The I-35W Bridge Collapse: Crimes of Commissionand Omission Resulting from the Confluence of StateProcesses and Political-Economic Conditions

Casey James Schotter • Gayle Rhineberger-Dunn

Published online: 1 May 2013� Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2013

Abstract The Interstate-35 West Bridge collapse offers a unique case of state crime.

First, it illuminates a new topical area in the state crime literature, public infrastructure.

Second, it illustrates how the bridge collapse was not a discrete act (Tombs in State Crime

1(2):170–195, 2012), but rather the outcome of relationships between different social

institutions. Specifically, it demonstrates how processes within a state, in confluence with

the broader political economy, produced decisions (omissions) not to invest in infra-

structure repair, take expert advice, and improve coordination between agencies. Simul-

taneously, these same processes resulted in deliberate actions (commissions) to invest in

new infrastructure rather than in maintenance and repair of existing infrastructure, and to

reduce both regulatory oversight and safety procedures. We provide a detailed overview of

the bridge collapse, then utilizing Kauzlarich and Kramer’s (Crimes of the American

nuclear state, Northeastern University Press, Boston, 1998) integrated theoretical frame-

work, contextualize the causes of the collapse and highlight how state processes and

political-economic conditions resulted in the simultaneous occurrence of crimes of

omission and commission on the part of the state.

Introduction

The Interstate-35 West (I-35W) Bridge collapse in Minneapolis, Minnesota in 2007 offers

a unique case of state crime. First, it illuminates a new topical area in the state crime

literature, public infrastructure. In the United States, the responsibility of infrastructure has

been endowed to the state through the Constitution, particularly the establishment of roads

and the regulation of commerce (Constitution 2005, p. 17). Building and maintaining an

infrastructure is just one of the many social obligations a state must accept due to the

complex nature of a growing organized society. How that responsibility is met differs from

state to state but the basic principle of state obligation remains intact. Specific decisions by

C. J. Schotter � G. Rhineberger-Dunn (&)Department of Sociology, Anthropology, and Criminology, University of Northern Iowa,1227 West 27th Street, Cedar Falls, IA 50614-0513, USAe-mail: Gayle.Rhineberger@uni.edu

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Crit Crim (2013) 21:477–492DOI 10.1007/s10612-013-9184-5

any state entity to act or not act are made within the context of its relationships to other

state agencies as well as the broader political economy in which it exists. As Tombs (2012)

suggests, ‘‘the state is a capitalist state, one that is necessarily if complexly committed to

prioritizing the practices and values of profit accumulation above ‘social’ values’’ (p. 172).

Therefore, in the context of the broader political economy, any market that the state

creates, such as infrastructure, is likely to follow the capitalist doctrine of profit maxi-

mization. This results in the health and safety of the population being vulnerable to state

crimes of commission, where funding is inadequately provided, and state crimes of

omission, where actions are deliberately avoided in order to save money or maximize

profits.

Second, it illustrates how the bridge collapse was not a discrete act, but rather the

outcome of relationships between different social institutions (Tombs 2012). Specifically,

it demonstrates how processes within a state, in confluence with the broader political

economy, produced decisions (omissions) not to invest in infrastructure repair, take expert

advice, and improve coordination between agencies, as well as deliberate actions (com-

missions) to invest in new infrastructure rather than in maintenance and repair of existing

infrastructure, and to reduce both regulatory oversight and safety procedures.

The purpose of this paper is to fill two primary gaps in the state crime literature. First,

we identify a new area of state crime, public infrastructure, as a state created criminogenic

market. Second, we demonstrate how two types of state crimes—omission and commis-

sion—can occur simultaneously as a result of state processes that exists within the broader

political economy. To do this, we first provide a discussion of state crime, followed by a

discussion of the connection between state processes, the political economy, and state

crimes of commission and omission. Next, we assess the historical events and deliberate

political/governmental actions and omissions that led to the collapse, the government’s

response to it, and government’s role in maintaining safe and secure infrastructure. Lastly,

we apply Kauzlarich and Kramer’s (1998) integrated theoretical framework to contextu-

alize the collapse in terms of motivation, opportunity, and social control.

Defining State Crime

Although the field of state crime is relatively new, beginning with Chambliss’s original

conception of it in his 1988 presidential speech at the American Society of Criminology

annual meeting, a growing body of literature attempts to define its scope (e.g., Barak 1991;

Kauzlarich and Kramer 1998; Rothe 2009; Rothe and Mullins 2006) and provide specific

examples of its existence (e.g., Faust and Kauzlarich 2008; Gerkin et al. (2010); Lenning

and Brightman 2009). As it is well-established in the extant criminological literature, it is

unnecessary in this paper to make the case that states can commit criminal and/or socially

injurious acts that are not technically defined as crime by state legal codes. We therefore

begin with the assumption that state crime exists, that it exists in many forms, and that

some state crimes are not defined as criminal by law, but that others may carry such

distinction.

In terms of what specifically constitutes state crime, we utilize Faust and Kauzlarich’s

(2008) conception, which is an integrated definition based on a number of scholarly works.

Specifically, Faust and Kauzlarich (2008) define state crime as, ‘‘a state act or omission

which generates harm in violation of an explicit trust or duty between states, states and its

citizens, or states and citizens of other jurisdictions (Barak 1991; Friedrichs 2004;

478 C. J. Schotter, G. Rhineberger-Dunn

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Kauzlarich et al. 2003; Kramer and Michalowski 2005; Ross 2000a, b; Rothe and Friedrichs

2006; Welch 2007)’’ (p. 86).

