| Island County settles meth car search Island County settled a federal lawsuit this month with a former used-car dealer who claimed a health inspector improperly conducted tests for methamphetamine residue and forced him to destroy 22 cars. After the arrest, the health department tested a building and three cars for meth residue. All 61 cars on the lot were tested and 29 came back as contaminated. Trouble started when deputies raided the business in March 2009. Also, the lawsuit alleges that the environmental health specialist defamed the Browns and damaged their reputations in "written statements. The lawsuit claimed the county, the county public health department and an environmental health specialist violated the couple's constitutional rights and acted with negligence by conducting flawed testing and unfairly closed the business. "We were able to settle for a fraction of the original claim," he noted. Brown, who is not related to the sheriff of the same name, owned the former car lot, Omphetamine was not accurate, not based upon a representative comparability of known risks, and was otherwise arbitrary," the lawsuit states. The lawsuit states that the decontamination standard applied by public health officials was "arbitrary and without justification. The lawsuit also claims that the public health officials invalidated appropriately obtained test results and refused to release uncontaminated property to the owner. Oak Harbor resident Mark Brown and his wife originally filed a claim with the county for more than $5 million in damages. |
Sunday 1 April 2012
Island County settles meth car search
