoz Pourat, vice president of AAD and manager of Right Choice, Inc., was sentenced in December of 2003 by the U.S. District Court in Los Angeles. He also received a penalty of 37 months in prison and was ordered to pay $1.29 million in financial restitution for his crimes.

Prior to that ruling, Pourat was tried and found guilty in Colorado for the same ongoing case. Judge Brian Boatright ordered him to pay a $100,000 in fine and serve a 17-year jail sentence — the longest ever levied for an environmental crime in the U.S.

In fact, Hormoz Pourat, along with his brother Harry and four AAD employees — Behzad Kahoolyzadeh among them — faced 34 criminal counts in Colorado, including charges of racketeering, forgery, attempting to influence a public servant, violations of the Colorado Hazardous Waste Act and conspiracy to commit violations of the Colorado Hazardous Waste Act.

While Harry Pourat was suspected of fleeing the country to Iran, the other AAD Distribution employees all received various probation and community services along with fines totaling up to over $80,000.

As for the recent case against Mr. Kahoolyzadeh, it was considered to be nothing less than the utmost priority, according to David M. Uhlmann, chief of the Environmental Crimes Section of the Justice Department’s Environment and Natural Resources Division.

“Illegal transportation of hazardous materials puts public health and the environment at risk,” he noted. “The defendant’s efforts to conceal his illegal conduct, carried out on behalf of one of the largest handlers of drycleaning waste in the state of California, made this a particularly egregious case and warranted the jail sentence imposed by the federal district court.”

Granta Y. Nakayama, EPA’s Assistant Administrator for Enforcement and Compliance Assurance, told the press his thoughts on the subject, as well.

“Illegal storage and disposal practices for profit will not be tolerated and individuals, not just corporations, that refuse to comply with the law, will be vigorously prosecuted,” he said.