February 08, 2008 09:49 pm
—
By Greg Grisolano
ggrisolano@joplinglobe.com
An insurance company for a rendering plant that is alleged to be at the center of what literally has been a big stink in Carthage has had enough.
Select Insurance Co. has filed a federal suit asking to be released from paying for the company’s legal defense in a class-action lawsuit.
Attorneys for the insurance company are also asking the court to rule that Select is not responsible for any expenses incurred by Renewable Environmental Solutions from the underlying suit. The plant’s manager, Donald Sanders, is also a co-defendant in the insurance company’s suit.
The documents, filed Friday in U.S. District Court in Springfield, represent the second civil suit to be filed against the company within the past eight months.
Cynthia Sundy, of Carthage, filed the class-action lawsuit against RES, contending that odors from the plant are a nuisance and that the company has been negligent. The plant renders animal byproducts into fuel, oil and other products.
Sundy’s lawsuit is seeking damages and class-action status aimed at allowing other residents to make claims for damages.
That lawsuit was filed in June in Jasper County Circuit Court, then in July was transferred to federal court at the request of RES. The case was remanded to the local court in October.
An attorney for Select Insurance, Donna Vobornik, of the Chicago-based law firm of Sonnenschein Nath & Rosenthal LLP, declined comment on the suit when the Globe reached her by phone on Friday.
Glenna Watkins, a spokeswoman for RES, also declined to comment Friday.
Messages left with the attorneys for Cynthia Sundy and RES were not returned Friday. Efforts to reach Sundy at home were unsuccessful.
In their complaint, attorneys for the insurance company cite 37 reasons to declare no coverage for RES and Sanders, including that the policies exclude coverage for “bodily injury or property damage” which would not have occurred except for the “actual, alleged release or escape of pollutants.”
The suit continues that coverage is barred if the insured company or authorized employee failed to disclose that prior to the policy period, that bodily injury or property damage had occurred, in whole or in part.
According to court documents, the companies have been remanded to the court’s Early Assessment Program, whereby they will choose an approved third party to mediate and attempt to work out an agreement before a jury trial. No hearing has been scheduled, according to court records.
The RES operation in Carthage has been the subject of hundreds of complaints from neighboring landowners to the Missouri Department of Natural Resources regarding odor and air pollution since the plant opened in 2003. A public-nuisance lawsuit was filed by the state and by the city of Carthage against the plant in 2005, but was later settled.
The plant was also cited by the DNR six times in 2005 for violating Missouri’s air-pollution laws, and was shut down temporarily by Gov. Matt Blunt in December 2005.
The company at first said it invested in equipment to solve the odor complaints, but has lately maintained that it is not the source of the odors spurring the complaints.
Hearing scheduled
A motions hearing on a class-action lawsuit filed by Carthage resident Cynthia Sundy against Renewable Environmental Solutions is scheduled for 9:30 a.m. Thursday in Division 2 of Jasper County Circuit Court.
Copyright © 1999-2008 cnhi, inc.