'Don't Talk To The Police': Details From Fill Pile Affidavits

FAIRFIELD, CT — A Fairfield official recently charged in the town’s ongoing fill pile scandal told a subordinate police were “a bunch of liars,” according to court documents.

A former town contractor accused in the pile contamination crisis discouraged workers from wearing protective equipment out of concern it would alarm the public, police said.

These are just a few examples of how Fairfield employees repeatedly misrepresented the situation surrounding the use of contaminated material in the construction of a berm at the pile, according to affidavits associated with an investigation of pile activity.

Defendants recently charged in the investigation include: Brian Carey, conservation director and interim head of public works; Emmet Hibson, former human resources director; Joe Michelangelo, former public works director; Scott Bartlett, former public works superintendent; and Robert J. Grabarek, an environmental contractor hired by the town.

All five are accused of conspiracy and of illegally disposing of toxic polychlorinated biphenyls — or PCBs — during the 2018 berm project. The affidavits offer a more detailed account of their actions.

Carey was accused of calling police liars, an affidavit said. He is on administrative leave pending an internal investigation and did not respond to a request Friday for comment.

“I heard you were talking to the police,” Carey said to a subordinate in August or September 2019, according to the affidavit. “Don’t talk to the police. They don’t know what they are talking about. They are a bunch of liars.”

Carey went on to tell his employee, “I can’t tell you what to do,” the affidavit said.

During a Board of Finance meeting in August 2019, Carey admitted the berm was built without state permission but did not disclose that the material used to construct it contained PCBs, according to the affidavit.

“I placed Mr. Carey on administrative leave when I was alerted to the warrant ... signed by a judge for his arrest,” First Selectwoman Brenda Kupchick, elected to lead the town in November 2019, said in an email. “I’m disheartened this situation was allowed to happen in our town and hope all who participated in any criminal activity will be brought to justice and held to account for their actions.”

Carey, along with Michelangelo and Bartlett, is also charged with illegal disposal of solid waste, receiving solid waste without a permit and an additional conspiracy charge after allowing contaminated material dredged from Owen Fish Pond to be dumped at the fill pile while the berm was being built, according to police.

In February 2020, when a state inspector requested paperwork associated with the dredging, Carey seemed upset and provided the inspector with documents that omitted information about where the dredged material would be disposed, an affidavit said. Carey confirmed to the inspector that there was no record of the disposal location, and said, while walking away, that the material was in the berm, according to the affidavit.

Three years prior, in May 2017, when a finance board member asked if the berm would be made with “clean material,” Michelangelo said that it would, according to police.

“Traditionally, arrest warrants are filled with accusations,” Michelangelo’s attorney, Eugene Riccio, said. “The merits of those accusations ultimately get tested in court.”

An affidavit also contends that when employees involved in the construction of the berm asked contractor Grabarek in April 2018 about protective equipment such as hazmat suits and respirators, he told them the equipment was available but unnecessary and that “it would just cause concern with the citizens.”

Grabarek did not respond Friday to a request for comment.

The recent charges concerning the berm and Owen Fish Pond are far from the first criminal accusations related to the fill pile.

READ MORE: Fairfield's Years-Long Fill Pile Saga Continues With New Arrests

In summer 2019, Michelangelo, Bartlett and contractor Jason Julian, of Julian Development, were arrested and accused of participating in a conspiracy to illegally run a dump for contaminated material at the pile and allow fraudulent billing, court records have shown.

Also charged is Fairfield's former chief fiscal officer, Bob Mayer, who was arrested in January and accused of stealing a file related to the fill pile and two folders on the Penfield Pavilion building project. Around the same time, Bartlett was charged again, in connection with accusations that he stole thousands of dollars from a mentally disabled woman whose affairs he was appointed to manage.

Fairfield hired Julian Development in 2013 to operate the fill pile and reduce the amount of unused material on the site by 40,000 cubic yards. But over the next three years, the pile tripled in size, and days before the agreement was set to end, contaminants were discovered on the property. Police opened an investigation into activity at the pile in 2017.

In summer 2019, around the same time Bartlett, Julian and Michelangelo were charged, asbestos at a local park was reported to police in connection with the use of town fill. More than 80 areas in Fairfield have since been tested for contamination.

The vast majority of those sites have been deemed safe, but some locations were found to contain asbestos, arsenic and other contaminants, and are undergoing expensive remediation.

Fairfield's town attorney has estimated the remediation cost for the pile and sites affected by its contamination at up to $10 million. The town has already taken steps to set aside well over $3 million for the aftermath of the fill pile scandal and Fairfield is pursuing multiple legal actions to recoup the cost.