Darren Campbell
Northern News Services

NNSL (Aug 31/98) - Fort Smith contractor Armando Berton has learned the hard way that it doesn't pay to ignore the law.

The 53-year-old was sentenced to 12 months in prison on Aug. 20 for his failure to obey a territorial court judgement handed down over a year ago.

In May of 1997, Berton was convicted on four charges under the Northwest Territories Environmental Protection Act. The charges related to Berton allowing oil stored on two lots in Fort Smith to leak into the soil and his failure to clean up lots as ordered by the department of resources, wildlife, and economic development (RWED).

In the 1997 sentence Judge Robert Halifax ordered Berton to submit a plan of action to RWED for cleaning up the lots. He was then to clean up the lots within three months of the ruling and pay for the cost of any further testing on the sites to ensure they met RWED's guidelines.

He was also ordered to properly store the contaminants in the future and pay $23,900 to RWED to cover some of the costs of the research and analysis done on the sites. Finally, Berton was fined a total of $50,000 on the four charges and given a year to pay them.

But it wasn't long before RWED laid new charges on Berton for his failure to obey the orders. On Aug. 20 that failure caught up with him and Judge Michel Bourassa made him pay.

"Mr. Berton has no respect for the law. There was an absolute, total refusal to abide by the court order," said Bourassa during the sentencing. "He was indifferent and unresponsive to his obligations."

Crown attorney Alan Regel asked for a two-year sentence for Berton, while Berton's lawyer Tom McCauley asked for a suspended sentence.

Regel said he thought Bourassa's sentence was a fair one.

However, McCauley said Bourassa's judgement was too harsh.

As for how the sites will eventually get cleaned up, Bourassa said the original orders are still in effect and Berton will have to clean up the properties.