Pesticides

Nancy and Bryan Lara, ages 10 and 8, knew something was wrong when they saw a tractor surrounded by white clouds near their school bus stop in Caruthers. "I know that clouds are not on the ground, they're in the sky," Bryan said. The children hid behind a row of grapevines, but they could taste the noxious blend of liquid sulfur, gibberellic acid, insecticide and fertilizer as the rig rolled past them, billowing out its chemical cargo. Moments earlier, the mist had enveloped 17-year-old Carina at another stop about two blocks away.

The unraveling of multimillion-dollar Los Angeles cases alleging that Nicaraguan men had been sterilized by pesticide exposure is now threatening to upend hundreds of other claims in U.S. courts, as judges examine charges that plaintiffs' lawyers orchestrated an extraordinary international fraud. At the center of the claims is the pesticide DBCP and allegations that workers in banana plantations in Central America and Africa were harmed by exposure to the chemical.

In the sweltering hub of Nicaragua's once-thriving banana industry, Juan Dominguez saw an opportunity. He arrived in Chinandega in 2002, shortly after watching a CNN report about men claiming they had become sterile from exposure to DBCP, a pesticide used on banana plantations in the 1970s. Until then, Dominguez was best known as the mustachioed personal injury lawyer pictured on the backs of Los Angeles buses and had no experience in international law.

A Los Angeles judge has wiped out most of a jury verdict awarding millions of dollars to Nicaraguan field hands who applied pesticides to Dole Food Co. crops and who are now sterile. Although the decision leaves four workers with $1.58 million, it will undercut claims of an estimated 6,000 others who have sued in the United States for similar injuries suffered outside of this country. Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Victoria G. Chaney overturned jury verdicts in the first U.S.

Nearly 700 Ivory Coast farmworkers alleging that they became sterile from exposure to a U.S.-made pesticide can't claim to be victims of genocide because the producers didn't intend harm, a federal appeals court ruled Wednesday. The pesticide, known as DBCP for dibromochloropropane, has been banned in the United States since 1979. The Africans' suit against Amvac Chemical Corp. of Newport Beach, Dole Food Co. of Westlake Village, Dow Chemical Co. and Shell Oil Co.

A criminal prosecution against a Central Valley nut farmer accused of poisoning a worker with methyl bromide unraveled this week after a defense investigation concluded that the toxic soil fumigant had not caused Arturo Becerra's ailments. The case against Ripon, Calif.-based Golden West Nuts, its co-owner, ranch manager and foreman, was the first criminal pesticide prosecution of a California company in 14 years, and was closely watched throughout the agricultural industry.

It's probably the last thing most people think about when buying roses but by the time the bright, velvety flowers reach your Valentine, they will have been sprayed, rinsed and dipped in a battery of potentially lethal chemicals. Most of the toxic assault takes place in the waterlogged savanna surrounding the capital of Colombia, the world's second-largest cut-flower producer after the Netherlands. It produces 62% of all flowers sold in the United States.

From its factory on a lonely strip in Los Angeles' industrial sprawl, Amvac Chemical Corp. does a booming business selling some of the world's most dangerous pesticides. Amvac has fueled double-digit revenue growth through an unusual business practice: It has bought from larger companies the rights to older pesticides, many of them at risk of being banned or restricted because of safety concerns.

Amvac's headquarters in Newport Beach gleams with dark paneling and marble desks, a testament to success. But another part of the company's history lies beneath its factory in Commerce -- a legacy of pollution buried in the soil. The land is contaminated with a variety of pesticides, according to state records. After more than a decade of negotiations, Amvac and California's Department of Toxic Substances Control have yet to agree on a cleanup plan.

A Southern California pesticide company has agreed to settle a lawsuit alleging that one of the firm's products caused agricultural workers in Nicaragua to become sterile, plaintiffs' attorneys announced Sunday. Amvac Chemical Corp. has agreed to pay a total of $300,000 to 13 Nicaraguan workers who contended that they were sterilized while exposed to a pesticide called DBCP on banana plantations nearly three decades ago.