A judge has denied efforts by the company which owns the pipeline which caused the big 2015 Santa Barbara County oil spill to dismiss criminal charges stemming from the accident.
Plains All American pipeline had sought dismissal of 46 criminal charges against it, as well as three charges against one of its employees. A Santa Barbara County Superior Court judge did dismiss one of the three charges against the employee, but let the remaining two misdemeanor counts against him stand.
A pipeline failure near Refugio State Beach resulted in a more than 140,000 gallon spill which took months to clean up from the ocean, and beaches. The pipeline is still offline.
In addition to the criminal charges Plains faces in court, it’s also the target of a number of lawsuits.
