Metal recycling plant owners charged for contaminating LA school grounds

After decades of complaints from staff and students at Jordan high school, Atlas Metals was hit with 22 felony counts

The owners of a metal recycling plant operating next to a south LA high school campus have been hit with 22 felony charges, after decades of complaints that the facility was contaminating school grounds with lead and other toxic waste.

Announcing the charges on Wednesday, the Los Angeles district attorney George Gascón said that staff and students at Jordan high school in Watts, a predominantly Black and Latino neighbourhood, had been “potentially exposed to dangerous levels of pollutants on a daily basis”.