ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Friday, October 4, 1996 TAG: 9610040057
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-4 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: NORFOLK
SOURCE: Associated Press
The former operator of a sewage plant at Smithfield Foods Inc. has pleaded innocent to charges that he filed false pollution reports and discharged waste into the Pagan River.
Terry Lynn Rettig, 45, of Virginia Beach, is charged with 23 counts of filing false reports and discharging waste into the river. If convicted, he faces a maximum of 54 years in prison and a $5.75 million fine.
After his appearance Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Norfolk, Rettig was released on a $10,000 bond pending a trial scheduled for Nov. 14.
He is accused of filing reports showing that sewage plants at Smithfield Foods, the town of Surry, a truck stop and a mobile-home park in Suffolk had complied with environmental laws, even though he had not checked the sites, according to a grand jury indictment against him.
State officials use the monthly reports to determine if sewage plants are releasing safe and legal amounts of treated waste into public waters.
Rettig also is charged with destroying three years of Smithfield Foods' records detailing what chemicals and nutrients were in slaughterhouse wastes. He originally told state inspectors the records were lost, state officials said, but a Sept. 24 indictment alleges he knowingly disposed of them.
The wastes are supposed to be treated before being piped into the Pagan River, a tributary of the James River. The Pagan has been closed to shellfishing since 1970 because of high bacteria levels from hog waste.
Rettig, represented by court-appointed attorney Charles R. Burke of Virginia Beach, also was ordered to pay $150 a month to retain Burke.
The case comes as Smithfield Foods is being sued by state Attorney General Jim Gilmore over past allegations of environmental violations.
The federal government also is considering a separate, tougher case against the company, which has a history of environmental troubles at its processing plants in rural Isle of Wight County.
Smithfield Foods has begun a project to end all sewage discharges into the Pagan River. At the prodding of state officials, the company will pipe its nearly 3 million gallons of sewage a day to a treatment plant in Suffolk. Plans would link the company with the treatment plant by early 1997.
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