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Waste Management files to seize city property after trespassing charge

Posted by Dale Liesch | Sep 26, 2018 | Bay Briefs | 0 |

The legal battle between the city’s Solid Waste Disposal Authority (SWDA) and Waste Management (WM) has expanded to two courts amid a fight over a 100-acre tract of land west of the Chastang landfill.

These are just the latest filings in a years-long row that has continued since a jury awarded WM a victory in a 2015 breach of contract lawsuit in United States District Court in Mobile.

In federal court filings, WM has asked for a ruling to allow U.S. Marshals to seize the property from SWDA because the authority has yet to pay the complete sum owed WM through the 2015 lawsuit.

The Sept. 18 application for a writ of execution states WM has recovered $725,405.27 of the judgment through no longer paying royalties to SWDA for use of the landfill. However, SWDA still owes $5.3 million, according to the filing.

“As a result, Waste Management Mobile Bay prays this court to enter a writ of execution for the sale of the real property owned by the authority …,” the filing states.

If the court orders the seizure of the property, it could be auctioned and the money of the sale would go to the company, WM attorney Jaime Betbeze said. The property would not fetch $5.3 million at auction, but Betbeze said it would help offset the debt remaining as part of the judgment. The rest, he said, would come from the withholding of royalties.

SWDA Chairman Pete Riehm said while there was never an agreement to let WM keep royalty payments as a way of paying down the award, it was understood. He added WM has never requested the authority pay the rest of the judgment.

“There’s nothing where they’ve come to us and said ‘you need to pay up,’” Riehm said. “They’re getting paid through withholding royalty payments.”

Instead, Riehm believes WM and its legal team is using the newest filing as an excuse to allow the company to continue to use the property in question.

In state court filings from late August, SWDA accused WM of trespassing on the property and sourcing dirt from it to cover the adjacent landfill. Riehm said the authority was unaware WM was using the property. In most cases, he said, waste disposal companies will use dirt from the landfill property to cover other portions of the landfill, or pay for dirt to do so.

Betbeze said the authority acquired the property in question in 1994 for the purpose of supporting landfill operations. He called the authority allegations of trespassing “not accurate.”

“We’ll have to address that at the proper time,” he said.

The state complaint asks the court to award compensatory and punitive damages to SWDA.

“The defendants and their employees, agents, contractors and affiliates have trespassed upon the west tract,” the complaint states. “Defendant’s trespasses are and have been intentional, willful, wanton and accompanied by malice, insult and contumely conduct and with complete reckless disregard for the rights of the plaintiff.”

Jaime Betbeze, an attorney for Waste Management, did not return a call for comment on this story.


WRIT OF EXECUTION



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About The Author

Dale Liesch

Dale Liesch

Dale Liesch has been a reporter at Lagniappe since February 2014. He covers all aspects of the city of Mobile, including the mayor, City Council, the Mobile Housing Board of Commissioners, GulfQuest National Maritime Museum of the Gulf of Mexico and others. He studied journalism at The University of Alabama and graduated in 2007. He came to Lagniappe, after several years in the newspaper industry. He achieved the position of news editor at The Alexander City Outlook before moving to Virginia and then subsequently moving back a few years later. He has a number of Alabama and Virginia Press association awards to his name. He grew up in the wilderness of Baldwin County, among several different varieties of animals including: dogs, cats, ducks, chickens, a horse and an angry goat. He now lives in the Oakleigh neighborhood of Mobile with his wife, Hillary, and daughter, Joan. The family currently has no goats, angry or otherwise, but is ruled by the whims of two very energetic dogs.

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