2 New Pages Added May 2005!
	Worm Care & Feeding	Bait Sellers & Large Growers

Magic Wiggler Worm Ranch

Larry Pelletier, Owner

Magic Wiggler’s decision to file liable suit against this father & son duo did not happen over night. As you will see below, we tried for months to resolve the issue and get our only adequate food source restored. All through this fiasco, all we ever wanted was to get the manure back. Magic Wiggler was naturally and safely recycling an estimated 15,000-30,000+ pounds of raw cow manure per week. This is manure that is commonly sprayed back into the open environment by the truckloads. It has been a source of complaints from area residents against both Cal-Maine's commercial dairy and chicken operations, for many years. The are two main problems with this type of manure disposal method:  1) Thin spraying of raw manure on top of the ground causes a tremendous amount of flies; 2) There is a much higher likelihood of bacteria infesting the very ground water we all use, especially during the excessive rains Mississippi often has. By recycling Mississippi's raw waste with worms, we solve the two greatest concerns: 1) the environment; 2) animal and human health. At the same time, we turn this waste into one of the most naturally rich soil amendments money can buy. "A worm never gets sick nor does it transmit any disease!" (internationally known Vermiculture Specialist, Dr. Mario Carrera).

Several months after we started using cow manure from the dairy in Edwards, Mississippi, Magic Wiggler Owner, Larry Pelletier told the dairy director, "We should be able to recycle every ounce of your manure waste within five years."  This meant he would no longer have to spray this raw waste in open fields or give it to anyone who would come get it, to remain compliant with Mississippi's manure disposal laws. We knew this would also stop the majority of residential complaints the dairy received when they thin sprayed manure, a problem which has kept that company and area residents at odds with each other for years! The director seemed very interested in our recycling the manure naturally with earthworms and seemed to agree it was a viable solution to his manure disposal problems. He even asked Larry to bring him some worm bins, so he could check them out. We gave him two bins full of worms and bedding, all set up and ready to go. Larry suggested he give one to his corporate boss in Jackson to see what he thought about it and the free fishing bait was cool too.

For nearly a year, Magic Wiggler and the dairy had a wonderful arrangement, benefiting us both. That is, until one man (with his son in tow) decided to use his powers of intimidation, through his alleged local & political connections, to shut us down! We firmly believe this was an intentional and calculated act of malicious sabotage! There is a legal process to start a business and there is a legal process and free forum for citizens to voice their opinions, make allegations and/or file any grievances against any business. This process is specifically designed to protect the rights and safety of both sides - the public & the business!  The law does not give anyone the right to directly contact your business associates to accuse you of wrong doing!

Below is a detailed description of Magic Wiggler's inception and our account of the malicious chain of events, which began just one week after we were granted permission to go commercial. We received unanimous approval from both boards of supervisors and one member visited the farm, prior to the hearing, so he could make an informed decision. This is our side of the story and our interpretation of the sequence of events! It is in no way meant to slander or defame the defendants, but merely to describe the events as they pertained to and affected us. We encourage the the defendants to come forward and publicly explain their alleged actions!  We have chosen to exercise our right to free press, because we believe this community has been held hostage by this family for far too long. This type of blatant interference in so many poor and minority lives, at the hands of still rich and racist white folk in this state has got to stop, if Mississippi ever hopes to be a fair and equal part of the 21st century in America and share in the prosperity of the future. The intimidation and degradation felt by the high population of minorities in the Raymond, Utica and Vicksburg areas, has been secretly discussed by both white and black residents in these communities for years, but the genuine fear of this one family's retribution holds them mute. The father and son duo have made it verbally clear who rules the roost around here, over the course of the 10 years we have known them.

Therefore, we feel the only way we can possibly get a fair trial is to: 1) move this trial to an area where neither the defendants nor us are known by the judge or the jury pool; 2) exercise our right to free press, in a solemn effort to ensure our case is watched close enough for us to receive a fair and unbiased adjudication process. Their say has nearly cost us everything! We have even been warned by others to stop this suit or the defendants are going to make this very ugly, because they are too well connected for us to have any chance against them in court. That little golf course isn't sitting in the boon docks for nothing. We already know the judge assigned to our case, knows the defendants personally well, so our chances for a change of venue do not look promising. We have also been warned that the means by which this single family rose to such power and control in a predominantly poor & minority community is legally questionable and that our very lives could be at stake, should they decide we have become too big a problem. We laughed at first, because we disregard idle gossip, but when the defendants flat out tell you, "...I got the Governor in my pocket..." and "...the Senator has dinner in my home once a month...," you tend to heed the warnings and tread cautiously, because mere crop farmers do not earn enough in a lifetime to run in these elite legal circles!