As mentioned previously, this paper adds to the extant state crime literature in that it

addresses a specific form of state criminality not currently covered in the literature, namely

public infrastructure investment and the regulation/maintenance of it. Because of our

specific focus on infrastructure, we also acknowledge the importance of Green and Ward’s

(2004) definition of negligence, or ‘‘the gross failure of state agencies to pursue effectively

their publicly proclaimed goals or to follow generally accepted professional standards, for

example, in civil engineering’’ (p. 56). It is the concept of ‘‘effective pursuit’’ (Green and

Ward 2004, p. 56) that connects the ideas of process and state crime together.

State Processes and the Role of Political Economy

The state’s ability to be effective at meeting its goals and willingness to follow its own

procedures and/or accepted professional standards hinges largely on the broader political

economy in which the state operates (Tombs 2012). Under the guise of capitalism, the state

prioritizes both profit and the reduction of monetary loss while simultaneously ignoring or

deprioritizing social values such as the health and safety of its citizens.

The political economy in which states operate can also result in government policy that

fails to adequately provide for the safety of its citizens, due to bureaucratic failure or

regulatory dysfunction (Kauzlarich et al. 2003) or wasteful spending (Friedrichs 2010).

According to Green and Ward (2004), population vulnerability is a key component as to

whether people become victims of state crimes, and ‘‘poverty, corruption and political

authoritarianism’’ exacerbate the situation (p. 59). Capitalism creates vulnerable groups

that have access to little political power, which in turn increases their vulnerability. Fur-

ther, specific population segments are targeted by the government and kept in a vulnerable

condition, usually by way of zoning laws, property values, etc. State crimes in this capacity

are unlikely to come to the attention of the public, until a natural disaster occurs that brings

a government’s long-standing practices of negligence, inefficiency, and problematic

funding priorities to light (Green and Ward 2004). For example, Hurricane Katrina brought

to light numerous governmental problems rising to the level of state crime, both long

before the disaster, and more prominently after it in regards to the state’s response to it

(Faust and Kauzlarich 2008).

The issue of regulating state agencies is an important one, as it emphasizes the role of

the broader political-economic context in which state crime occurs. As Tombs (2012)

suggests, ‘‘Regulatory agencies are not, then, simply (actual or potential) ‘policeman’—

that is, their relation to capital is not merely one of opposition and externality—but play a

much more general role in reproducing the social conditions necessary to sustain a capi-

talist social order’’ (p. 173). Although Tombs (2012) appears to reference formal regulatory

agencies (e.g., Environmental Protection Agency, Interstate Commerce Commission), we

can extend the sentiment of oversight to how states regulate their own agencies and the

extent to which they pass laws to either restrict the actions of these agencies, or to reduce

the degree to which they are accountable to other state agencies. Therefore, deliberate

actions (commissions) that result in a lack of regulation, whether through formal regulatory

bodies or via state policies/laws, can result in state crimes of omission when states fail to

enforce existing laws/policies, fail to put into place more effective laws/policies, or fail to

properly respond to law/policy violations (Tombs 2012, p. 177). Essentially, then, the state

and its representatives engage in crimes of omission because regulation and oversight are

The I-35W Bridge Collapse 479

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not present. Additionally, and simultaneously, the state is engaging in crimes of com-

mission for having either failed to create regulation or to enforce what exists.

There is, however, more to state crimes of omission than simply failing to take a

particular action. In his discussion of state-corporate crime, Tombs (2012) stresses that a

dynamic, symbiotic relationship exists between states and corporations, one that results in

‘‘routine production of crimes and harms’’ (p. 170). His criticism is that most examples of

state-corporate crime are simply reduced to a discrete, singular cooperation between the

state and the corporation without fully acknowledging the ongoing relationships and

contexts that set the stage for these events to occur. Tombs’ (2012) point is that this

obscures the reality of the ‘‘social relationships, which are ongoing, enduring, and more

akin, in fact to a process’’ that exist between states and corporations (p. 175). If analyzed

within the context of processes and relationships, much of what is considered crimes of

omissions may in fact be crimes of commission that result in acts of omission (Tombs

2012). For example, deliberate decisions (commissions) on the part of the state to enact

laws that reduce regulation or safety mechanism results in crimes of omission by way of

the state then failing to properly regulate particular agencies or failing to adequately

protect its citizens.

As discussed previously, the I-35 Bridge collapse in Minnesota offers a unique example

of state crime. It illustrates how the bridge collapse was not a discrete act (Tombs 2012),

but rather the outcome of relationships between different social institutions. Specifically, it

demonstrates how processes within a state, in confluence with the broader political

economy, produced decisions (omissions) by state actors not to invest in infrastructure

repair, take expert advice, and improve coordination between agencies. Simultaneously the

state made deliberate actions (commissions) to invest in new infrastructure rather than in

maintenance and repair of existing infrastructure, and to reduce both regulatory oversight

and safety procedures. We turn next to a discussion of the bridge collapse.

The I-35W Bridge Collapse1

The I-35W Bridge over the Mississippi River in downtown Minneapolis, Minnesota,

opened in 1967, and ‘‘by 2007 carried a daily average of 140,000 total vehicles north and

south over four lanes between University Avenue and Washington Avenue’’ (Stambaugh

and Cohen 2007, p. 1). At 6:05 p.m. on August 1, 2007, the I-35W Bridge suddenly gave

way and collapsed, killing 13 motorists and injuring another 145 people (Shuster 2008,

p. 10). Over 170 local, state, and federal agencies responded quickly to the scene (Min-

nesota Department of Public Safety 2008), not only because of the magnitude of the event,

but also because it had no immediate identifiable origin. Immediate questions arose as to

how such a tragedy like this could happen in the United States, one of the world’s

wealthiest nations.

