Thursday, December 4, 2003

JEREMIAH STETTLER
THE SAGINAW NEWS

Residents suing Dow Chemical Co. for dioxin contamination may receive reinforcements.

Jan P. Helder, lead attorney for the residents, has asked Saginaw County Circuit Judge Leopold P. Borrello to expand the list of litigants by 135 individuals.

The recruits would almost double the resident pool, which now stands at 179.

Helder also asked the judge to remove four residents from the list -- two who are no longer interested in suing Dow and two who discovered their property was in Midland County rather than Saginaw County.

The attorney's final request was to designate a core group of litigants -- the 26 people named in the original complaint -- as representatives of the group. As such, the court would use those residents to determine if the group is similar enough to receive "class" status.

"We have a significant portion of the community represented in this case, but it makes more sense to talk about 26 people than 300 and something," Helder said.

The revised complaint also designates the Tittabawassee River floodplain as a hazardous waste facility and identifies Dow as the "principal source of dioxin contamination" -- each declared by the state Department of Environmental Quality this year.

The Saginaw News could not immediately reach Dow attorneys for comment. t

© 2003 Saginaw News.