Charges Involving Kinzua Bridge

HARRISBURG - Attorney General Tom Corbett today announced that agents from the Attorney General's Public Corruption Unit have filed criminal charges against a former senior state civil engineer who is accused of conflict of interest and failing to report an expensive gift from the president of a company that received a no-bid "emergency" contract for repairs to the historic Kinzua Railroad Bridge, located in McKean County.

Corbett identified the defendant as James Allen Eppley, 61, 63 Lehman Road, Halifax, Dauphin County.

Corbett said that Eppley, in his role as a Senior Civil Engineer for the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, was the manager for a 2003 project to repair the deteriorating Kinzua Bridge - a historic railroad trestle in McKean County that was the centerpiece of a state park and listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

According to the criminal complaint, the paint product that Eppley selected for an emergency no-bid contract was produced by a company whose president provided Eppley and his wife with an all-expenses-paid trip to London, England. Eppley allegedly failed to inform his superiors about the trip, valued at $4,850, and failed to include the trip in his state-required Statement of Financial Interest, in which state employees must disclose various gifts they have received.

Corbett said that because of their role in the first "emergency" phase of the repair project, the company that manufactured the paint - Thortex America, Inc. - was in consideration for a larger second phase of the project. The remaining portion of the project was never completed because a tornado struck the bridge on July 21, 2003, while Eppley was still on his trip to England, causing more than half of the structure to collapse.

Corbett said that Eppley is charged with one count of conflict of interest, a felony punishable by up to five years in prison and a $10,000 fine. Eppley is also charged with one count of tampering with public records, a second-degree misdemeanor punishable by up to two years in prison and a $5,000 fine, along with one count of unsworn falsifications to authorities, a third-degree misdemeanor punishable by up to one year in prison and a $2,500 fine.

Eppley is scheduled to appear for a preliminary hearing on Monday, March 9th, at 10 a.m., before Harrisburg Magisterial District Judge Marsha C. Stewart.

The case is being prosecuted in Dauphin County by Deputy Attorney General James M. Reeder of the Attorney General's Public Corruption Unit.

Corbett thanked the Pennsylvania Ethics Commission and the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources for their cooperation and assistance with this investigation.