As is typical with tragic events, numerous agencies and individuals alike took action to

determine the cause of the collapse. Because of the national significance of the bridge, the

National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) was in charge of the official investigation of

1 Data on the bridge collapse were collected from independent reports, newspaper articles, and other variousinternet sites covering the collapse. The three specific reports are from Wiss, Janney, Elstner Associates, Inc.(Hill et al. 2008). (hired by MnDOT), Gray, Plant and Mooty (hired by the Minnesota Legislature’s JointLegislative Committee on the I-35W Bridge Collapse), and the National Transportation Safety Board (leadinvestigative body). Although many newspapers covered the collapse, the primary sources used in this paperare from the New York Times and the Star Tribune.

480 C. J. Schotter, G. Rhineberger-Dunn

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the collapse (Hill et al. 2008). On August 2, Minnesota Department of Transportation

(MnDOT) retained Wiss, Janney, Elstner Associates, Inc. (WJE), a firm specializing in

structural engineering, architecture, and materials science, to lead an investigation into the

collapse (WJE 2007; Hill et al. 2008). Additionally, in December 2007, a committee of the

Minnesota Legislature, the Joint Legislative Committee on the I-35W Bridge Collapse,

hired the law firm of Gray, Plant and Mooty (GPM) to conduct an independent investi-

gation to determine if the collapse was a result of policy or practice (GPM 2008). There

was also discussion in various news articles that the law firm was also hired to investigate

if the Governor’s actions played a role, as ‘‘\3 months before the accident, the governor,

Tim Pawlenty, had vetoed a 7.5-cent-a-gallon increase in the state’s gasoline tax, favored

by Democrats, to pay for highway and bridge work’’ (Wald 2008, para. 7). Further, the

engineering firm of Thornton Tomasetti Inc. was hired by the attorneys representing the

victims in civil suits (Kennedy and Diaz 2008, para. 18).

Before the official cause was known, several lawsuits were filed. MnDOT and the State

of Minnesota bore the first round of suits. According to Kumnick (2009), the State of

Minnesota settled a $38 million suit with incident survivors ‘‘in exchange for their

agreement to not bring legal action against the state’’ (para. 1). The survivors sued Pro-

gressive Contractors, Inc. (PCI), the firm hired by state contract to resurface the bridge, and

settled with the company in 2008 for $10 million. The survivors also filed suit against the

URS Corporation, as this agency advised MnDOT on the safety of the bridge in 2006.

According to James (2010), URS Corporation paid out an additional $52.5 million to the

victims ‘‘except for $1.5 million set aside for a memorial to those who died’’ (para. 1, 4).

The State of Minnesota also initiated lawsuits against both PCI and URS Corporation.

The state settled with PCI for $1 million (Foti 2009) and with URS Corporation for $5

million in 2010 (Karnowski 2010). The State of Minnesota sued Jacobs Engineering

Group, Inc. (JEG), the firm that purchased the original firm that built the bridge, Sverdrup

& Parcel and Associates Inc. (James 2010, para. 5). JEG and the State of Minnesota settled

for $8.9 million (Sepic 2012). Additionally, URS Corporation and PCI filed third-party law

suits against JEG for the faulty bridge design (Karmasek 2012). The court ruled that JEG

was not liable to URS Corporation (Lapicola 2010). Presumably JEG was not liable to PCI

either, as PCI did not participate in the appeal that resulted in the court’s decision not to

hold JEG liable to URS Corporation (Lapicola 2010).

Although government entities, victims, victims’ family members, and ordinary citizens

questioned how such a prominent bridge in the United States could collapse, several

government agencies at the state and federal levels had access to information identifying

structural concerns with the bridge prior to the incident. Their actions and omissions were

complicit in this tragic, but preventable, event.

The official ‘‘probable’’ cause of the I-35W Bridge collapse according to the NTSB’s

(2008) investigation was:

the inadequate load capacity, due to a design error by Sverdrup & Parcel and

Associates, Inc., of the gusset plates at the U10 nodes, which failed under a com-

bination of (1) substantial increases in the weight of the bridge, which resulted from

previous bridge modifications, and (2) the traffic and concentrated construction loads

on the bridge on the day of the collapse (p. 152).

However, the NTSB (2008) report cited that the bridge had been structurally deficient for

16 years prior to the incident. Although the NTSB (2008) report maintains that these

deficiencies were not associated with the bridge collapse, maintenance that did occur was

marred with inadequacies and failures that should have alerted engineers. According to

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GPM (2008), the maintenance records from 1994 to 2006 failed to ‘‘quantify section loss in

fracture critical bridge inspection reports’’ (p. 34). This means deterioration of the bridge

could not be measured properly and therefore increased the risk of collapse. According to

the same report, GPM (2008) states that work on the bridge from 1998 to 2007, ‘‘was

intended to extend the life of the bridge as well as its drivability, but would not have

improved the superstructure rating’’ (p. 46–47). The superstructure was the part of the

bridge that was in the worst condition and contains the gusset plates. Since the

superstructure was never the primary reason for repair, the gusset plates continued to be

ignored. Befitting its capitalist ideology, the state delayed replacing the bridge because

they did not have the funds and did not want to disrupt economic activity of the city (GPM

2008, p. 45–47). Indeed, economic concerns and priorities drove state-decision making

instead of public safety.

