EAST PALESTINE — The five residents appealing the final approval of last year’s $600 million settlement between Norfolk Southern and households impacted by the 2023 train derailment continue to fight for a reduction or complete elimination of the $850,000 appeal bond they were ordered to pay.

In the most recent brief filed in Cincinnati’s Ohio Sixth Circuit of Appeals, David Graham — the attorney representing the Rev. Joseph Sheely, Zsuzsa Troyan, Tamara Freeze, Sharon Lynch and Carly Tunno — asked the court for oral arguments and to consider several issues. Chief among them is whether the correct components were used to determine the nearly $1 million bond.

The $850,000 bond was ordered by U.S. District Judge Bentia Pearson in January, with each of the appealing residents responsible for $170,000. Pearson agreed with the lead co-counsel’s claim that the appeal would lead to both $25,000 in related printing costs for them and $825,000 in additional administrative fees to be billed by Kroll — the since-removed settlement administrator who was replaced due to overpaying claims by miscalculating the court-approved allocation system.

Graham argues that both figures are excessive.

“Given absolutely no legitimate basis for positing that class plaintiffs’ appellate counsel will incur $25,000 in taxable costs, Judge Pearson abused her discretion including that amount in her calculation of an appeal bond,” he wrote.

Graham said that most, if not all, appeal documents would be electronic, and even if they weren’t, he pointed out that “FedEx Office, a national chain, charges 20 cents per page for bulk orders, so $25,000 represents almost 125,000 pages and upon entry of final judgment, the electronic record consisted of only 14,586 pages, so copying every page at FedEx Office (to no useful purpose) would only cost $2,917.20.”

As for the additional $825,000 Kroll estimated they would bill due to the appeal process, Graham wrote that “no statute cited by class counsel or Judge Pearson — whether federal or Ohio — authorizes class plaintiffs, as appellees, to recover anything like ‘administrative costs’ relating to appeal.

“The $825,000 figure is just another number plucked out of thin air by a claims administrator that was ultimately removed for cause by the district court,” Graham added.

Graham also asked the appeal court to consider whether the district court abused its discretion by disregarding the Sixth Circuit’s March 21 order “expressly providing that appellants had time to move for an extension of time to appeal the setting of the bond.”