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LOUISIANA RECORD

Thursday, March 28, 2024

Environmentalists accuse Mo-Dad Utilities of years of water pollution

Wastewater pollution

NEW ORLEANS – A Baton Rouge environmental group says Mo-Dad Utilities has polluted the water it is allowed to dump waste in for the past five years.

The Louisiana Environmental Action Network Inc. filed a lawsuit Nov. 24 in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania against Mo-Dad Utilities, William A. Stegall Sr., Gwendolyn Michel Stegall and William A. Stegall Jr., alleging violations of the 1972 federal Clean Water Act.

According to the complaint, eight wastewater treatment plants owned by the defendants are permitted to discharge treated sewage effluent into the streams north of Lake Maurepas in southeast Louisiana. The suit says discharge from the plants has chronically exceeded the maximum allowable levels for total suspended solids, biochemical oxygen demand, pH levels and fecal coliform set by the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality.

The plaintiff seeks declaratory and injunctive relief punitive damages for each day of violation, and litigation costs. It is represented by attorneys Clay Garside, Mauricio Sierra, Joel Waltzer, Marc Florman, Michael Brown Robert Wiygul of Waltzer Wiygul & Garside in Gretna, New Orleans and  Ocean Springs, Mississippi.

U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana Case number 2:15-cv-06300

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