Furthermore, MnDOT failed to act on expert advice given to it by both the HNTB

Corporation and the URS Corporation (GPM 2008). According to a MnDOT (2007)

incident fact sheet, URS Corporation conducted an investigation in 2006 which detailed

their concerns about the bridge’s safety (p. 3). URS Corporation made two recommen-

dations which were to ‘‘add redundant plating over the most critical 52 truss members and

conduct a visual examination of all suspected weld details and remove measurable defects’’

(MnDOT fact sheet 2007, p. 3). According to the GPM (2008) report, URS Corporation

also suggested that MnDOT ‘‘develop plans for adding structural redundancy; prepare

conceptual plans for a procedure for deck removal, structural changes and deck replace-

ment’’ (p. 59). Furthermore, an earlier report addressed the same issues as URS Corpo-

ration and also identified the gusset plates that needed to be inspected more thoroughly.

According to the GPM (2008) report, in 1999 HNTB Corporation had submitted proposals

to MnDOT, the purposes of which were to ‘‘add redundancy features to the Bridge…[-

which] was identified by MnDOT’s Bridge Engineer, as an important safety factor for the

Bridge’’ (p. 27). However, ‘‘In October 2001, HNTB submitted a proposal to MnDOT for

further study and work on the Bridge. MnDOT chose not to proceed with HNTB. Instead,

MnDOT prepared a Request for Interest (RFI) which it sent to interested consultants in

March 2003’’ (GPM 2008, p. 27). MnDOT was given a plan of action that more than likely

would have resolved the gusset plate problem and avoided disaster. However, it appears in

both cases that costs for these projects were too high, so they were either deferred or

reduced in scope to comply with budget constraints (GPM 2008, p. 63–69).

However, several state and federal agencies contributed to the political and structural

conditions that led to the bridge collapse. These agencies include, but are not limited to:

Minnesota Department of Transportation (MnDOT), United States Department of Trans-

portation (USDOT), Federal Highway Administration (FHWA), National Highway Traffic

Safety Administration (NHTSA), and the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB).

All of these agencies fight for the same limited federal funding to cover all of the projects

in their jurisdictions. Additionally, the American Association of State Highway Trans-

portation Officials (AASHTO), a private, non-profit national organization which creates

guidelines for better integration of intrastate and interstate networks that supports itself

financially through member dues (AASHTO 2009, p. 1, 6), also played a major role in

creating the conditions that led to the collapse. AASHTO represents all fifty states, the

District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico, and acts as a liaison between states and the federal

government in issues related to transportation (AASHTO 2009). Although not a federal

agency, AASHTO had been given powers, real and presumed, through its business of

‘‘setting technical standards for all phases of highway system development. Standards are

482 C. J. Schotter, G. Rhineberger-Dunn

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issued for design, construction of highways and bridges, materials, and many other tech-

nical areas’’ (AASHTO 2012).

Integrated Theoretical Framework

To contextualize the collapse of the I-35W Bridge, we use Kauzlarich and Kramer’s (1998)

integrated theoretical framework that combines theoretical levels of analysis with catalysts

for action. This model was initially constructed by Kramer and Michalowski (Kramer et al.

2002), and further specified in Kauzlarich and Kramer (1998) and Kramer et al. (2002).

Because Kauzlarich and Kramer (1998) offer the most initial details about the various

components (e.g., levels of analysis and catalysts for actions) of the framework, we rely on

their work throughout this paper.

Kauzlarich and Kramer (1998) posit that there are different motivations, opportunity

structures, and control mechanisms that operate at each theoretical level of analysis (e.g.,

institutional environment, organizational, and interactional) that create action. The insti-

tutional (also structural environment) level of analysis represents society at large and the

social, political and economic context in which the state or organization exists (Kauzlarich

and Kramer 1998, p. 148–150). The organizational level represents the specific state

agency or contractor and their specific processes and organizational culture, while the

interactional level represents the individual interactions of people within the agency or

contractor organization (Kauzlarich and Kramer 1998, p. 148–150).

Motivations and Opportunities at the Institutional Level

Motivation as a catalyst for action at the institutional level includes the following: ‘‘culture

of competition, economic pressure, organization goals, performance emphasis’’ and

opportunities involve ‘‘the availability of legal means, obstacles and constraints, blocked

goals/strains, availability of illegal means and access to resources’’ (Kauzlarich and Kra-

mer 1998, p. 149). The NTSB (2008) notes that: ‘‘Neither Federal nor State authorities

evaluated the design of the gusset plates for the I-35W Bridge in sufficient detail during the

design and acceptance process to detect the design errors in the plates, nor was it standard

practice for them to do so’’ (p. 150). Additionally, Saulny and Steinhauer (2007) reported

that ‘‘a study released in May [2007] by the Urban Land Institute and Ernst and Young

found that 83 percent of the nation’s transportation infrastructure was not capable of

meeting the country’s needs over the next 10 years. The American Society of Civil

Engineers, in its latest national report card, gave transportation infrastructure a D’’ (p. 1).

These statements tell us that in the broader political economy, and in deference to the

state’s capitalistic focus, infrastructure repair and maintenance are of low priority at the

state and federal level. The maximization of profits and reduction of loss results in the state

failing to adequately protect citizens from harm.

In September of 2007, the United States Department of Transportation (USDOT)

offered to immediately invest $65.2 billion to shore up bridge deficiencies (Landers 2007,

p. 10). According to Landers (2007), as of October 2007 there were about 74,000 bridges

determined to be structurally deficient, of which 6,175 were on major highways and 2,830

were on the interstate system (p. 10). In commentary over the I-35W Bridge collapse and

funding for bridges nationwide, New York state Senator Charles E. Schumer criticized how

the federal government financed bridges, saying ‘‘For too long, the federal government has

focused on building new bridges at the expense of fixing old ones, and now we are living

The I-35W Bridge Collapse 483

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with the consequences…Robbing Peter to pay Paul is no way to keep America’s drivers

safe’’ (Fessenden 2007, p. 6). An August 2007 article in the New York Times discusses the

2005 Federal Transportation Legislation that allocated $286 billion dollars to a number of

transportation venues and issues; almost all of the money allocated to bridges was for new

construction, not maintenance and repair (Saulny and Steinhauer 2007). The goal then is to

build new bridges. However, this creates opportunities for crimes of omission, in the form

of singling out and neglecting old bridges. It may simultaneously result in crimes of

commission in the case of closed bridges, in that the state is relying on other bridges to

accommodate the higher demand, even if they were not designed to handle the increased

traffic.