Pertaining To Magic Wiggler Worm Ranch’s Liable Suit:

In October 1995, we moved into our trailer on the 10 acres of land we currently operate our worm farm on. Mid to late 1996, Jr. and his wife moved into the brick house to our left from Bush Road. Over the years, we have interacted with the father and son duo over a variety of issues, the most notable of which are listed below:

1) On two separate occasions, Larry was asked to put roofs on both dugouts at the baseball field the defendants own on the left side of our 10 acres. The first time we did it for free, because the area children used the field to play their summer leagues. Larry warned Jr. to brace both roofs to their concrete structures or a high wind was going to rip them right off. He never did and several months later, high winds took off both roofs and nearly half the concrete structure of one dugout. When Jr. asked Larry to re-do the roofs, Larry quoted his normal price for roofing, since he had already built these roofs once. Junior whined that the baseball field was not insured and begged Larry to cut him some slack. Larry agreed to reconstruct, paper and shingle both roofs for $240. When the job was done, Jr. told Larry he had no money, so Larry had to wait until he could get the money from his dad. Two or three months later, Jr. gave Larry $220 and that was all he ever got.

2) Junior later asked Larry to write him a repair estimate to submit to his insurance company, when the kitchen caught fire in the little house on the corner, Jr. lets his mother live in. Jr. told Larry the insurance was paying for it, so he should jack the price up as high as he could. For 20 years, Larry had always done quality work at lower prices than most other contractors and he prepared this estimate like he did any other job. A few months later, after doing the repairs himself, Jr. asked us to have a look at it. He'd done little more than slap a bit of paint on a section of one wall, but seemed very proud to show us his masterpiece.

3) Larry's final helping hand was just a few months prior to the events which brought about this suit. Senior asked Larry to put the tin on a new metal building at his golf course, about 3 miles from our house off Bush Bottom road. Larry put him off for a few days, because they had used him for years and he really didn't want to get shafted again. When Sr. called and told Larry he wanted him to come do the job that weekend, Larrye tried to politely decline the job, but Sr. insisted Larry had to do it, because didn't know anyone else who could. He told Larry he'd pay him the same hourly rate Larry got from repairing rental houses for a lady in Utica and Larry's good nature over-rode his common sense again. When it came time to pay, there was heated controversy again over the amount Larry charged, but he stood his ground and Sr. defiantly paid him in full.

4) One incident when Larry first got involved with the defendants, gave us a taste of how mean and racist Sr. treated minorities. Larry was asked to do some repairs at one of the rental houses Sr. owns. Larry said the shack should have been condemned a long time ago and he didn't see how anyone could possibly live there. While he was there, a colored man with a crippled arm stopped by. He told Larry he worked for Sr. and that his wife had just given birth to a new baby. The old man said he went to Sr. and asked for more money, because he could no longer make it with a wife and child on $20 a day. The poor man told Larry that Sr. not only fired him, but kicked him, his wife and newborn baby out of this house too. Larry felt so bad for the man and wondered how anyone could do such a thing to a poor man with only one good arm and a family to feed. Born and raised in eastern New  Brunswick, Canada, Larry had never being exposed much to minorities or racism, that day he began to see the bigotry, which is still bestowed upon colored folk in Mississippi.

In October 2001, we bought 15 pounds of red wiggler worms to try our hand at growing them on a commercial scale. Once we started feeding our worms cow manure, our stock exploded. After about a year of access to the cow manure, we had a commercially sustainable worm stock growth and felt it was time to move to the next step. In March 2003, when our stock was thousands of pounds strong, Larry Pelletier & Marie Bateman (owner/business manager) started the process of establishing Magic Wiggler Worm Ranch, a new commercial enterprise. On April 2, 2003, when we found out we needed a building permit for the 4,000 square foot worm hatchery, we received it and started the process of obtaining our “Conditions of Use” Permit. On April 23, 2003, we obtained a Business Privilege License (Acct. #:  3195) for Larry’s Home Improvements & Worm Grower, which renews every year in September.   

