Custodial sentence possible for illegal tyre storage

Some people are slow to learn, others don’t seem to learn at all. The Lincolnshire Echo has reported a case where the second of these may well apply – that of Carl Steele, a man who must have tested the Environment Agency’s patience.

According to the Echo, Steele’s business, FCM Logistics (Tyres) Ltd, illegally stored thousands of tyres in Deeping St Nicholas while running an unlicensed waste and treatment operation. Despite receiving no less than twenty warnings from the Environment Agency on the folly of storing tyres without a license, Steele made no attempt to register the operation, which at one stage housed as many as 400,000 waste tyres. After the Environment Agency instigated legal action against Steele and his company, the amount of tyres at the site declined – yet not because Steele had learned the error of his ways. Agency investigators traced the missing waste tyres to other illegal sites in Yorkshire, Norfolk, Essex and Worcestershire.

Court proceedings began last year and on July 15 Steele pleaded guilty of six charges relating to the illegal storage and treatment of waste tyres. Sentencing has been adjourned until September, however upon granting bail Judge Sean Morris warned Steele that “options are open” and that “for offences such as these a custodial sentence can follow.”