Another organization that played a role in creating the conditions that led to the bridge

collapse is the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA). The FHWA failed to advise

other states of gusset plate problems after the Grand River Bridge collapse in Ohio in 1996

(e.g., instrumental rationality, role specialization, task specialization). According to the

GPM (2008) report, the FHWA did not send a bulletin to other states that had bridges of

similar design, specifically gusset plate truss bridges (p. 56). The cause of that bridge

failure was gusset plates in conjunction with overloading one side of the bridge with

equipment and trucks (GPM 2008, p. 53). According to that same report, the Ohio

Department of Transportation (DOT) ‘‘revised its bridge engineer training program to

emphasize the importance of inspecting compression members and especially gusset

plates’’ (GPM 2008, p. 55). FHWA maintains a bridge inventory and would have known

exactly what states had bridges that could be at risk of collapsing. Had FHWA dissemi-

nated this information that Ohio DOT gave to them, it is possible that MnDOT may have

acted to prevent the I-35W Bridge collapse.

Furthermore, it appears as though the FHWA failed to act with the information that

MnDOT provided to them on a yearly basis from 1993 to 2006. Per MnDOT policy,

‘‘inspectors would prepare a separate fracture critical inspection report, in addition to the

annual inspection report’’ (GPM 2008, p. 18). The fracture critical reports included details

on ‘‘fracture critical members, identification of areas visually inspected, description of

fatigue prone areas, and amount of corrosion and associated field measurements of loss of

section’’ (GPM 2008, p. 19). This information was then forwarded electronically to

FHWA, within 90 days of the date of inspection, as per FHWA policy (Code of Federal

Regulations 2012). The FHWA then requires ‘‘periodic notifications of the actions taken to

resolve or monitor critical findings’’ (Code of Federal Regulations 2012, Sec. 650.313).

Both of these incidents of information withholding highlight the uncooperative relationship

between federal and state governments. Each level wants unabridged authority to act

within their jurisdictions, however, due to the nature in which the US government is

structured, each level of government depends on the other for resources (e.g., funding,

information, military support). It is this symbiotic relationship (Tombs 2012) state and

federal agencies that lends itself to crimes of omission when, taken into context, may

simultaneously be crimes of commission.

Motivations and Opportunities at the Organization Level

At the organization level, motivations include ‘‘corporate culture, operative goals, subunit

goals, and managerial pressure’’ and opportunity structures include ‘‘instrumental ratio-

nality, internal constraints, standard operative procedures, creation of illegal means, role

specialization, task segregation, computer, telecommunication, and networking technolo-

gies, and normalization of deviance’’ (Kauzlarich and Kramer 1998, p. 149).

484 C. J. Schotter, G. Rhineberger-Dunn

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MnDOT and its offices are the primary organization of concern in the I-35 Bridge

collapse. The Joint Legislative Committee on the I-35W Bridge Collapse hired Gray Plant

Mooty (GPM) to investigate if MnDOT policies and procedures (e.g., its oversight of the

physical conditions of the bridge) were responsible for the collapse (GPM 2008). GPM

(2008) found that MnDOT faced a lack of oversight by the Minnesota legislature, and in

their report, GPM recommended better communication in the form of an annual report by

MnDOT to the Legislature.

Second, MnDOT’s organization allows for maximum autonomy per district but also

inhibits cooperation between districts and creates budget problems (e.g., opportunity

structure, task segregation and role specialization). According to GPM (2008), ‘‘the

Operations Division operates through eight regional areas—seven Greater Minnesota

district offices and the Minneapolis-St. Paul Metropolitan Area’’ and that ‘‘most of the day-

to-day operations are managed at the district level, including maintenance, highway

construction projects, and highway right-of-way issues’’ (p. 10). In addition, the Office of

Bridges and Structures is the main technical expert and assistant to the individual districts

and ‘‘is in charge of retaining consultants to work on the design and study of the State’s

bridges, but construction contractors are usually retained through individual districts’’

(GPM 2008, p. 11). This decentralized structure makes it much more difficult for separate

districts to share information, and further results in a lack of oversight from the Office of

Bridges and Structures in terms of contractor retention.

Third, the process to obtain funding for bridge work was challenging. According to

GPM (2008), bridge repairs had to be ‘‘identified four to five years in advance’’ (p. 12),

become part of the ‘‘Statewide Transportation Improvement Program (STIP)’’ (p. 12) for

expensive repairs, and in order to be in STIP the repairs ‘‘needed to be proposed by the

Metro District, then gain approval through Metropolitan Council’s review process and,

finally, be submitted to MnDOT’s central administration for further consideration’’ (p. 12).

This system meant that districts were unable to respond to emergency repairs timely and to

effectively plan for ‘‘Budget Buster’’ (GPM 2008, p. 13) bridges, ones that needed to be

totally replaced like the I-35W Bridge.

Fourth, MnDOT policies on follow-up maintenance did not exist. According to GPM

(2008), MnDOT lacked written policies indicating what classified maintenance work as

non-critical, who was responsible for the decision to determine work was non-critical, and

a timeframe in which to act on maintenance work (p. 21). Furthermore, the GPM (2008)

report states that there was ambiguity over what constituted a large project that should be

outsourced or a small project that could be done by in-house operations (p. 21).

