A WASTE disposal company is facing a huge fine after leaving rotting human blood and body parts in lorries at sites in the North-East.

Eurocare Environmental Services, based in Newcastle, which has contracts to dispose waste from most of the hospitals in the North, will be sentenced on Friday after admitting a string of environmental breaches.

It includes leaving human hospital waste to rot in trailers at sites in Newcastle and Birmingham.

The firm pleaded guilty to ten charges of breaching the Environmental Protection Act 1990 at a magistrates' court in Wrexham, North Wales, last October.

The Environment Agency began an investigation after a backlog of waste built up in December 2000 when Eurocare's plant at Walker, Newcastle, suffered two major breakdowns.

Environment Agency officials later looked at sites in Birmingham, other parts of Newcastle, and Chester.

They discovered large amounts of "poisonous and noxious" clinical fluid had leaked into the River Dee, near Wrexham.

The company also pleaded guilty to the unauthorised dumping of clinical waste on land near Chester, as well as fraudulently obtaining licences to dispose of waste.

Eurocare is one of the country's leading waste management firms and is the largest "non-burn" disposal operator in Europe, disposing of 45,000 tonnes of hospital waste each year.

John Saxby, chief executive of County Durham and Darlington Hospitals Trust, said they were awaiting the court case result with interest to see what action, if any, they would take.

The case, at Chester Crown Court, is against the firm rather than its directors and carries an unlimited fine.

No one from Eurocare was available for comment yesterday.