ROCKLAND (AP) – An antitrust lawsuit alleging price fixing among four Maine blueberry processors could go to court as soon as October, according to an attorney for a blueberry grower who filed the suit.

Nathan Pease of Union filed the suit in Knox County Superior Court more than three years ago accusing the processors of conspiring to set low field prices for the state’s blueberry crop from 1996 through 1999.

The processors – Jasper Wyman & Son of Milbridge, Cherryfield Foods Inc. of Cherryfield, and Merrill Blueberry Farms Inc. and Allen’s Blueberry Freezer Inc., both of Ellsworth – have denied the allegations.

William Robitzek, a Lewiston attorney who represents Pease, last week placed legal notices in the state’s largest newspaper notifying Maine’s more than 500 blueberry growers that they have until July 23 to exclude themselves from the lawsuit.

Robitzek said the notification is the final procedural hurdle before a trial date is scheduled. He expects the trial to get under way in October of November.

Superior Court Justice Joseph Jabar last year denied a motion for summary judgment by the blueberry companies which, if granted, would have effectively killed the lawsuit.

In the ruling, Jabar concluded Pease and other growers did not have direct evidence that the companies agreed beforehand on the price they would pay growers. But he also found that the field price paid by each of the companies was similar during the time period in question, and that there was enough circumstantial evidence to allow the case to go to trial.

“Defeating their motion for summary judgment meant that we generated sufficient facts to show that this case is something that a jury needs to evaluate, something the judge can’t decide without a jury,” Robitzek said. “Our case remains the same case that it has been all along. I think we knew where we were going from the start.”

The lawsuit focuses on the way the majority of the state’s wild blueberry growers are paid for the annual harvest.

Growers have traditionally received an initial payment of 25 cents a pound when the fruit is delivered to the plant or a receiving station for one of the companies.

The final price, however, is not determined until the harvest is over, with most growers receiving additional payment in the fall or winter. Pease’s lawsuit alleges that the four companies determine what that price will be among themselves without negotiating with growers.

Tom Gardner, a spokesman for Jasper Wyman & Son, said he could not comment on Robitzek’s trial timetable and deferred all questions to Ed Flanagan, the company’s chief executive officer, who was out of the country and not available for comment.

AP-ES-07-01-03 1246EDT