EPA Seeks to Recover Costs of Cleaning Up Fire

The Environmental Protection Agency has filed a lawsuit to recover cleanup costs following a Sun Valley chemical plant fire three years ago that sent more than 50 people to hospitals for treatment.

The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles, contends that Marianne Pratter, who headed the defunct Research Organic & Inorganic Chemical Co., should pay back the $167,382 the EPA said it spent to clean up and remove toxic chemicals and contaminated debris after the fire at 9068 DeGarmo Ave.

Pratter, 50--who still faces a felony charge and several personal-injury suits stemming from the fire--failed to return phone calls Monday.

The lawsuit, filed on behalf of the EPA by Justice Department attorneys, also names as co-defendants Advent Laboratories--a chemical firm Pratter operated in Orange County after the Sun Valley fire--and Pratter’s landlords at the DeGarmo Avenue property, Juan and Maria Company.

Juan Company refused comment on the lawsuit. But Richard Seitz, one of his lawyers, described Company as a victim. Seitz noted that in such lawsuits, the EPA customarily sues property owners along with the operators of toxic cleanup sites.

The EPA cleanup began on April 15, 1985, two days after the fire at Research Organic, which stored and repackaged hazardous and radioactive compounds for sale to industry and laboratories, including such substances as hydrofluoric and nitric acid, hydrazine, uranium and thorium.

‘Array of Chemicals’ Released

The fire, according to the lawsuit, “caused the release of a vast array of chemicals,” as well as damage to chemical containers. Because the defendants “failed to take the necessary response actions,” the suit says, the EPA moved in to repackage and dispose of the most dangerous materials. It removed 1,200 gallons of tainted water generated by the steam cleaning of the building, the suit says. In addition, 16 drums of low-level radioactive waste were shipped to a disposal site, according to the complaint.

The complaint also seeks up to $25,000 per day for an unspecified number of days for Pratter’s alleged failure to answer EPA requests for information following the fire and cleanup.

More than 50 people, mainly firefighters and police, were treated at area hospitals for breathing problems and dizziness following the fire.

Company and Pratter are listed as defendants in at least four personal-injury suits involving dozens of plaintiffs who claim to have been injured by the fire. Some of the plaintiffs say they have suffered lingering injuries.

Pratter and Research Organic are charged with illegal hazardous-waste disposal, which carries a maximum penalty of two years’ imprisonment and a $100,000 fine. The case, filed by the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office, has been pending for two years and is expected to go to trial this summer.

The waste-disposal violation involves Pratter’s failure to remove chemicals that the EPA did not clean up because it believed they did not constitute an imminent threat. In December, 1985--eight months after the fire--the chemicals were finally removed by county health officials.

“She abandoned the hazardous material on the premises,” said Deputy Dist. Atty. Joseph Charney. “She basically walked away from it.”

Hector Briones, Pratter’s lawyer in the criminal case, said Pratter was unable to clean up the chemicals “through no fault of her own” because health officials and her landlord restricted her access to the site.

Pratter, who had operated Research Organic in New Jersey before setting up shop in Sun Valley, pleaded guilty in New Jersey in 1984 to charges of reckless storage of hazardous materials and of creating a risk of widespread injury. She was sentenced there to three years’ probation, five months of community service and a $15,000 fine.