"Alligators turn Miss. couple’s dream into court fight" by Herbert Buchsbaum | New York Times March 20, 2014
CENTREVILLE, Miss. — Finding an alligator in your backyard can ruin your day.
Find two and it is time to lock up the pets and children.
But find dozens and you could end up in state Supreme Court battling Exxon, which is what happened to Tom and Consandra Christmas.
The couple, both 56, bought an idyllic 35-acre tract of rolling pasture and woodland in rural southwestern Mississippi in 2003, planning to raise livestock and build their dream home there.
Tom Christmas, who works at a petrochemical plant in Louisiana, wanted to raise horses and cattle. Consandra Christmas, a purchasing agent for the local board of supervisors, wanted to fish in the pond and invite friends for trail rides.
But it was not until after they sold their house, moved into a trailer on the property, and started clearing it in 2007, they say, that they discovered unwanted visitors. Lots of them.
“One maybe, OK, that’s fine,” Tom Christmas said, casting a wary eye across the pond. “I wouldn’t have a beef with that. But in the course of a summer, I’m looking at 40 to 50 alligators crossing through.”
“It took the joy out of it for me,” Consandra Christmas said. “I have hardly come back here since.”
The legal case hinges on a bizarre tale of how the alligators got there, and that is where the parties vehemently disagree.
As Tom Christmas tells it, he was rabbit hunting in October 2007 when his dog crawled under the fence into the property next door, Rogers Landfarm, which is owned by ExxonMobil. Christmas drove around to the entrance to retrieve his beagle and what he saw floored him.
Signs on the imposing metal gates said: “Keep Out. Waste Disposal Site.” A land farm, the rustic name notwithstanding, is a waste dump in which the waste is plowed into the soil, eventually to be decomposed by naturally occurring organisms.
For decades, Exxon had trucked containers of oil waste sludge, as much as 140 tons a day, from its refinery in Baton Rouge, La., to Centreville, according to court records.
Beyond the gates was another sign: “No Fishing. Snakes and alligators in area.”
“I started seeing all these alligators all over the place,” Christmas said, shaking his head. “I said, ‘Good God!’ ”
Alligators are native to Mississippi, as denoted by their scientific name, alligator mississippiensis.
Then why is it Florida Gators?
But when specialists at the State Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks were called to the site in 2008, they counted a minimum of 84 alligators in 85 acres of ponds, acknowledging there were undoubtedly more.
After unsuccessfully trying to persuade Exxon to do something about them, the Christmases sued in 2008, saying that the gators diminished the value of their land. They are seeking compensation for their property, for which they paid $72,000 and where they have abandoned plans to build a house.
The Christmases, who say they lost two calves and a Catahoula hunting dog named Bear to the gators, began making inquiries. Neighbors, including people who worked at the land farm, told them a strange story.
The company, they said, had brought in a menagerie — alligators from Louisiana, as well as ducks, chickens, geese, and peacocks — to serve as coal-mine canaries, their health intended to gauge the environmental health of the land.
Exxon says the case should be thrown out.
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