EXTRACT: On the video, a lawyer asked [a 30-year Monsanto employee William Papageorge] whether any Monsanto official ever warned the public about the dangers of PCBs.
"Why would they?" he said.
Papageorge said he and other officials decided "there was no rational reason" for informing the public about the PCBs or their effects. During that time, the company tested fish in Snow Creek and Choccolocco Creek and found high levels of PCBs, but opted against telling the people who routinely ate fish from the creeks.
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Plaintiffs rest in PCBs trial
By Megan Nichols
Anniston Star, 9 April 2009
http://www.annistonstar.com/breaking/2009/as-localupdate-0409-0-9d09m0245.htm
BIRMINGHAM - Plaintiffs in a PCBs trial here rested their case this morning, ending with testimony from a former Monsanto employee who defended the company's decision not to tell Anniston residents it polluted the city.
Jurors watched part of a video deposition taken in 1998 of 30-year Monsanto employee William Papageorge. Papageorge is no longer with Monsanto, but worked at the company during the decades it released millions of pounds of polychlorinated biphenyls into Anniston's air, water and dirt.
On the video, a lawyer asked Papageorge whether any Monsanto official ever warned the public about the dangers of PCBs.
"Why would they?" he said.
Papageorge said he and other officials decided "there was no rational reason" for informing the public about the PCBs or their effects. During that time, the company tested fish in Snow Creek and Choccolocco Creek and found high levels of PCBs, but opted against telling the people who routinely ate fish from the creeks.
The former Monsanto Co. made PCBs at its plant on Alabama 202 from 1929 to 1971. PCBs from the plant settled in the yards of many homes near the plant. The chemical also flowed through drainage ditches to Snow Creek and eventually Choccolocco Creek.
This trial is the first of 47 cases filed in Jefferson County Circuit Court against Pharmacia, which in 2000 merged with Monsanto.
More than 3,000 claimants make up all 47 suits. Attorneys say these claimants were left out of two cases settled in 2003. About 21,600 claimants split $600 million in that case. Another $100 million went to research and a health clinic, among other efforts.
Plaintiffs attorneys are trying to prove that the five claimants in this case have diabetes and osteoarthritis because of PCB exposure.
The defense began its case today by questioning UAB rheumatologist Walter Chatham about PCBs and osteoarthritis.
"There is nothing whatsoever”¦ that establishes any link between (PCBs) and the development of osteoarthritis," Chatham said.
Plaintiffs attorneys yesterday offered an expert who said studies show PCBS can cause osteoarthritis.
Testimony is ongoing today. Lawyers say the trial should wrap up early next week.