U.S. District Judge Terrence Boyle continued a hearing Monday in which a former director of the N.C. DOT Ferry Division was to have been sentenced for making false statements that obstructed an investigation of illegal dredging in the Currituck Sound.
In May 2004 state workers in the division of the former director, Jerry Gaskill of Cedar Island, 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.
A jury convicted Gaskill 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. The crime is classified as a felony and sentencing guidelines call for a 27- to 33-month prison term.
At the opening of the hearing, Gaskill was allowed to speak. He told the judge that he never made a false statement. Boyle critically questioned both defense attorney Thomas Manning and the government prosecutor, Assistant U.S. Attorney Banu Rangarajan. He asked Manning why he did not object to an obstruction-of-justice claim contained in a pre-sentencing report. Boyle also took issue with Rangarajan’s recollection of some evidence presented at the trial. Boyle said he was continuing the hearing so he could review the trial transcript, including previous motions made by Gaskill’s lawyer to dismiss the jury’s verdict.
Four other Ferry Division workers pleaded guilty last year to participating in the dredging. Three pleaded guilty to misdemeanors and received no active prison time.
Another worker, Billy R. Moore, pleaded guilty to a felony. He is to be sentenced in February.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the N.C. Bureau of Investigation, the U.S. Coast Guard Investigative Service, and the Corps of Engineers conducted the investigation.
Previous Carolina Journal stories reported that the new ferry service faced 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.
About 30 supporters accompanied Gaskill to the federal courthouse on Monday.
Don Carrington is executive editor of Carolina Journal.