Pursuit to Hinds County’s “Condition’s of Use” process, we filled out all of the required paperwork and on April 4, 2003, sent out the required Certified letters, Return Receipt to all 12 parties within 1,000 feet of our property lines, informing them of our intent to use it for the purpose of selling earthworms commercially.  Since this information is a matter of public record at the Hinds County Permit & Zoning Department in Raymond, MS, a list of those recipients is as follows:

Walter H. Gibbs, Jr. & Gibbs, III – Article #:  7002-0510-0000-6497-5114

Martin T. Gray, Jr. – Article #:  7002-0510-0000-6497-5121

Martin T. Gray, Jr. – Article #:  7002-0510-0000-6497-5138

Calvin Earl Lee – Article #:  7002-0510-0000-6497-5142

Dona G. Hales & Martin T. Gray, Jr. – Article #:  7002-0510-0000-6497-5145

Mary B. Nail – Article #:  7099-3400-0014-0427-2130

Erwin A. Summers – Article #:  7099-3400-0014-0427-2253

Scott B. Tucker – Article #:  7099-3400-0014-0427-2260

Dennis P & Pamela J. Varnado – Article #:  7099-3400-0014-0427-2277 – returned to us as undeliverable, but Mr. Varnado said he thought it was a cool idea.

Larry D. Lee – Article #:  7099-3400-0014-0427-2347

Ellis R. & Dauvice Berry – Article #:  7099-3400-0014-0427-9672

Walter H. Gibbs, Jr. – Article #:  7099-3400-0014-0427-9689

On April 29, 2003 we paid the $250 fee and filed our petition with the Hinds County Permit & Zoning office. The next day, the Hinds County Permit & Zoning office erected a metal posted sign in front of our property on Bush Road, stating we had petitioned for a Use Permit. On May 24, 2003, we obtained our Sales Tax License (Acct. #:  025-36332-6) from the MS State Tax Commission.  On May 27, 2003, Larry & Marie appeared before the zoning board of supervisors in the Hinds County Courthouse Annex in Raymond, MS and were approved by all members.  None of the people whom we notified by certified mail were present nor are we aware of any written or verbal objections by anyone. On June 16, 2003, Larry & Marie entered the final stage of approval and appeared before the Hinds County Board of Supervisors at the Chancery Court in Jackson, MS & were approved for “Conditions of Use” by all members of this board too, who jokingly added, "Now we know where to get our worms to go fishing!"  Again there were public no objections to our knowledge.  Magic Wiggler Worm Ranch was issued commercial "Use Permit #: 401.”  It was recorded in Minute Book #: 3, Page 137 on June 16, 2003.

Throughout the years we had known both Jr. and Sr., they always told us to let them know if we ever needed anything. On a Saturday evening, around June 21, 2003, Larry & Marie went next door to speak with Jr. We told him how slow construction had been and that we would be 2 months behind on our mortgage in a couple weeks. We explained how Magic Wiggler was our only hope in saving our property. Larry said his goal was to be the largest in five years and he had no doubt he would be. We told Jr. that we received unanimous approval by all members of the final supervisory board for our use permit, so we could start selling worms. We even told him about the website we had uploaded and ready to go, all we needed to do now was advertise. Larry told Jr. he'd hurt his arm pretty bad a few months earlier and it didn't seem to be healing. Larry said he would like to take them up on their offer to help and asked if he could borrow the loader Sr. rarely uses at his golf course. Larry needed it to unload the worm food from his 16' trailer for three or four weeks, instead of having to do it with a shovel until his arm healed. Since the loader belonged to his dad, Jr. said couldn't give him permission, but he would sure ask his dad the next day at Sunday dinner.  We thanked him and went home.

