Judge Rodney Sippel
Refuses to Step Down from Monsanto Price-Fixing Case

JIM SUHR / AP 16jan04

[More on Monsanto]

ST. LOUIS—A federal judge refused to recuse himself from presiding over a price-fixing case involving Monsanto Co., insisting he never worked on a Monsanto case despite being listed as a lawyer representing the company.

"I have no horse in this race," U.S. District Judge Rodney Sippel said Thursday. "I honestly don't care which party in this case prevails."

The conflict-of-interest claims surfaced last week when The New York Times reported that Sippel - before becoming a federal judge in 1998 - was among lawyers assigned to represent Monsanto in a lawsuit against Pioneer Hi-Bred International Inc. in 1997. Pioneer now is a unit of DuPont Co.

Sippel was a lawyer for the firm now known as Husch & Eppenberger, which the Times said worked on more than a dozen cases for the St. Louis-based agriculture biotechnology company.

But during Thursday's hearing on a request by plaintiffs' attorneys seeking Sippel's recusal, the judge said he never actually worked on the Pioneer lawsuit despite being listed in court papers as legal counsel for Monsanto.

"I never even read the complaint," he said.

Attorneys who pressed for Sippel to step down refused to comment after Thursday's hearing, including whether they planned to appeal to the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Richard Lewis, an attorney for the plaintiffs, argued Thursday that the earlier case involving Pioneer and the current one are "substantially similar," and that Sippel's work with the law firm might create the appearance of a conflict of interest.

Philip Bartz, an attorney for Monsanto, countered that Sippel was "duty-bound to stay on this case," calling the plaintiffs' arguments for recusal "squishy."

The lawsuit accuses Monsanto and some of its seed-marketing rivals of plotting to control genetically modified corn and soybean prices.

Monsanto - along with others named in the case, Bayer CropScience, Syngenta and Pioneer - has denied the farmers' allegations. The farmers also contend that genetically modified seeds and foods are unsafe.

Corn and soybeans genetically altered to kill pests or withstand herbicides have become widely popular in the United States, but they've have met consumer resistance in many foreign countries. Genetic engineering involves splicing a single gene from one organism to another.

Biotech opponents have focused on persuading food makers not to buy genetically modified crops and getting governments to require the labeling of altered foods.