The owner of Bugman Pest and Lawn and three employees say the state has made them scapegoats for the pesticide poisoning deaths of two Layton girls.

"I'm convinced the only reason all this went down the way it did [with thousands of violations alleged] was because they have got to find someone to lay this on," company owner Ray Wilson told The Salt Lake Tribune in a wide-ranging interview Thursday at his Bountiful office.

Wilson and his employees spoke out for the first time in months after settling 3,500 alleged violations of state pesticide law brought by the Utah Department of Agriculture and Food. Proposed fines of $151,000 were whittled down to $46,800 in the final agreement, with $7,400 to be suspended on condition the workers complete additional training and commit no violations during a probation period.

As part of the settlement, the employees admitted to violating the Utah Pesticide Control Act without specifying the offenses. And, while they express sympathy for the tragic deaths of 4-year-old Rebecca Toone and 15-month-old Rachel Toone, they insist — despite the medical examiner's finding of elevated phosphorous and lung damage in the girls — that the jury is still out on whether pesticide is to blame.

Any fault in the February tragedy, they said, belongs not to them but to Coleman Nocks, an ex-employee who allegedly used aluminum phosphide improperly at the girls' home the week before they died. Nocks broke with company protocol, they said, when he put pellets in field-mice burrows outside the home.

Having lost his job with Bugman as police began investigating the Toone girls' deaths and still facing two negligent homicide charges in 2nd District Court, Nocks surrendered his exterminators' license and promised never to apply for one again. His attorney did not respond to a request for comment for this article.

Agriculture Department spokesman Larry Lewis said his agency did not fine Nocks because any penalties from the case should be paid in restitution to the girls' family, and department regulations do not allow that.

The Toone family has repeatedly declined to comment on the case.

Meanwhile, Bugman's business has plummeted, and employees say they have been attacked for what happened to the Toone girls even though they played no role in the Feb. 5 fumigation. One employee said he had been called a murderer and had been told "you guys should go to prison."

"I was devastated," said James McCarty, one of the technicians who agreed to a settlement earlier this month with the Utah Department of Agriculture and Food. "I was devastated."

Ray Wilson, Bugman's owner for the past 16 years, said he has been angry and frustrated about not being free to discuss his company's plight in the six months since the tragedy. He said employees believe they are being mistreated by the government, which Wilson served with distinction in the U.S. Army during the Vietnam War.

"My government did not stand by me," he said. "It attacked me … I was attacked vehemently."

Lewis said the Agriculture Department had nothing to say about the criticisms leveled against the agency by Wilson and the Bugman employees.

"The residents of this state can feel good," Lewis said, "that pesticide applicators know they must comply with the pesticide laws."

"This settlement works to those ends. The employees agreed with that and they signed that" agreement.

Ray Wilson Jr., whose fine of $10,000 was the largest of those faced by Bugman employees, said friends have expressed support and wished a good resolution for him. But, noting that his income has been cut in half because of the bad publicity, he added: "I don't think it was fair that I had to be brought in for what was someone else's mistake."

Meanwhile, McCarty fought back emotion as he told how the family-owned company had seen its reputation muddied by the unfair allegations despite more than two decades of serving the community responsibly.

"It's all coming back to Bugman," he said.

The company's owner, Ray Wilson Sr., noted that many of the same record keeping glitches that had gone unnoticed by regulators for years suddenly became violations after the girls' deaths. In 2008 the company had a warning letter for paperwork violations, and last year two technicians faced a $50 fine and the company a $100 fine for infractions.

He gave several examples of the state's recent overreaction.

One involved the change a few years ago in a pesticide manufacturer's official identification number when the company changed its name. State regulators hadn't pointed out — until now — that Bugman had failed to change the ID number on its invoices. In the violation notice issued in May, state regulators logged dozens of violations for using the old ID number.

Lewis, of the Agriculture Department, said the company is "expected to keep up to speed on these things" and declined to discuss the other record-keeping violations.

"Our comment is that we are not trying this case in the newspaper," Lewis said.

But, in a three-page statement released to The Tribune on Thursday, the Bugman employees said they only signed the settlement to avoid the expense, the time and the uncertainty of a hearing.

"The technicians wanted to contest the allegations in court and have the chance to state their opinions and hopefully vindicate themselves," the statement said.

"All the while, the [Agriculture Department] was under pressure from several unmentioned sources to find and hold someone accountable. Bottom line, [the Agriculture Department] has more authority, money and manpower than Bugman, and no matter what, Bugman will always have to work with the [Agriculture Department] if it is to exist."

fahys@sltrib.com —

Pesticide now banned

Aluminum phosphide is a "restricted-use pesticide" and is available under a variety of labels, including the Fumitoxin suspected in the deaths of Rachel and Rebecca Toone.

When exposed to moisture, the pesticide breaks down into the toxic chemical phosphine, which can cause abdominal pain, nausea and vomiting. High levels can cause weakness, bronchitis, excess fluid in the lungs, shortness of breath, convulsions and death.

The Environmental Protection Agency in April banned residential use of pesticides that produce phosphine gas. Previously, the pesticides were allowed in burrows at least 15 feet from a home.