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  • Opportunity: Our client was accused by a regulatory agency of polluting groundwater through leaking underground storage tanks, even though no source of pollution on the client’s property had ever been conclusively established. Our challenge was to defend three separate hearings in which the client was accused of being the source of pollution.
  • Solution: With the help of a top consulting firm, we researched all of the pertinent documents in the possession of the regulator and interviewed the agency’s investigative staff.  We found serious gaps in the data and what we considered to be incorrect analysis of the data that did exist. 
  • Result: After we challenged its findings, the agency conducted a more thorough investigation of our client’s site. After the agency voluntarily dismissed two of the hearings, we sought at the third hearing to get the matter dismissed without incorrect identification of our client as the source of pollution. Our cross-examination of the government’s chief witness brought an admission that our client’s property was actually affected by groundwater movement carrying contaminants from a nearby site, which the government had previously claimed was not a source of pollution on our client’s property. In the middle of our examination of its witness, the government asked the hearing examiner to dismiss the case.