A Jefferson County grand jury has indicted the Southeast regional administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency and a former Alabama Environmental Management Commissioner for violating state ethics laws.

The investigation was led by the Alabama Ethics Commission at the request of the Jefferson County District Attorney’s office.

“The Alabama Ethics Commission is committed to working with Alabama’s District Attorneys, and all enforcement agencies, whenever needed and asked to do so, to ensure enforcement of Alabama’s Ethics laws on behalf of the citizens of Alabama; and these indictments are evidence of that,” Alabama Ethics Commission Director Tom Albritton, an Andalusia native, said in a press release. “I want to recognize the hard work from the Jefferson County DA’s office which requested our assistance in this important matter; and from our office, Cynthia Raulston, the Commission’s General Counsel, as well as Special Agents Dustin Lansford, Byron Butler and Chief Special Agent Chris Clark for their hard work and dedication to the enforcement of our Ethics laws.”

Charges include multiple violations of Alabama’s Ethics Act, including soliciting a thing of value from a principal, lobbyist or subordinate, and receiving money in addition that received in one’s official capacity, according to the Alabama Ethics Commission.

Before being appointed by President Donald Trump to serve as the Region 4 administrator of the EPA, Trey Glenn worked closely with the Birmingham-based law firm Balch & Bingham and one of its clients, Drummond Co., to fight EPA efforts to test and clean up neighborhoods in north Birmingham and Tarrant.

Likewise, former Alabama Environmental Management Commissioner Scott Phillips worked with Balch to oppose the EPA. Phillips and Glenn worked together in a company they co-owned, Southeast Engineering & Consulting, at the same time Phillips served on the commission.

Under Alabama ethics law, it is illegal for a lobbyist or a lobbyist’s client, called a principal, to give a public official a thing of value, including a job.