Northeastern Pharmaceutical and Chemical Company (NEPACCO) had a manufacturing plant in Verona, Missouri, that produced various hazardous and toxic by-products. The company pumped the by-products into a holding tank, which a waste hauler periodically emptied. Michaels founded the company, was a major shareholder, and served as its president. In 1971, a waste hauler named Mills approached Ray; a chemical-plant manager employed by NEPACCO, and proposed disposing of some of the firm’s wastes at a nearby farm. Ray visited the farm and, with the approval of Lee, the vice president and a shareholder of NEPACCO, arranged for disposal of wastes at the farm.
Approximately eighty-five 55-gallon drums were dumped into a large trench on the farm. In 1976, NEPACCO was liquidated, and the assets remaining after payment to creditors were distributed to its shareholders. Three years later the EPA investigated the area and discovered dozens of badly deteriorated drums containing hazardous waste buried at the farm. The EPA took remedial action and then sought to recover its costs under RCRA and other statutes. From whom and on what basis can the government recover its costs? [United States v. Northeastern Pharmaceutical and Chemical Co., 810 F.2d 726 (8th Cir. 1986), cert. denied, 484 U.S. 848 (1987).]