Two days later, on Monday afternoon around 2:00 pm, Sr. showed up at the farm.  He asked for Larry and Marie told him Larry wasn't here. She asked if she could help him and he asked if they were feeding the worms chicken manure. She told him no way, because it was too acidic to feed to the worms, unless it had been sitting for at least a year or more. She told Sr. they were feeding cow manure from the dairy, because it was the perfect food for massive breeding & it was the only food we had access to, which was sufficient to feed all the stock we had.  Sr. then asked if he could see the "wire basket thing" he'd seen on Channel 3, which was a harvester Larry built from scratch.  He stated, "I think I can use something like that to break up my fertilizer."  I told him sure & gave him the "grand tour" like we did everyone who visited the farm.  As we walked through I kept talking about the worms & their value to environment, people & animals.  I told him how terribly bad it was for everyone & everything when they spray all that manure out in open pastures & crop fields, when recycling it with worms eliminated all the risk of contamination & disease.  Upon leaving, Terry, Sr. stated, “If they ever start a worm association around here, I am going to nominate you President."  We laughed & he left.  When Larry returned, I told him of Senior's visit. He asked me what he said about the loader. "Nothing." I replied, "He never mentioned it."

The next morning was Tuesday.  We went to Cal-Maine Dairy, about 5-6 miles from our house, to get a load of manure like we'd been doing for nearly a year.  One of the employees told us he could not let us have any manure. He said we'd been cut off, due to complaints from our neighbors that we were causing excessive flies.  Larry said, “You are kidding, right?”  The man said, “No I am not. If this guy calls DEQ (Department of Environmental Quality), they'll fine us $20,000.”  We went directly to the office to talk to Mr. Gill, the dairy director.  He told us Terry, Sr. & Terry Jr. had called him complaining that we were creating excessive flies.  We told him we didn't have a fly problem, but Gill said we would not be able to get any more manure until they called (the Grays) & said it was okay.  We offered to call DEQ & clear him of any liability for manure we got from them & Mr. Gill said, “No!  Do not call them or you'll wind up with a fine too.”  We went home, totally dumbfounded.  It just didn’t make sense that DEQ could fine Cal-Maine $20,000 for unsubstantiated complaints just anyone called in.  Since we'd already been trying to get DEQ out to make sure we were in compliance with their regulations as part of our Use Permit instructions, I went home & called DEQ anyway, explaining the complaint.  The man laughed & said that was all bull.  They did not just slap fines on businesses.  There was a process that had to be gone through and only they had the authority to determine who was non-compliant.  He said he would get someone out as soon as possible and no one had anything to worry about until a site visit could be made by them.

We talked to several local people about what had happened to get their views on the situation.  We were really confused as to why Terry, Sr. had purposely come to our farm the day before under false pretenses, just to find out how to shut us down.  For years, they both had told us to call if we ever needed anything.  The first time we do, this is what happens?  About a week later, a friend of ours went to Cal-Maine with his own trailer & got us a load of manure so we wouldn't lose any worms.  A couple weeks after that, we were desperate to feed again.  Larry went to Terry, Jr. to find out what the problem was & try to work it out.  Larry asked Terry why he didn't say anything the evening we went to see him about the loader.  Terry replied, "The flies weren't bad then, but a few weeks before, they were terrible."  (Yet he called Gill two days after Larry & I talked to him about the loader.)  Larry refreshed his memory that the flies are bad every year at this time.  He told Terry all our worms were going to die if we couldn’t feed & the cow manure was our only adequate source of food available.  Terry stated, “I don’t give a F*** about your worms!  I am sick of my wife B****ing about the flies.  Larry told Jr. he didn’t understand how we could be creating excessive flies for him, if we had no problem with flies at our farm.  Larry assured Jr. he didn’t want to cause any problems for his neighbors & would do everything in his power to make sure he never did.  Larry told Jr. that he & his father needed to call Magic Wiggler, not our suppliers, if they felt we were creating a problem with flies or anything else.  Larry said to Jr. "I can’t fix a problem I don't know exists."  He told Jr. we'd contacted DEQ and they said Magic Wiggler was responsible for the manure it used on its farm, not Cal-Maine, so he was to call us from now on, not Mr. Gill.  Terry reluctantly agreed to call Mr. Gill & release the hold on our manure and assured Larry he would call Magic Wiggler, if he had any more problems.

