BIRMINGHAM — A federal grand jury heard more testimony Thursday in its investigation into the operation of the Talladega Water and Sewer Board, spending the entire afternoon listening to at least three witnesses.The grand jury first heard testimony Tuesday in a case believed to involve the contamination of a city well that was used off and on to pump water to residents since 1995.
After spending about 20 minutes Thursday with an operator at the board's surface water treatment plant, the grand jury then heard testimony from board chairman Wayne Kearley.
Kearley's testimony went on for almost 2 hours, not including a 7-minute break for him to confer with board attorneys Charlanna Spencer and John Bolton.
After completing his testimony and speaking further with his lawyers, Kearley declined to comment on the questions posed to him. "I suspect it would be best right now if I just didn't say anything," he said.
Next up was former board general manager George Montgomery, who testified for about an hour and 10 minutes before the grand jury concluded its business for the day.
When Montgomery was approached for comment outside the Hugo Black Federal Courthouse in Birmingham, he said only, "Yeah, it's getting cold out here."
Bolton also declined to comment, citing the secrecy of the grand jury process.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Robert Posey, who is handling the investigation, was also unable to comment.
Another plant operator gave just over an hour of testimony to the same grand jury Tuesday afternoon. The first operator did not bring an attorney with him.
Prior to the operator testifying Thursday, Posey received a packet of sealed documents from two employees at an environmental testing firm in Gadsden, but it was not entirely clear Thursday whether or not these documents were directly related to the water board investigation.
Posey also told an attorney handling an unrelated case on Thursday's docket (which was not called) that he did not expect the water board testimony to go on as long as it had.
Federal involvement
The water board first attracted the attention of federal law enforcement in early 2003, after officials with the Alabama Department of Environmental Management and the Alabama Attorney General's Office passed on suspicions that the board had violated the Clean Water Act by continuing to run the Grant Street well, which is contaminated with tetrachloroethylene.
This substance is used as a metal degreaser and an ingredient in dry cleaning fluid. It is considered a carcinogen, and has been shown to cause liver and kidney problems in laboratory animals.
Agents with the FBI and the Criminal Investigative Division of the Environmental Protection Agency executed search warrants in Talladega in September and interviewed Montgomery extensively at that time.
ADEM initially ordered the well shut down in 1995. The previous board had let bids for an aeration tower in the late 1990s that would have solved the contamination problem, but the device was never built. Nonetheless, the well was pressed back into service on several occasions since the initial, ordered closure in violation of the Clean Water Act.
The investigation is also believed to cover allegations of mail fraud, stemming from falsified reports submitted to state and federal agencies.
The well was shut down the last time in May, and was temporarily disabled in October in order to assure residents that it was not being used.
The board recently approved bids for the construction of yet another aeration tower, which should render water from the well safe to drink again.
In addition to the federal criminal probe, the board, along with ADEM and the city of Talladega, are defendants in a class action lawsuit brought by a citizens group consisting largely of people who live near the well. The cases against ADEM and the board will be heard in Montgomery by Circuit Judge Charles Price.
The case against the city of Talladega has been severed from the other two, and will be heard in Talladega by Circuit Judge Julian King.
