The owner of a company that was charged by the Attorney General’s office with dumping chemicals and cleaning products into a storm drain near Bowmanstown was placed on probation on Tuesday in Carbon County court.

Seyedahmad Ziabari, 61, of Nazareth, who previously pleaded guilty, was placed in the county’s Restrictive Conditions of Probation program (house arrest), for a total of 60 months by Judge Joseph J. Matika.

Ziabari and his company, Plastic World Recycling Inc., of Bowmanstown, were charged in 2020 by the AG’s office.

Ziabari pleaded to four counts of violation of rules/regulations to protect water supply, a felony 3; and misdemeanor 3 counts of disturbing waterways or watersheds; allowing substances be deposit which will poison fish, and unlawful conduct. In exchange for the plea, the commonwealth agreed to drop two other felony 3 counts.

At the time of his plea he was told he faced a prison term of between 12 and 18 months. He applied for and was granted placement in the special probation program which includes he must wear an electronic monitoring device for 12 months. The 60-month term was imposed on the felony count with one year probation periods imposed on the other three counts, with all terms running concurrently.

Ziabari was also ordered to pay a fine of $10,000, which will go to the state’s clean streams fund. He must also pay court costs of about $1,000 and a $50 per month supervision fee while in probation.

At the time of the filing of the charges, Attorney General Josh Shapiro said, “Pennsylvanians have a right to clean air and pure water. Today, we charged Plastic World Recycling for dumping an outrageous amount of cleaning agents into a Carbon County creek that people rely on for trout fishing.”

On May 28, 2018, witnesses saw employees of Plastic World Recycling pouring drums of a white chemical on a loading dock which then flowed to a storm drain connected to the Fireline Creek in Carbon County. Witnesses also observed that Fireline Creek had a white, frothy appearance.

Several witnesses reported smelling an acidic odor in the area of the stormwater drain inlet, according to Shapiro.

One witness estimated that 300 drums of cleaning chemicals were dumped by Plastic World Recycling employees. When employees were asked why they had dumped the cleaning agents into the water, they responded that they had been instructed to do so by the owner, Ziabari, of Plastic Waste Recycling, and that they were only “doing what (they were) told to do.”

The company was charged with disturbance of waterways and watersheds, pollution of waters, industrial waste discharge, and related charges. All the counts against the company were dropped by the commonwealth on Tuesday as part of a plea deal with Ziabari.

His house arrest program will be supervised by Northampton County probation office.