Protesters vandalized the home of a Detroit-area auto supplier's CEO last week after the company allowed a cancer-causing chemical to flow into a nearby waterway.
Police told local media that the group of about 20 people wearing all black spray-painted the executive's garage and driveway, damaged several vehicles and set off fireworks.
The protest happened several weeks after the Michigan health department issued violation notices to the supplier, Tribar Technologies, for allowing hexavalent chromium to reach the Huron River. A Tribar wastewater operator overrode alarms 460 times over a three-hour period, the Detroit Free Press reported.
The employee no longer works for the company, which makes chrome trim parts. State officials told residents to avoid contact with the river for several weeks, though testing later determined that the amount of hexavalent chromium released was much less than initially believed and drinking water was not contaminated.
State inspectors said the plant was not supposed to be in production at the time of the incident and that the wastewater operator was left unsupervised.