I called DEQ again, stressing how important it was they come out, because our neighbor agreed to call & release the manure this time, but the flies better not increase or else.  So I needed them to make sure we were doing everything right.  The man said he was amazed that the Grays had the power by a mere phone call to just turn on & off our manure at will & promised to send someone soon.  A week or two later, on or about August 6, 2003, Krista Dubois, Mining & Solid Waste Division, Department of Environmental Quality, finally made her site visit with another man, whose name I do not recall.  She saw no evidence of excessive flies and stated we were in compliance with all state regulations as far as she knew.  Krista also agreed to write us a letter stating that no one we used as a food supplier for our worms would be held liable for nuisance complaints.  Magic Wiggler alone would be held responsible.  We received her letter dated August 11, 2003 a few days later.

On August 25, 2003, we went to Cal-Maine to get a load of manure & were once more told we were cut off, due to neighbor complaints.  Back to Gill’s office we went.  At first, he just said Terry, Jr. had called in another complaint.  I popped off something like, "What is the Grays problem with us all of the sudden?" & Gill quickly added that another neighbor, Don Nail, had called complaining about excessive flies too.  Don Nail lives about a quarter mile from us and works for Cal-Maine’s chicken plant, which is also in Edwards, MS.  Nail was growing worms, as was another man between him & I, neither of whom had permits to do so.  We did not believe Don Nail called anyone. It just wasn't like him and since he owned the pond at our property line, we felt we knew him pretty good after nine years.  Larry & I figured someone asked him to call or someone called him to inquire if he had a problem.  We once again asked Mr. Gill to come to our farm & see for himself if we had a fly problem.  He refused & we left.

When we got home, I immediately called the Department of Health.  Three days later, on or about, August 28, 2003, Alvin Woods from the Environmental Health Division of the Mississippi Department of Health, came to our farm.  He made his inspection & couldn’t believe what we were being accused of & said he’d raised cows his whole life.  He agreed that the seasonal fly problem was in direct correlation with the weather & the tons of manure both Cal-Maine’s chicken & dairy farms were producing daily, both just 5-6 miles away from our farm.  Mr. Gill himself told us a fly could travel up to 20 miles a day. Alvin's supervisor called his cell phone for a report & Mr. Woods stated, “I see more flies at the grocery store than I can find here.”  Mr. Woods explained he had to make at least one more unannounced visit, before he could file an official report.

A week later, on or about September 4, 2003, Mr. Woods returned to our farm with State Entomologist, Dr. Jerome Goddard, who said the complaint was totally without merit, because he would see many adult flies and/or fly larvae in our pits if we were creating a problem.  As stated in his report to Mr. Woods, he found "less than 5 adult flies" anywhere on our property & "no fly larvae" in any of the 8 pits he randomly dug in.  He also stated that with the number of cows within a mile or so radius of our farm, there was no way anyone could say, much less prove, we were creating any excessive fly problem. 

On or about September 8, 2003, we received our copy of Dr. Goddard’s letter to Alvin.  We took his letter, the letter of liability release from DEQ, & a copy of a short, to the point letter I intended to send to all 3 complainants to Gill for his approval.  The short letter said they each were to immediately cease all calls to Mr. Gill and for them to never contact any of our suppliers again or they would be sued.  When we arrived at Mr. Gill’s office, we handed him the 3 documents.  Without looking at any of them, Mr. Gill commenced to telling us he'd figured out what the problem was.  He said the flies were already in the manure when we picked it up, so we had to unload the manure into a pile, cover it tightly with plastic & leave it sit for a week or so, before we fed our worms with it.  Gill told Larry to go talk to the Grays & tell them we'd figured out the problem & what we were going to do about it.  He said again we could get manure when they called him & said it was okay.  I tried to get him to look at the documents in his hand & he would see we do not have a problem to fix!  Mr. Gill not only ignored me completely, he walked Larry to the other side of the office so he could instruct Larry what he wanted him to do, without my interference.  Gill made it very clear he was only concerned with satisfying the Grays.

