Judge Delays Decision on Malathion

After three days of debate on the legal merits and potential health hazards of aerial spraying of malathion over El Cajon, a Superior Court judge late Friday delayed until Monday his decision on whether to halt the state’s eradication plan for the Mexican fruit fly.

The second helicopter-borne spraying mission against the Mexfly is planned for Monday night.

There had been a slim chance that Acting Superior Court Judge J. Michael Bollman would issue a decision Friday on the city’s suit to halt the spraying, but testimony took all day. Bollman, appearing weary but ready to spend the weekend reviewing the mountain of evidence, said his decision will come by 10:30 a.m. Monday at the earliest.

In closing arguments, Deputy City Atty. Stephen M. Eckis attacked the state Department of Food and Agriculture, saying the agency’s director, Henry J. Voss, flagrantly violated state laws governing pest eradication and endangered species when he implemented the spraying plan.

The plan failed to justify declaring the existence of an infestation, selecting the aerial spraying method, designating the size of the spray area and even the reason for eradicating the Mexfly, Eckis said.

He said Voss’ “abrogation of the law goes to the heart of our legal system and democracy. . . . We think the more important issue than spraying is whether these state officials have to follow the law.

“The biggest problem here is not the spraying itself, but knowing how and why the decision was made.”

Calling the state plan “hopelessly inadequate,” Eckis said there is no doubt that the malathion would indiscriminately kill beneficial insects and already had caused El Cajon residents mental anguish and possibly physical harm.

Deputy Atty. Gen. Charles W. Getz IV disputed Eckis’ claims and urged the judge to place greater emphasis on why the spraying is needed--to prevent the Mexfly from becoming entrenched here--than on legal technicalities.

Getz said the state had “substantially fulfilled” the legal obligations of implementing the spraying plan. He attributed any oversights to the haste in which the plan was adopted. Fruit flies’ presence in Southern California has led to a state of emergency in an effort to protect the state’s citrus industry, he argued.

Getz solicited testimony from four scientists but relied most heavily on Dr. Peter H. Kurtz, senior medical coordinator for the state agriculture department. Kurtz disputed Thursday’s dramatic testimony from the city’s star witness, Dr. Samuel Epstein, a professor of occupational and environmental medicine at the University of Illinois.

Epstein had blasted the state, saying there is a lack of research on malathion’s health effects and calling for the spraying to be halted immediately.

Kurtz, however, said there is an “abundance” of data on malathion and that it causes “no measurable impact” on human health. For any toxic threat, a person would have to be exposed to hundreds of times the amount of malathion that is to be sprayed over the city, Kurtz said.

He also cited a 1960s study in which human volunteers swallowed up to 60 milligrams of malathion a day for two months--thousands of times that to which anyone could be exposed in the El Cajon spraying--and showed no permanent damage.