District of Columbia AG Sued Pesticide Manufacturer for Decades-Long Pollution of Waterways

District of Columbia Attorney General Karl Racine filed a lawsuit against chemical manufacturer Velsicol for polluting waterways and natural resources with chlordane, a cancer-causing pesticide over several decades, with especially grave impacts on environmental justice communities. AG Racine argued that the company knew about the dangers of the pesticide as early as 1959, but continued to sell products that contained the chemical for many more years until it was banned in 1988. In 2016, over half of D.C.’s waterways still contained unsafe levels of chlordane. The complaint sought damages for contamination, recovery of the cost of monitoring and cleaning up the chemical, and liability for future costs.