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Chemical Firm Owner Convicted in N.J. Case : Sister plant of Burned-Out Sun Valley Facility Blamed in $1-Million Gas Leak 2 Years Ago

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Times Staff Writers

The owner of a Sun Valley chemical company that burned Saturday, sickening 57 people who inhaled fumes and prompting a federal cleanup, also owned a New Jersey firm blamed for a $1-million toxic-waste problem that led to her criminal conviction, according to officials.

New Jersey officials identified Marianne Pratter, 48, as the owner of the Research Organic & Inorganic Chemical Co. in Belleville, N.J., the site of a toxic-gas leak two years ago.

Pratter also was identified by Los Angeles County hazardous-waste control officials as the owner of the Sun Valley company of the same name.

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New Jersey officials said Pratter pleaded guilty on March 30, 1984, to charges of reckless storage of hazardous materials and creating a risk of widespread injury, and was sentenced to three years’ probation, five months of community service and a $15,000 fine.

Officials said the State of New Jersey was left with the estimated $1-million expense of cleaning up the company’s property, including $250,000 the state legislature appropriated to reimburse the town of Belleville. The state has a suit pending to recover all cleanup costs from the company.

A spokesman for the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection said the company housed such a quantity and variety of hazardous chemicals that the 2-year-old cleanup project will take until next month to complete.

In Los Angeles, Police Department records indicate that officials had some previous evidence of problems at the Sun Valley plant, which buys chemicals from manufacturers and repackages them for sale in smaller amounts to laboratories. According to a department spokesman, a police officer who entered the building last month had to be given two days off to recover from a nosebleed, nausea and other medical problems, apparently caused by exposure to a poisonous gas.

A private hazardous-waste management firm, hired by the federal Environmental Protection Agency and a Coast Guard team, continued working Wednesday to remove chemicals from the burned-out ruin of the chemical company’s facility on De Garmo Avenue.

The cleanup, which led to the evacuation of a two-block area Monday and Tuesday after a toxic gas was discovered forming in the ruins, is expected to continue at least until Saturday.

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The New Jersey and California firms are both in financial trouble, according to officials in the two states.

In 1980, the New Jersey company filed for protection from its creditors under Chapter 11 of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code, according to Anne Simonoff, New Jersey deputy state attorney general.

That same year, Los Angeles County health officials said, the California company apparently began operating out of the Sun Valley building. In March, 1981, it was stripped of its rights as a corporation for failure to pay state income taxes, said Karen Ives, spokeswoman for the California Franchise Tax Board in Sacramento.

“They no longer have the right to operate a corporation, protected by corporate law,” she said, noting that the company could remain in business as a sole proprietorship or partnership. She declined to disclose any details in the case.

In Los Angeles, a Police Department spokesman said that an officer who entered the Sun Valley building March 4 to look for a burglar “complained of nosebleed, abdominal cramps, nausea and headache.”

The 44-year-old officer, whose name was not made public because of the confidentiality of medical records, was examined at Lake View Medical Center in Lake View Terrace, the spokesman said.

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A police sergeant investigating the officer’s case was told by a chemist at the company that the officer “was probably exposed to hydrogen selenide,” the spokesman said. A chemical reference book describes hydrogen selenide as “highly toxic, damaging to the lungs and liver.”

Police reported the incident to the county Hazardous Waste Control Program. The program’s chief, Anastacio Medina, said an inspector was sent to the site and found no violations of hazardous-material regulations.

The inspector found that the company did not have a hazardous-waste control license, but that is not unusual and is not a basis for action against it, Medina said. The company subsequently took out a license.

The license program began only two years ago, Medina said, and there has not been enough time to inspect or license many firms. Although more than 12,000 licenses have been issued, he said, 5,000 to 10,000 companies still are not listed.

He said the only requirement for the license in any case “is the ability to pay the fee,” which ranges from $70 to $230, depending on the number of employees. The purpose of the license is not to authorize firms to do anything, but to raise money to pay for the program’s listing of hazardous-waste sources, he said.

The Sun Valley company was issued a county license to possess and use radioactive material on June 1, 1984, after passing an on-site inspection showing it had “qualified personnel with technical competence” and the proper equipment, said Joe Karbus, director of the county health department’s Radiation Management Bureau. About 12 gallons of uranium salts, with a low level of radioactivity, were removed from the burned-out building Tuesday and sent to a federal nuclear waste dump.

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Medina said that, after four days of unsuccessful attempts by county and federal officials to make contact with Pratter, she appeared at the Sun Valley site Wednesday to talk to an EPA official, saying she would try to find money to pay for the cleanup.

The EPA took over the cleanup Tuesday, saying work had to begin immediately because of the danger of the chemicals, and that neither Pratter nor local governments could guarantee payment of the $100,000 that a private disposal firm estimated the job may cost.

Medina and Karbus said there is no way their agencies could have known about Pratter’s New Jersey conviction when they issued licenses to her company because there is no clearing house for such information.

Pratter could not be reached for comment.

City Councilman Howard Finn, whose district includes Sun Valley, said he will propose a hazardous-materials disclosure ordinance that will include a requirement that managers of companies seeking a hazardous-materials license undergo a police records check.

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