By Ron Wood
The Morning News

FAYETTEVILLE - Three new claims that arsenic from the spreading of chicken litter around Prairie Grove caused injuries were filed Friday in Washington County Circuit Court.

The lawsuit, naming chicken companies and the makers of arsenic-based chicken feed additives, claims exposure caused Christopher Scott Rasco to develop a brain tumor, Robert Grupe to develop a brain cyst and caused colon cancer that killed Larry Dee Baker.

The suit seeks actual and punitive damages.

The suit makes claims similar to several pending lawsuits and one suit that was tried where a jury quickly found for the defendants.

Members of about 50 other families in the Prairie Grove area say they're convinced health problems in the community are linked to substances found in chicken litter, particularly Roxarsone. They sued area poultry companies in December 2003. The lawsuits include about 100 plaintiffs.

Michael "Blu" Green and his parents sued Alpharma and Alpharma Animal Health, makers of the arsenic-based feed additive Roxarsone, along with all the major Northwest Arkansas poultry companies. The Greens claim exposure to arsenic from litter spread near Prairie Grove in the 1990s caused Blu to develop leukemia. After a three-week trial in September 2006, a Washington County Circuit Court jury took 21 minutes to find for Alpharma and against the Greens.

But, some of those claims will likely be retried against area poultry companies.

In May, the Arkansas Supreme Court said the poultry companies should not have been dismissed and ordered those claims tried.

Smith dismissed Tyson Foods, Cargill, George's, Peterson, and Simmons from the Green case before trial, ruling there was no way Green could prove litter from those individual companies caused his cancer. Alpharma and Alpharma Animal Health remained as defendants because they supplied Roxarsone to each of the companies.

The high court said the plaintiffs provided at least enough evidence to create factual questions a jury should resolve.