SA environment court refuses to release EPA documents to Shahin family, accused of illegally dumping 2000 tonnes of contaminated soil

ONE of Adelaide’s richest families has been denied access to confidential documents they claimed could absolve them of unlawfully dumping 2000 tonnes of contaminated soil.

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ONE of Adelaide’s richest families has been denied access to confidential documents they claimed could absolve them of unlawfully dumping 2000 tonnes of contaminated soil.

The Environment, Resources and Development Court on Tuesday dismissed an application by the Shahin family for permission to view internal Environment Protection Authority paperwork.

The EPA has accused the family of using 100 trucks to transport the soil from the corner of Anzac and Marion roads, Plympton, to private land at Mount Compass.

It has further alleged the soil moved during the 10-day operation tested positive for hydrocarbons and “exceeded intermediate levels” of toxicity.

The family — operators of the lucrative On The Run and Krispy Kreme chains — claimed the EPA was “shifting the goalposts”.

They said the body had the legislative power to “flip-flop” the definition of waste to suit its prosecutorial purposes.

The Shahins asked the court to order the EPA to release details of previous occasions in which it granted a person permission to dump waste materials after it had already been done.

They claimed the material was “substantially damaging” to the case against them.

In a decision handed down on Wednesday, Judge Jack Costello refused the application.

He ruled the documents “could not be of evidentiary value to the defendants” and that it was unlikely they would have been granted retrospective permission to dump the soil.

The case returns to court next week.

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