No charges for toxic sludge plant boss

A judge has dismissed prosecution demands that the head of a metals company linked to Hungary’s devastating red sludge spill be charged with negligence and he has been released from police custody, his lawyer said yesterday.

Appearing after the closed court hearing reviewing the case, Zoltani Bakonyi’s lawyer, Janos Banati, said the judge ruled in his favour after finding that prosecutors could not substantiate their argument that Mr Bakonyi did not sufficiently prepare emergency warning and rescue plans in case of accidents like the sludge spill. Mr Banati said prosecutors were preparing an appeal.

The decision was sure to embitter hundreds of villagers who blame the management of MAL Rt, or the Hungarian Aluminium Production and Trade Company, for the deaths of nine people, hundreds of homes being left uninhabitable and the poisoning of local waterways.

Some 700,000 cubic metres of caustic sludge and water burst from a storage pool of the metals plant on October 4, inundating three western Hungarian towns and spilling into the Danube.

“Life won’t be returning to normal for a very, very long time,” said Devecser Mayor Tamas Toldi, whose town was one those swamped by the toxic slurry.

In a bit of good news, authorities said that cracks in the wall of the broken reservoir appear not to have grown wider, calming some fears that further collapse would release a second flood of sludge.

One village remained evacuated yesterday and residents in Devecser were ready to leave at short notice. But Mr Toldi said he hoped the state of alert could be called off later in the day once a protective wall in neighbouring Kolontar meant to contain any new spill had been completed.