Voggenthaler v. Maryland Square, LLC

Jul 26: In the U.S. Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit, Case No. 10-17520, 11-15174, 11-15176, 12-16409, and 12-16412. Appealed from the United States District Court for the District of Nevada. The Appeals Court explains, "Two environmental statutes "everyone loves to hate" are the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA) and the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA). "In combination, they make owners of contaminated property and contributors to contamination responsible for cleaning up toxic waste, and, if someone else cleans up the waste, liable for the costs of that clean up. This litigation illustrates the point. It involves seepage over several decades of a toxic dry cleaning chemical into the ground under a Las Vegas shopping center. There have been two district court actions leading to multiple appeals."

    Two companies leased the Site and operated the dry cleaning facility. Shapiro Bros. Investment Co. (SBIC) operated it from 1969 until 1984. Johnson Group, Inc., the predecessor of DCI USA, Inc., (collectively DCI) purchased the dry cleaning business in 1984 and operated it until 2000. Neighboring homeowners brought the first action, seeking injunctive relief against the property owners of the shopping center and operators of the dry cleaning facility. The Nevada Division of Environmental Protection (NDEP) brought the other action to recover its clean up costs. The district court granted summary judgment for both sets of plaintiffs on all claims. The current owner and the former operators of the dry cleaning facility appeal. There are numerous procedural issues, but the principal legal contention is that application of CERCLA to this conduct that occurred solely in Nevada violates the Commerce Clause.

 

    The Appeals Court rules, "We largely affirm the district court, including its rejection of that constitutional challenge. We vacate the grant of summary judgment under CERCLA against the current owner and remand so the owner may have an opportunity to make the additional showing that would be necessary to establish that it meets an exception to CERCLA liability. We reverse on procedural grounds the grant of summary judgment under RCRA against the current owner and the operators because those defendants did not have an adequate opportunity to respond to plaintiffs' claims. We also reverse the grant of summary judgment against one guarantor, because there is no evidence of spills during the term of his guaranty.

 

    The Appeals Court concludes as follows: "The district court properly rejected Maryland Square's constitutional challenge to the application of CERCLA in this case, and correctly granted judgment against Maryland Square and in favor of NDEP on its state law claims. The district court's judgment in favor of NDEP and against SBIC on both the CERCLA and the state law claims must be affirmed. The judgment against SBIC on the claims of the prior Site owners for indemnity was in accordance with the provisions of the leases and must be affirmed.

 

    "The district court erred, however, in entering judgment against Maryland Square on NDEP's CERCLA claim without giving Maryland Square an opportunity to correct the deficiencies in its 'bona fide prospective purchaser' submission. The district court also erred in denying for lack of jurisdiction Maryland Square's motion for reconsideration of the RCRA judgment, and we remand for consideration on the merits. In the homeowners' RCRA action, the district court erred in entering judgment against SBIC sua sponte and the judgment, as well as the ensuing injunction, must be vacated. Although the district court properly held that the prior Site owners were entitled to indemnification from SBIC, the court erred in holding Melvin Shapiro was individually liable for indemnification on the basis of his personal guaranty that operated only prospectively."

 

    Access the complete opinion (click here). [#Haz, #Remed, #CA9]