Fifth, role specialization and lack of communication, perhaps by way of defective

standard operating procedures, influenced the relationship between MnDOT and Pro-

gressive Contractors, Inc. According to the NTSB (2008) report, the load of all the con-

struction equipment and materials (e.g., rock, sand), and civilian vehicles on the bridge was

estimated at 289 tons (p. 28). This weight limit should have been safe; however, the gusset

plates at node U10 were only one-half inch thick instead of one inch thick as designed

(Ballarini and Liao 2011, p. 32). According to Ballarini and Liao (2011) this means ‘‘the

elastic safety factor of the gusset plates at nodes U10 was approximately equal to 1.0,

instead of approximately 2.0 as required by the design code in 1967’’ (p. 32). Considering

the construction materials on the bridge the day of the collapse, Ballarini and Liao (2011)

state ‘‘the calculations show that the addition of this weight produced a very large region of

plastic deformation in the gusset plates and rendered a demand on the gusset plates that for

all intents and purposes was equal to their capacity’’ (p. 33). After modifications in 1977

and 1998, MnDOT conducted load capacity rate tests on the I-35W Bridge. However, both

The I-35W Bridge Collapse 485

123

analyses were limited in that they: used original bridge designs and not actual specifica-

tions, did not use bridge reports quantifying section loss on the bridge, and did not take into

consideration the previous construction on the bridge and its added weight, nor the actual

gusset plate thickness at node U10 (GPM 2008, p. 47–49). More importantly, ‘‘MnDOT

did not conduct a load ratings analysis in response to the bridge’s deteriorating condition’’

(GPM 2008, p. ii). The fact that MnDOT did not follow procedures in (1)quantifying

inspection reports that should have been used in a re-rating analysis, (2)failing to conduct a

re-rating analysis based on deteriorating conditions and (3)ignoring a key photo of the

gusset plates at Nodes U10, created the conditions in which the bridge would eventually

collapse.

Another important fact is that the State of Minnesota did not increase funding to

MnDOT to match consumer usage of MnDOT assets. According to the Minnesota State-

wide Transportation Policy Plan: 2009–2028, Chapter 5 (2009), ‘‘although total trans-

portation expenditures have increased over time, as a share of the gross state product they

have declined since 1990, suggesting that transportation investments have not kept pace

with the growth of the economy’’ (p. 5-1). Further, a Congressional report revealed that the

State of Minnesota spent only about half of its allocated federal funds that were intended

for bridge repair and that overall, the state had passed up $63.5 million in federal aid for

substandard bridge repairs since 2003 (Diaz 2008). This was due to federal funding pro-

gram limitations and strict guidelines as to what bridges qualify for federal funding, which

the I-35W bridge had only been classified as such 1 year earlier (Diaz 2008). MnDOT

would prefer more of a pooling approach of federal funding so MnDOT can determine the

projects that need funding rather than having to adhere to strict federal guidelines as to how

much and when a project may receive federal funding (Diaz 2008). Moreover, in 2007 the

Federal government ‘‘rescinded a near record $3.47 billion in promised transportation

dollars’’ (Diaz 2008). Although MnDOT did not utilize certain federal funding, it was due

to the restrictions that came along with the funds or the funds being rescinded. This created

the budget shortfall(s) that would eventually lead to the bridge collapse. This illustrates

another example of political economy hindering infrastructure maintenance and repair. The

federal government is offering money to the state but only if certain conditions are met,

conditions that either don’t exist or are unknown to exist, and therefore the funding goes

unused. As this may appear to be a crime of omission on the surface, purposely not using

funding specifically budgeted for infrastructure repair is a crime of commission, at both the

state and federal levels.

Lastly, another issue that appears to have been omitted from consideration of load

ratings and overall bridge health and stability is the increase in bridge use overtime.

According to Hansen (2007), ‘‘the average life expectancy of steel deck truss bridges is

approximately 50 years’’ (p. 14); construction on the I-35W Bridge began in 1964 and was

completed in 1967 (Hansen 2007, p. 13). That makes the age of the bridge 40 years, with

ten left if we assume that it would in fact have lasted exactly 50 years. There are several

indications that the bridge would not last the full 50 years. The Minneapolis Airport was

opened for public use in 1962, and by 1967 had already surpassed its expected passenger

capacity of 4 million in 1975 (Metropolitan Airports Commission 2010). Moreover, the

population of Hennepin County, MN, the county where the bridge was located, increased

from 842,854 in 1960 to 1,116,200 in 2000 (United States Census Bureau 2012). Since the

I-35W Bridge was a main traffic way to the airport and into the Twin Cities, we can assume

that population increase and increased use of the airport would have accelerated the aging

of the bridge and loss of useful life.

486 C. J. Schotter, G. Rhineberger-Dunn

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Motivations and Opportunities at the Interactional Level

At the interactional level, motivations include ‘‘socialization, social meaning, individual

goals, competitive individualism, and material success emphasis,’’ while opportunity

structures involve ‘‘definitions of the situation, perceptions availability and attractiveness

of illegal means’’ (Kauzlarich and Kramer 1998, p. 149). The key to the interactional level

is autonomy (e.g., opportunity structure). Autonomy for employees in and of itself is not a

bad thing; in fact autonomy can improve employee morale and productivity. However, in

the case with MnDOT, engineers did not have clear, written, enforced standard operating

procedures (SOPs) to follow, and so the ‘‘check’’ on autonomy was lost. This means that

every situation faced by one engineer could be interpreted differently from other engineers.

