Appraisal: October 2009 Archives

The company that holds thousands of artifacts from the Titanic luxury liner returned to federal court in Norfolk on Monday seeking sole title to the property and an end to more than 15 years of legal wrangling over the treasure.  After the Titanic's discovery and subsequently the first expedition to retrieve the artifacts in 1987, ownership of the property has been a legal and corporate challenge.  Lawyers for the company said they will present about 15 expert witnesses, including appraisal experts who estimated the worth of the artifacts. The $110 million figure, the appraisers said in a court filing, is not to be taken literally.

U.S. District Judge Rebecca Beach Smith opened a hearing that will determine the fate of the artifacts lifted from the depths of the North Atlantic.  Premier Exhibitions Inc., the parent company of RMS Titanic Inc., has asked the court to award it sole title to the artifacts with covenants to preserve them forever, or alternatively, a cash award of the estimated value of the pieces.  The company also notified the court that it has begun initial planning for another expedition to the site, tentatively scheduled for 2010.

Excerpted from hamptonroads.com.

Geology expert J. Berton Fisher has given extensive testimony for Oklahoma about poultry waste and its application in the Illinois River watershed.  The expert's firm has spent about five years gathering data on pollution in the watershed, testified that the poultry companies sued by Oklahoma in 2005 have polluted surface water, ground water, soil and sediment.

The state is suing 11 poultry companies, saying they are legally responsible for the handling and disposal of poultry waste — also known as litter — that the state says has damaged the watershed. During his testimony before U.S. District Judge Gregory Frizzell in Tulsa, Fisher discussed the phosphorus, copper, zinc and arsenic that the state asserts are contaminants in the watershed that can be traced to the poultry industry.

On Wednesday, Fisher repeated his assertion that the chemical composition of poultry waste — including its high concentrations of phosphorus, copper, zinc and arsenic — is distinct from that of cattle waste in the area. Defense attorneys tried to establish on cross examination that Fisher's emphasis on those four substances as a sort of "fingerprint" of poultry waste has not been replicated to any extent by other scientists.

Excerpted from tulsaworld.com.