## Facts

- In 1943, a U.S. military aircraft crashed on land in what is now Chino, California.
- In 2002, Lewis Operating Corporation purchased a tract that included the crash site for commercial development.
- Before purchase, Lewis retained an environmental consultant to conduct a Phase I-type assessment; the consultant found no evidence of contamination.
- During grading, Lewis excavated soil from the crash site and used it as fill in other areas of the development.
- Lewis later discovered military ammunition and unexploded ordnance in soil that had been excavated and redistributed.
- The California Department of Toxic Substances Control investigated and removed ammunition and related material from the crash site and multiple fill locations.
- Lewis incurred approximately $3.2 million in investigation and cleanup costs and sued the United States under CERCLA seeking to shift those costs to the government.

## Issues

1. Whether Lewis qualified for CERCLA’s innocent landowner defense so as to avoid liability and recover its response costs from the United States.
2. Whether Lewis’s excavation and redistribution of contaminated soil constituted contribution to a release, preventing Lewis from showing the United States was the sole cause of the contamination.

## Decision

- The court held that Lewis did not qualify as an innocent landowner under CERCLA.
- The court concluded Lewis’s grading and spreading of soil contributed to the presence of contamination at additional locations and increased remediation costs.
- Because Lewis contributed to the release, Lewis failed to establish that the United States was the sole cause of the release as required for the defense.
- The court rejected Lewis’s effort to impose exclusive cleanup liability on the United States and left cost allocation for further proceedings.

## Legal Principles

- CERCLA’s innocent landowner defense is unavailable to a landowner whose actions contribute to a release or the spread of hazardous substances.
- To establish the defense, the defendant must show the release was caused solely by another party and did not occur in connection with the defendant’s acts or omissions.
- Pre-acquisition due diligence, standing alone, does not preserve innocent landowner status where the purchaser’s post-acquisition conduct spreads contamination or increases response costs.
- When multiple parties contribute to contamination conditions, CERCLA permits shared responsibility rather than shifting all costs to a single party.

## Conclusion

The court denied Lewis the innocent landowner defense because Lewis’s earth-moving operations spread contaminated soil and increased remediation costs, preventing a showing that the United States was the sole cause of the release and precluding exclusive federal liability for cleanup expenditures.


Lewis Operating Corp. v. United States, 533 F. Supp. 2d 1041 (C.D. Cal. 2007)