Intermanager condemns Mangouras prison sentence in Prestige case

InterManager has described as “abhorrent”, the decision by Spain’s Supreme Court to sentence the master of Prestige, the oil tanker which sank off Spain’s north-west coast in 2002, to two years in prison and has called on the shipping industry to support him after what have been 14 highly stressful years.

The sentencing of Apostolos Mangouras was high on the agenda of the InterManager executive board which met in London recently. The InterManager executive committee agreed to throw its full weight towards getting the shipping industry to act together in protesting what it described as a “totally unfair” court decision. Captain Mangouras was convicted of recklessness resulting in catastrophic environmental damage, according to a statement by the court, overturning a previous sentence by a Galician Regional Court which cleared him of criminal responsibility. Gerardo Borromeo, president of InterManager, said he was hugely disappointed by the court ruling and said it set a very worrying precedent for the role and responsibilities of masters in certain jurisdictions.