PANAMA (dpa-AFX) - Carnival Corp.'s Princess Cruise Lines has agreed to plead guilty to seven felony charges stemming from its deliberate pollution of the seas and intentional acts to cover it up. Princess has also agreed to pay a $40 million penalty, which is the largest-ever penalty involving deliberate vessel pollution.
The agreement was announced by Assistant Attorney General John Cruden for the Department of Justice's Environment and Natural Resources Division and U.S. Attorney Wifredo Ferrer for the Southern District of Florida in Miami, Florida.
As part of the agreement, eight Carnival cruise line companies will be under a court supervised Environmental Compliance Program for five years.
Princess Cruise Lines is a subsidiary of Carnival Corp., which is the world's largest cruise company.
The charges are based on the investigation by the U.S. Coast Guard by the British Maritime and Coastguard Agency indicating that a newly hired engineer on the Caribbean Princess reported that a so-called 'magic pipe' had been used on August 2013, to illegally discharge oily waste off the coast of England.
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