A U.S. District judge sentenced two former N.C. Ferry Division officials Tuesday to three years of probation for their roles in the illegal dredging of the Currituck Sound in 2004.
Former Ferry Division Director Jerry Gaskill, of Cedar Island, and former Superintendent of Dredge and Maintenance Billy R. Moore, of Grantsboro, also were sentenced to six months of home containment, 50 hours of community service, and a $5,000 fine.
Under the federal sentencing guidelines each was expected to receive about two years of active prison time. Federal prosecutors had no comment after the hearing conducted by Judge Terrence Boyle.
Outside the courthouse Gaskill said he was satisfied with the ruling. “I believed in my innocence and believed in my Lord. My faith brought me through this,” he said.
In May 2004, Ferry Division workers used workboats to “prop wash” a channel in an essential marine habitat. The dredging was done in a futile effort to establish passenger ferry service across the Currituck Sound. When news reports about the incident surfaced, Gaskill and other Ferry Division officials said the damage done to the sound was accidental.
However, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the N.C. State Bureau of Investigation, the U.S. Coast Guard Investigative Service, and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers conducted a lengthy investigation, which led to criminal charges.
Moore pleaded guilty in 2005 to ordering the workers to do the dredging.
Gaskill pleaded not guilty to several charges and his case went to trial. A jury convicted him in June of making a material false statement to the Corps of Engineers during an investigation of the dredging. His false statement obstructed federal efforts to identify the dredgers and to begin remediation at the site. Gaskill said in court Tuesday that he did not knowingly lie.
Three other Ferry Division workers who participated in the dredging pleaded guilty last year to misdemeanors and also were given no active prison time.
Previous Carolina Journal stories reported that the new ferry service ran into several obstacles. Plans for the project were initiated soon after the Currituck County Board of Commissioners asked State Sen. Marc Basnight in July 2002 to help establish a ferry service to transport schoolchildren from the Outer Banks to the mainland. But previous stories by CJ showed that a scheme to transport resort workers and tourists was a major factor behind the project.
The 2002 state budget bill ordered the Department of Transportation to perform a feasibility study. Gaskill conducted a study and submitted it to the General Assembly in May 2003. The proposed route would have been about 12 miles across the shallow Currituck Sound from the Currituck community to the Corolla community.
“The proposed ferry service is feasible, assuming the appropriate permits can be obtained,” Gaskill concluded in the study. But he failed to address two previous unsuccessful attempts by Currituck County to obtain a dredging permit for the shallow Corolla location.
State and federal environmental agencies had ruled that the area was a sensitive marine habitat that needed to be protected. At the time of the illegal dredging, neither DOT nor Currituck County had applied for a permit.
The 49-person, 50-foot pontoon boat ordered for the service was delivered in August 2004 to the State Shipyard in Manns Harbor. The boat is still docked there unused, and there are no efforts to revive the project.
Several friends and family members showed up for the sentencing hearing to support Gaskill and Moore.
Don Carrington is executive editor of Carolina Journal.