What he told Larry to do with the manure made no sense either.  It seemed to us that piling manure and letting it sit would cause more of a problem.  I called Dr. Goddard and told him Gill had the solution to our fly problem.  Dr. Goddard said, "But you don't have a problem."  I told him what Gill said about the flies already being in the manure already and what we needed to do to kill them before we fed the manure to our worms. Dr. Goddard laughed and explained the gestation from larvae to pupa to adult, stating that he would have seen one or more of these various stages during his visit, if the flies were already there as Gill said.  He didn't, so the facts didn't support Gill's theory.  He told us not to follow Gill's instruction, because if we did, we would have a problem on our hands for sure.

I told Larry I would comply with Mr. Gill to the extent of full disclosure and explanation of the facts.  Instead of the short snappy letter I gave Mr. Gill, I sent out letters which fully explained each complaint made and who Gill said made the complaints.  I described all the steps Magic Wiggler took to resolve the issue and the results given us by the governing state agencies.  I also included copies of the DEQ's Release & Dr. Goddard’s report. I made it very clear that they were to call Mr. Gill immediately & release the manure & never call him again or they would be sued.  I explained that by law they were illegally interfering between two businesses & would be held liable for any and all damages incurred by Magic Wiggler as a result of any unsubstantiated complaints. If they had future complaints, they were instructed to call Magic Wiggler first and/or Alvin Woods at Environmental Health and/or DEQ.  I stated Gill said he'd give us manure as soon as they called him with their approval.  I warned them to be very careful what they said to him, because if he didn't release the manure after they called, they would still be sued for destroying our relations with our only adequate food supplier.  I gave them until September 22, 2003 to comply.

Terry, Sr. got his letter first & called raising hell, saying he had nothing to do with Don Nail calling & demanding to know what this was all about.  I asked him who had accused him of anything with Don Nail & tried to explain my letter, but he kept ranting.  "You had manure piled everywhere on your farm.  When I got around the corner to Terry's place from yours, we counted 22 flies that come out of my truck." Senior ranted.  It took forever to explain anything to him, because he wouldn’t shut up long enough to listen.  I tried to explain that he couldn’t accuse Magic Wiggler of wrong-doing & not call Magic Wiggler.  I told him that he has no legal right to call any supplier we use, whether he knows them or not & cause a disruption of our food supply or he is liable for damages. He continued to raise cane, so I finally told him to read the letter again; it was self-explanatory.  Finally, Sr. said, “So, when the problem comes back next spring, I’m suppose to call Alvin Woods!” (Bingo! Why would he assume the problem would be back next spring, unless he was already aware of the frequent problem that's always existed here, even before Magic Wiggler came to be?) “No!” I replied, “You are suppose to call Magic Wiggler, but if you insist on ignoring our business rights, you can call Mr. Woods, that's fine with me!”  I said goodbye & hung up.  A few days later, Terry, Sr. called again and said he & Terry, Jr. discussed it, they agreed & had already called Mr. Gill & told him to let us have all the manure we wanted.  He ranted on in his usual manner for a while. Then I politely thanked him for calling Gill & hung up. The postal service could not catch Terry, Jr. and he never went to the post office to pick up his letter.  It was not returned to me either, as is normal postal procedure for certified letters not claimed.  To my knowledge, Don Nail has never made any response to anyone. It appeared that Terry Sr. was handling everything himself, since he was the only one making noise about anything.  No one else was saying a word...

On September 23, 2003, we went back to Gill’s office & he was fuming mad!  We'd been getting manure for nearly a year & had never seen Mr. Gill angry, much less so livid.  We had no doubt the Grays had done more than called and told Gill to "give us all the manure we wanted" like Senior told me he did. Gill started yelling that he told Larry how to handle this & it was not to send them letters threatening to sue them.  He was holding the short letter, he knew I'd given him before he told us he'd figured out the problem.  The one he never looked at!  Besides, he had no idea whether I sent that letter or not, unless the Grays told him.  “I told Larry to go talk to them face to face like a man & explain everything!” Gill spouted.  I reminded Gill we tried talking the first time & they called him again anyway.  This time I put it in writing, so there could be no misunderstandings as to what would happen if they ever called him again.  I explained that the letter was several pages long and explained everything, just like he asked.  He said, “I didn’t tell Larry to say anything about suing anyone!”  I added, Terry, Sr. called me and said he called you..."  Gill cut me off & spouted, “I haven’t talked to Terry, Sr. or nobody else!”  I knew then Gill was only interested in pleasing the Grays and there was no point in trying to explain anything else.  Mr. Gill voiced his disapproval to Larry & ignored me completely.  Since I had decided to send the letters, I tried once more to explain to Mr. Gill that I was only trying to protect him from having to deal with the Grays' complaints and/or threats and protect Magic Wiggler's rights too.  He didn’t want to hear anything I said.  He demanded to see copies of the letters we sent & we left to go get them. 

