Did Demolition Release Asbestos? Jury Hears 2 Sides

The guilt or innocence of Lawndale Public Works Director James Sanders hinges on a single question, his attorney told a Torrance jury Friday: whether Sanders’ use of a tractor to demolish a building containing cement-hard asbestos tiles was enough to release harmful fibers into the air or soil.

Sanders and former City Manager James Arnold are both charged with five misdemeanor counts of illegally disposing of hazardous materials in the June, 1989, demolition of three city-owned storage buildings in the old city yard at 167th Street and Osage Avenue. If convicted, each man could face as much as a year in jail and a $100,000 fine.

Sanders’ attorney, Brendan O’Neill, said his client had workers separate the asbestos tiles into barrels before he crushed the rest of the rubble with the tractor. In addition, Sanders, who discovered the asbestos his first day on the job, took what one expert witness called a conservative approach by watering down the site and requiring workers to wear painters’ masks, O’Neill said.

He also said the prosecution’s evidence that Sanders actually drove over the asbestos tiles was weak and inconsistent, and he described unclear photocopies of photographs--part of the prosecution’s proof that tiny fragments of asbestos tiles were scattered around the demolition site--as “a joke.”

O’Neill suggested that Sanders and Arnold became scapegoats in “a small town with small-town politics” when neighbors began pressuring the council in 1989 to tear down the buildings, which had become an eyesore.

But Deputy Dist. Atty. Anthony Patchett, whose closing remarks mostly consisted of reading key parts of each witness’ testimony, took a different tack in presenting his case to the jury.

Patchett, who had called on several neighbors who testified that their homes had been covered with dust during the demolition, said the very act of knocking down the building caused a disposal of hazardous materials and that Sanders, who drove the tractor and supervised the job, was responsible.

He also accused Sanders of possessing “general criminal intent” when he continued to demolish the buildings after discovering the asbestos tiles instead of calling in a licensed contractor to remove them. Both Sanders and Arnold knew or should have known what they were doing, he said.

“I believe, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that defendant Sanders acted hastily, improperly, without regard for the neighbors” living next to the demolition site, Patchett said.

He also said that as Sanders’ supervisor, Arnold should have stopped the demolition project as soon as he learned Sanders had discovered asbestos.

“What’s the motive of Arnold?” Patchett asked the jury. “Hard to speculate, except for the fact that the city saved themselves $5,000” by not having a licensed contractor remove the asbestos tiles before the demolition occurred, he said.

Arnold’s attorney, Brian O’Neill, brother of Sanders’ attorney, will present his closing arguments on Monday. The jury will then begin its deliberations.

Throughout the trial, heard in the courtroom of South Bay Municipal Court Judge Deanne Smith Myers, both sides agreed that after the asbestos tiles were collected, they were deposited in a licensed dump. But testimony differed about whether Transite tiles, the cement-like material found at the demolition site, were subject in 1989 to the same handling regulations as friable asbestos, a form that easily crumbles.

Both defense and prosecution experts testified that the Transite tiles, which contain 35% asbestos, would be harmful only when pulverized into a powder. But the experts disagreed about whether the tiles were ground into a fine enough powder during the demolition to cause any harm.

Once a common form of insulation, asbestos is now considered a hazardous material because it contains invisible needle-like fibers that may cause cancer if swallowed or inhaled.

The four-day trial, which started Tuesday, drew testimony from several witnesses, including Lawndale Mayor Harold Hofmann, former Assistant City Manager Paula Cone and two Lawndale maintenance workers who sued the city in December, alleging they were exposed to asbestos when they were required to haul debris from the demolition site.

Neither Sanders nor Arnold took the stand during the trial.

In a conversation secretly recorded by a district attorney’s investigator, Sanders conceded he failed to follow a notification rule imposed by the South Coast Air Quality Management District but dismissed it as a technicality that most contractors do not follow.

“Personally, I think it is ridiculous that they (AQMD) are supposed to be notified when you start demolition, and I don’t think anybody does,” Sanders said in the tape that was played for jurors Thursday. “There might be a couple of people, but I don’t think as a rule people do.”

Sanders said he took what he considered to be reasonable measures in watering down the site and having workers, who wore old clothes and painters’ masks, separate the asbestos from the rest of the rubble into sealed 55-gallon barrels.

He called the investigation “politically motivated, a waste of the taxpayers’ money,” and said he was “a lot more conscientious than any contractor would have been.”