Sludge Watch ==> Hog barn loses stink suit - there's hope!

[Maureen Reilly]

Hog farm company loses suit

 http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2006/sep/25/hog_farm_company_loses_suit/

The Associated Press
Monday, September 25, 2006

Kansas City, Mo. - The nation's second-largest pork producer must pay $4.5
million to three families bothered by the smell from a northwest Missouri
hog farm, a jury ruled.

The same Jackson County jury also found grounds for punitive damages against
Kansas City-based Premium Standard Farms, but the company agreed not to
appeal the actual damages award and the plaintiffs in exchanged dropped
their request for punitive damages.

The families own or owned property near the company's farm near Trenton.

The families' lawyer, Charles Speer, said Friday's verdict was "by far and
away the biggest award (in the nation) against a major confined animal
producer."

Kirk Goza, an attorney for Premium Standard Farms, declined to comment after
the verdict.

Speer is handling more than 50 other lawsuits against Premium Standard
Farms. A separate class-action lawsuit involving a consortium of law firms
seeks to represent anyone who owns property within 10 miles of the company's
more than 20 hog farms in Missouri.

Before the jury began its deliberations Friday, Goza said Premium Standard
Farms was looking for new technologies to stop odor and already had spent
millions to control it.

The lawsuit, Goza said, was motivated by the property owners' hostility
against corporate farms. He also said that the smells were infrequent, minor
and quickly faded.

But another attorney for the plaintiffs said Friday that Premium Standard
Farms falsely played down the odor problem. The smell, attorney Richard
Middleton Jr. said, "comes and goes, and you never know where, and you never
know how far."