On the way, Larry & I talked & decided that Gill was going to do whatever Terry, Sr. told him to, just as he had been doing all along and taking him copies of the letters wasn't going to change that, so we didn't go back.  Instead I sent a letter to Fred Adams, the CEO of Cal-Maine Dairy in Jackson, on or about September 25, 2003, explaining the whole nine yards & that all we wanted was the manure to feed our worms.  I told Adams we had no intentions of suing anyone, we just needed the manure back.  If we couldn't get it anymore or if the Grays chose to call any of our suppliers again, then we would be forced to sue the Grays for illegally interfering with our business relations.  I stressed that we would do all we could to protect them from any liability the Grays may try to bring against Cal-Maine as a result of the false allegations they made against Magic Wiggler and any litigation we filed would be against the accusers not Cal-Maine.  I enclosed the DEQ Release, Dr. Goddard’s letter & copies of the letters to all three complainants.  Cal-Maine's corporate office in Jackson, Mississippi never made any response.

Terry, Sr. openly bragged about having “the Governor in his pocket” & “the Senator has dinner at my house once a month.”  Several people said the Grays had connections.  We were not intimidated, because we knew we had done nothing wrong and we rarely listened to gossip.  All we knew or cared about was what the Grays were doing to Magic Wiggler and the stress they were obviously causing Mr. Gill & the dairy by making false allegations.  After losing nearly 90% of our worm stock, causing us to turn away thousands of pounds in sales & costing us another $35,000 to buy worms for the Mexico Sale, enough was enough.  On March 1, 2004, the governor's office signed for a Worm Farming Proposal Package, we sent to Mississippi Governor, Haley Barbour. The Proposal included a section explaining the Gray situation and the legal action we would be forced to take if he could not intervene, in some way, to help us regain access to the manure or offer us another alternative.  The package also described all the social, environmental and economic advantages worm farming could bring to our state.  Two days later, on March 3, 2004, Terry, Sr. showed up at our farm again, demanding to know why Larry was suing him.  Sr. said he’d heard “out in the community” that Larry was fixing to sue him and he demanded to know why.  We had not said anything about a lawsuit to anyone but the Governor for months.  It didn’t take a genius to figure out where his information came from.  I never heard anything from the Governor’s office pertaining to that proposal package, just Terry, Sr. as usual. 

One month after my letter to the Governor, a bankruptcy attorney from Vicksburg, Charles Robb, showed up at our farm claiming Brent Gray, Terry, Sr.’s nephew, still owned half our property, 9 years after we bought it from someone else.  We did not believe this was just another coincidence!  It was then we had no alternative but to seek legal counsel, because Robb said he was going to sue us for Brent Gray’s half of our 10 acre parcel’s current worth to help pay Brent’s creditors. We’d never heard of Brent Gray in all the time we’d lived here and over the course of nine years, we’d refinanced several times and made improvements which increased the value of our home and property to over $155,000, not including the worm structures & stock. We couldn’t sit back and just let them take it, simply because they claimed to have that right.  After a couple referrals, we found our current lawyer, Mr. James L. Martin.  We voiced our suspicions to Robb that it was awful funny this was happening now, right when Brent's uncle & cousin believe they are fixing to be sued.  Robb claimed he'd had our property deed in his office since about 2000. Yet, he never explained why he waited until after we built a commercial worm farm on it and were going into possible litigation with other members of the Gray family to stake his claim.  Our lawyer told us not to do anything until Robb actually filed suit, because he had no legal claim to our property and Robb knew it.  We also gave him all our facts and written documentation about the banning of our worm food and he agreed to take the case. Hence:

 Magic Wiggler files multi-million dollar liable suit against malicious neighbors!

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