Lake Placid Man Jailed for Illegal Asbestos Removal

December 13, 2006 - A contractor from Lake Placid, NY has received a 27-month prison term for illegally removing asbestos from a local church.

According to an account in the Press Republican, Troy Donie of Norwood, NY, was found guilty by a U.S. District Court justice in Binghamton, charged with violations of the Clean Air Act for unsafe abatement at Lake Placid's St. Eustace Episcopal Church last year.

Donie, age 38, had been hired by the church to clear pipes of asbestos insulation in the boiler room and rectory last November.  The job cost the church $6,000.  Unfortunately, what church officials found after Donie left was piles of asbestos strewn throughout the two church buildings.

"He left gross asbestos contamination throughout the basement of the church and the church rectory," Assistant U.S. Attorney Craig Benedict said Thursday. "He risked exposing numerous people in the church to a life-threatening substance."

When the church contacted Donie, he did agree to remove the material, placing the asbestos in a shed on his property in Norwood that was also used to store little league equipment, Benedict said.

The church found it necessary to find another contractor to complete the job correctly, to the tune of tens of thousands of dollars.  Donie, who is licensed and trained in proper asbestos removal, told another Watertown, NY paper that the sentence was unfair and that the EPA shouldn’t be investigating small jobs like the one he performed at the church.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Benedict disagrees. "Mr. Donie committed multiple violations of the Clean Air Act and lied repeatedly to investigators. The notion that this in an insignificant crime is preposterous," Benedict told the Press Republican.  “He reportedly said he just wanted to make money for Christmas.”