A Co Meath man has been jailed for six months for illegal dumping and another man fined €150,000 for allowing his land to be used as an illegal dump.
Neville Watson (41), of Kilmurray, Trim, who was legally trading in a small way in the waste disposal business at the time, was jailed for six months at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court.
He pleaded guilty to not having a licence under the Waste Management Act for use of a site for dumping between November 2000 and December 2001.
John O'Reilly (64), of Robertstown, Naas, who then owned the site at Whitestown, Baltinglass, Co Wicklow, pleaded guilty to disposing of waste which could cause pollution on a date between November 2000 and December 2001.
The men were charged as a result of a Garda investigation arising from an official complaint by Wicklow County Council.
Both men, along with others, are also facing civil proceedings in the High Court initiated by the council.
Judge Katherine Delahunt was told that it could cost up to €10 million to make the dump safe.
She said because Watson was already involved in the business he would have been aware of his responsibilities and liabilities under the legislation. He would have known the consequences of his actions and the ramifications for the environment.
Judge Delahunt said she was satisfied that O'Reilly had made frank admissions to gardaí and he was not a "hard ruthless businessman" but a man in a state of depression and alcohol abuse who had made "ill-considered judgments".
She accepted that he was not aware of the volume of the waste or the extent to which his land was being abused, and that he was taken advantage of by others.
The court heard that gardaí became involved in 2001 after the complaint by Wicklow County Council.
It was told that the council had also used the 20-acre site informally for dumping waste for some years.
O'Reilly had planning permission since the 1980s to operate the site as a quarry to extract sand and gravel and he did this mainly by licensing others.
He told gardaí that some of these users unloaded waste on the site before taking sand or gravel. He made an arrangement with AI Waste in 1998 that waste could be deposited for £20 per load.
O'Reilly was then approached in 2000 by Watson, on behalf of Swalcliffe Ltd, trading as Dublin Waste, who agreed to pay £62.50 per lorryload to deposit waste.
Watson had his own waste disposal trucks but he worked for Dublin Waste and for Louis Moriarty, of Griffith Avenue, Drumcondra, Dublin, who would be before the court on another date in relation to illegal dumping of waste.
O'Reilly had now disposed of his interest in the land and was retired.
Donal Ó Laoire, an environmental consultant, said that the site had been very well covered and concealed. It took some time to detect the illegally-dumped waste, which included chemical waste and human blood.
He said that the site was totally unsuitable for waste dumping because of its permeable soil, which meant that contaminants from the residue could seep down to the ground water level.
The council was "probably looking at a cost from €6 million to €10 million", depending on factors, to deal with the waste. The waste went down more than 14 metres in some places, and the new owner, Brownfields Ltd, had been refused planning permission by both the council and Bord Pleanála on appeal.