Another Delaware law firm has threatened to sue Mountaire Farms for violations of federal law related to water contamination found near Millsboro.
The News Journal After years of what experts are calling a "gross" violation of poultry wastewater and sludge contamination, a Delaware law firm filed a class action lawsuit Wednesday representing nearly 700 residents against Mountaire Farms in Millsboro.
"It only took me about a week, and about a box’s worth of data to figure out that this is really one of the most egregious cases of groundwater contamination that I’ve ever seen in my four decades of working," Bauer said during a press conference on Wednesday.
In his report, Bauer stated the Millsboro-area chicken plant "failed to meet its permit limits" and "to follow industry-accepted practices for spray irrigation of wastewater."
The chicken company disagreed with the findings of the report.
The law firms object to a consent decree filed by DNREC that addressed the violations at the Millsboro plant.
The consent decree doesn’t include the host of requirements they’d like to see Mountaire Farms meet, according to the law firms.
After Mountaire Farms was cited by state environmental regulators late last year for spraying highly contaminated wastewater on hundreds of acres of farm fields on the outskirts of Millsboro, dozens of residents living near the plant learned that their private wells contained potentially unhealthy levels of nitrates — in some cases two or three times the federal safe drinking water standard of 10 milligrams per liter.
Studies also show it can cause birth defects, miscarriages and has increasingly been linked to other problems such as some cancers and gastrointestinal issues.
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