Secretive Olive Farm Asks Judge To Seal Docs, Gag Order and Change of Venue

A judge ruled there will be no gag order involving a lawsuit brought by an olive farm near Indio, which alleges its workers are put in danger by hot air balloons that are flown too low over the orchard.

JCM Farming Inc. sued 15 Coachella Valley balloonists and hot air balloon companies in March 2009, alleging they violated property rights and put JCM’s workers in danger when passing over its walled compound near Jackson Street at Avenue 54.

An airplane services company was also named as a defendant because its plane — dropping sterile insects under contract for the U.S. Department of Agriculture — flew too low over the orchard, according to the lawsuit.

JCM attorney Andrew Rauch asked Superior Court Judge Randall D. White today to move the proceedings out of Riverside County, court records show. He also asked White to issue a gag order to prevent attorneys from speaking to the media and to seal court records in the case.

The judge did not immediately rule on either of the plaintiff’s requests, instead setting the July 7 hearing date.

A Nov. 28 trial date had been set in the case last week. A mandatory settlement conference scheduled for July 15.

Rauch could not be reached for comment today. But he told City News Service last week that JCM had reached a resolution with all but two of the balloon companies named in the lawsuit.

“We are just hoping we can come to some sort of settlement agreement sooner rather than later,” he said then. “We wrote many, many letters before we ever started the lawsuit. The lawsuit was a last resort.”

An attorney for Fantasy Balloon Flights, one of the two companies still fighting the lawsuit, said many of those settlements came about because legal fees forced balloonists to go bankrupt or comply with the farming company’s restrictions.

“Their game plan is to drive these defendants into financial attrition to essentially agree to terms to avoid any cost expense,” Robert Gilliland told City News Service earlier this week.

Gilliland, who is working on the case pro bono, said he has filed a request with the court to inspect the farming facility on June 3. However, he expects Rauch to object to that request, meaning White will ultimately decide whether attorneys can make a site visit.

“Their compound is more fortified than Osama Bin Laden’s,” Gilliland said. “What are they doing on the JCM compound?”

The terms requested by JCM Farming include no flights over the olive farm at any altitude, limited hours of operation and no flights lower than 1,000 feet in the area from Avenue 52 south to Avenue 56 and from Monroe Street east to Calhoun Street.

Rauch previously denied that JCM Farming is trying to shut down the Coachella Valley hot air balloon industry.

“We are just concerned about the safety of the workers at our ranch,” he said. “We are just interested in our space where people our working; they can fly their balloons where they want — just allow our workers to be safe.”

Gilliland said defense attorneys should be allowed an inspection to determine what threat balloonists create at the complex.

“We should absolutely be entitled to see what’s going on in the compound and how it supports their damages,” he said. “They are claiming they have workers falling out of trees when a balloon is flying overhead, but what happens when a jet airplane flies overhead? Are (workers) properly harnessed to ladders? And I’ve never heard of a balloon striking someone on the ground and injuring them.”

The other remaining defendant in the lawsuit is Magical Adventures Inc, according to court records.

JCM Farming’s 80-acre olive field southwest of Indio is surrounded by a 24-foot-high, four-foot-thick security wall. Turret-like structures, possibly ornamental, sit at the corners of the plot, and signs warn intruders of an armed response.

Rauch said the company is based in Solana Beach but owns farms across the state.

A July 7 review hearing is set. The trial is scheduled for November.