This is evidenced in the GPM (2008) report indicating that the maintenance records from

1994 to 2006 failed to ‘‘quantify section loss in fracture critical bridge inspection reports’’

(p. 34). The individual engineer, then, was left with an inordinate amount of discretion

concerning such things as writing reports, requesting maintenance operations, and priori-

tizing projects.

According to GPM (2008), ‘‘written documentation is lacking in some critical areas and

important information did not always reach consultants or the appropriate parties within

MnDOT’’ (p. 31). SOPs requiring written documentation were lacking at MnDOT, which

created an environment that relied on the oral communication of information, typically

relying on key personnel to facilitate the process. As GPM (2008) stated, ‘‘This situation

was exacerbated by the departure of professional staff, particularly senior engineers’’

(p. 31). This working atmosphere at MnDOT created conditions which resulted in the

collapse of the I-35W Bridge. Although the engineers omitted information they believed to

be irrelevant they really committed the crime of falsifying records. Furthermore, without

enforced SOPs from MnDOT, there wasn’t a safeguard against ‘‘bad judgment’’ as to what

constituted irrelevant data.

An additional problem for MnDOT, emphasizing role specialization, internal con-

straints and defective standard operative procedures, is that the Commissioner of Trans-

portation was the Lieutenant Governor, who did not have engineering experience. The

Commissioner is the person charged with adopting rules for bridge inspections and

inventory (GPM 2008). In this case, the Commissioner was not an engineer, and therefore

had to rely on the word of other transportation staff members when making and enforcing

policy. Interviews with former Commissioners showed that they believed it was not

essential for the Commissioner to have engineering experience, but that one of the three

top positions (Commissioner, Deputy Commissioner, and Assistant to the Commissioner)

should have such experience (GPM 2008). At the time of the collapse, Lt. Governor

Molnau did not have engineering experience, nor did the Deputy Commissioner or the

Assistant to the Commissioner. The Deputy Commissioner was an engineer until 2006,

when Lt. Governor Molnau replaced him with a non-engineer. Soon after the collapse, Lt.

Governor Molnau was removed as Commissioner and lawmakers replaced her and the

Assistant Commissioner with individuals who had engineering backgrounds (Kaszuba and

Foti 2008).

Additionally, although we do not know why the original bridge engineer from Sverdrup

& Parcel and Associates, Inc. failed to properly calculate the proper thickness of the gusset

plates, it is nonetheless the case that the official cause of the collapse was its inadequate

capacity (NTSB 2008). Had these original calculations resulted in the appropriate gusset

plate thickness, the extra weight on the bridge would most likely not have been an issue,

meaning that perhaps the bridge would not have collapsed.

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Operationality of Control at the Institutional, Organization, and Interactional Levels

At the institutional level, operationality of control (e.g., the presence/absence of social

control) is defined as international reactions, political pressure, legal sanctions, media

scrutiny, public opinion, and social movements (Kauzlarich and Kramer 1998, p. 149). At

the organizational level, control is evidenced by a ‘‘culture of compliance, subcultures of

resistance, codes of conduct, reward structure, safety and quality control procedures,

communication processes,’’ while at the interactional level it is represented by ‘‘personal

morality, rationalizations and techniques of neutralization, separation from consequences,

obedience to authority, group think, diffusion of responsibility’’ (Kauzlarich and Kramer

1998, p. 149).

As evidenced in the discussion of motivations and opportunity, there clearly was an

absence of control at the institutional level, until after the bridge collapsed. This lack of

control may well have been a result of political pressures related to funding priorities that

did not include maintaining and repairing basic infrastructure, or it may have been a result

of the absence of legal sanctions. Although a number of law suits were generated, no

criminal charges were filed in the case of the I-35W Bridge collapse. According to current

criminal law, it would be legally difficult to prove that any person or entity was guilty of

criminal negligence. Yet this is the environment in which infrastructure operates: under-

managed, under-regulated, and under-funded. All three of these aspects lend themselves

for crimes of omission.

After the collapse, however, political pressure and media scrutiny dramatically

increased, and public opinion was voiced loudly. The federal government was openly

criticized by legislators for funding priorities related to bridges (Fessenden 2007; Saulny

and Steinhauer 2007). Minnesota legislators were openly and highly critical of MnDOT, to

the point of hiring a law firm to investigate the specific role that MnDOT and its staff

played in the collapse (Doyle and Kaszuba 2007). While the public likely had little interest

or little knowledge of bridge funding issues prior to August 1, 2007, this was not the case

after the collapse. The virtual lack of interest and/or knowledge would have provided

politicians and government agencies alike with a lack of social control mechanisms to

influence their ‘‘good’’ behavior to work in the best interest of the public as it relates to safe

and secure infrastructure.

At the organization level, MnDOT is the primary agency of interest. As discussed

previously, MnDOT suffered from a culture of non-compliance (e.g., lack of control) with

its own procedures. The GPM (2008) report indicated that MnDOT failed to follow its own

procedures, such as in failing to quantify section loss each year, and re-rating the bridge’s

load capacity in conjunction with its obvious deterioration (GPM 2008). It even ignored a

vital photo from 2003 of a bowed gusset plate at Node U10, the one blamed for the bridge

collapse (GPM 2008). As we discussed previously, MnDOT was also highly criticized for

its safety and quality control procedures, as well as its communications procedures with the

legislature as well as internally among staff (GPM 2008). The legislature’s failure to

oversee MnDOT by way of requiring more regular and detailed communication meant that

there was very little external control exerted on MnDOT proper. Similarly, FHWA failed

to communicate with other states that had similar bridge designs as the gusset plate truss

bridge that collapsed in Ohio in 1996. Here again, this process of non-communication

between agencies and individuals not only allows for crimes of omission, but over time the

whole process of withholding information becomes a crime of commission in itself.

Lastly, as mentioned previously, at the time of the collapse and as far back as 2006,

MnDOT did not have a staff person with engineering experience in any of its top three

488 C. J. Schotter, G. Rhineberger-Dunn

123

positions—Commission, Deputy Commissioner, and Assistant to the Commissioner. When

the Deputy Commissioner, who had engineering experience, left in 2006, Lt. Governor

Molnau replaced him with a non-engineer. According to an interview she gave to the GPM

investigators GPM (2008), ‘‘she considered the Deputy position as primarily a commu-

nications and management position that did not necessarily have to be filled by an engi-

neer. She noted that she had three engineers among the five heads of her operating

divisions and that they worked collegially and acted as the senior management team for the

Department’’ (p. 76). This clearly demonstrates the use of techniques of rationalization that

can be used to illustrate the operationality of control aspect of Kauzlarich and Kramer’s

(1998) integrated theoretical framework.

Discussion

In his assessment of state-corporate crime research, Tombs (2012) observes that ‘‘despite

the clearly-stated, and genuinely innovative, conceptual intentions of Michalowski and

Kramer—that the focus should on relationships not acts—the work which has utilized and

indeed sought to develop this concept has overwhelmingly focused upon discrete acts and

paid inadequate attention to the nature and dynamics of state-corporate relationships’’

(p. 175). This criticism, although it is of state-corporate crime research, can equally apply

to research on state crime. Although we offer a case study of state crime, we have paid

specific attention to the relationships and processes that exists between agencies, and not

solely on the bridge collapse itself. Utilizing Kauzlarich and Kramer’s (1998) integrated

model, we have illuminated the processes between the levels of analysis and within each

level of analysis that allowed for the bridge collapse. Had we only identified the incident

facts, as Tombs (2012) critiques, then this case study would be about crimes of omission.

However, we have identified the processes that created these crimes of omission and have

exposed them as the true crimes of commission that they are. Moreover, we have uniquely

identified public infrastructure as a criminogenic market created by the state wherein the

state itself has monopolistic control. This market control establishes dependency between

the population at large and the state, thereby automatically putting the population in a

condition of vulnerability to state actions in terms of infrastructure.

The I-35W Bridge collapse illustrates how the structure of the United States govern-

ment, coupled with the ideologies of capitalism and other aspects of the political economy,

creates conditions in which state crimes of commission simultaneously result in the

occurrence of state crimes of omission. The bridge collapse is neither a random, nor

discrete event. Rather, it is the outcome of historical relationships and processes among

and between state agencies and the federal government that resulted in deliberate decisions

to reduce funding, regulatory control, and safety procedures that in turn resulted in a

variety of omissions on the part of the state and its representatives. Although the I-35W

bridge incident did not correspond with a natural disaster (e.g., earthquake, tornado,

hurricane), the collapse itself was a disaster that brought attention to the presumably

‘‘normal’’ and ‘‘routine’’ operations of the state and federal government that resulted in

problematic processes, policies and actions. Purposely not funding or deregulating public

infrastructure is a crime of commission as it increases the risk of social harm.

Funding priorities played a prominent role in the processes leading up to the collapse.

The state operates in a federally created environment and depends on federal funding to

support state infrastructure. Moreover, the federal government does not wish to hand over

authority of its money unless the state agrees to certain conditions. Furthermore, this

The I-35W Bridge Collapse 489

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precarious process puts the direct benefactor (the public) in immediate danger until one

party concedes to the other’s demands or, as happened in Minneapolis, the public at large

becomes harmed. Since the entire population is at risk to government negligence in terms

of infrastructure, we rarely consider ourselves victims of this type of crime. The risk is

diluted by the large population of the country and the very size of the nation as well, and

therefore this crime goes unchecked.

What this paper demonstrates, then, is that what are perceived to be routine and normal

business practices in government can be constructed as crimes of commission and omis-

sion, and can ultimately result in public harm. The I-35W Bridge collapse illustrates how

the process of bureaucracy can be easily stymied or corrupted by an individual, depart-

ment, or level of government. At the very least the process of bureaucracy is crime

facilitative and at its extreme bureaucracy can be criminogenic from its inception. Cer-

tainly, deregulation of the construction industry played a role in the design of the I-35W

Bridge. However, it was the deregulation and under-management of MnDOT and federal

departments that perpetuated and exacerbated the situation to its final outcome. Had these

bureaucratic institutions been subject to more routine scrutiny, then the element of

information omission may not have been critical in establishing the interactional levels of

crimes of omission. Moreover, one could infer that there may be a problem of over

regulation in that there were too many departments involved and that certain processes

(e.g., funding and cooperation between government levels) were too cumbersome or drawn

out that it was near impossible to have an impact on staving off the I-35W Bridge collapse.

The structure of the political economy in which state and federal agencies operated

created an environment in which deliberate decisions were made to prioritize profits and

loss reduction at the expense of public safety. Under-regulated agencies relied on the oral

culture of certain personnel, which resulted in the lack of documentation of key pieces of

information. This, as well as other bureaucratic polices, resulted in a lack of communi-

cation between agencies and departments. Without this political economic context, the

conditions necessary for bridge collapse may not have existed.

This paper has accomplished its two stated goals. First, it introduced a new topic area to

the discussion of state crime, that of public infrastructure. Second, utilizing the integrated

theoretical framework from Kauzlarich and Kramer (1998), we have demonstrated that the

I-35 bridge collapse was an outcome of bureaucratic processes, in conjunction with dif-

fering political economies and regulatory policy at the federal and state levels, which

simultaneously resulted in crimes of commission and omission.

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