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“A CIVIL ACTION”, BEHIND THE MOVIE, A SPECIAL REPORT
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A TRUE STORY ABOUT POLLUTED DRINKING WATER
IN WOBURN, MASSACHUSETTS
The movie, “A Civil Action”, starring John Travolta, is based on a true
story of toxic contamination of drinking water in the 1970's in an
industrial town, Woburn, Massachusetts. The massive pollution of
the groundwater in Woburn and an even larger chemicals pollution
event at Love Canal near Buffalo, N.Y., were, in part, responsible
for helping move the U.S. government to establish the “Superfund”
legislation to finance the clean up of severely polluted sites across
the country.
The movie is based on a book with the same name written
by Jonathan Harr, that focuses on the 1986 civil lawsuit by local
citizens and the public trial and prosecution that ensued. The citizen
action was sparked by a much higher than normal occurrence of
leukemia and other serious illnesses amongst neighborhood families
in East Woburn, Mass., who were all drinking severely contaminated
water from two municipal wells G and H that were drilled in an old
industrial area on the banks of a very polluted river running through
the industrial area. The river is called the Aberjona River. The citizens
rose up in alarm, led by Anne Anderson, whose son, Jimmy was
diagnosed with leukemia in January 1972 and died January 1981.
Jan Richard Schlichtmann, a young Boston attorney (graduated Cornell
University), was an “ambulance chaser”, who made his money on accidents
and injury claims, agreed with the Woburn townfolk. In May 1982, he
filed a lawsuit on behalf of his clients, who were six Woburn families, all
of whom had a child who had died of leukemia or who was being treated for
the illness. He had taken the case in 1981 to court, against the advice of
his
law associates. The trial and appeal drag on for years, and resulted in the
bankruptcy of Schlichtmann and his small law firm. The legal, laboratory,
and hydrogeology (drilling and testing the groundwater) expenses had left
him and his partners penniless and over a million dollars in debt to their
many
creditors. Schlichtmann eventually filed for bankruptcy. See Natural Resources
Defense Council’s website http://www.nrdc.org/
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FOCUS ON W.R. GRACE & CO., BEATRICE FOODS,
RILEY TANNERY, AND UNIFIRST CORP., IN WOBURN
Three companies were named in the civil lawsuit brought by Schlichtmann
on behalf of the East Woburn citizens. The companies were:
o W.R.Grace Co.’s Cryovac (heavy equipment manufacturing) Plant,
on Washington Street
o Beatrice (Foods) Properties, which purchased the John
Riley Tannery, located at the corner of Wildwood Ave.,
and Salem St.
o UniFirst Properties, which ran an industrial dry cleaning
operation on Olympia Ave.,
The companies were suspected of using one or more of the five chemicals
named in the lawsuit, which were detected in water samples taken by the
Massachusetts Department of Environmental Quality Engineering from
municipal wells G & H on May 14, 1979. They were trichloroethylene
(TCE), perchloroethylene (PCE), 1,1,1 trichloroethane, dibromochloromethane,
and chloroform.
See website http://www.geology.ohio-state.edu/courtroom/defendants.html.
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W.R. GRACE COMPANY
The W.R. Grace Cryovac Plant operated from 1960 until 1988. It
manufactured food processing and packaging equipment. TCE and
PCE were common liquid solvents used regularly to degrease and
clean heavy equipment and other metal products manufactured there.
The plant is about 3000 feet northeast of well H. It too was alleged
to have dumped its liquid solvents and other used chemicals on, or
near its own property, with much of the chemicals finding their way
into the Aberjona River and into the G & H municipal drinking water
wells.
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BEATRICE (FOOD) PROPERTIES
Beatrice (Food) Properties purchased an old family leather
tannery owned by John Riley and his sons in Woburn
in 1978. Beatrice did not own the tannery long and sold it back to the
employees five years later in 1983. However, Beatrice was still required
to retain liability for any pollution impacts. Beatrice also owned the
15 acre woodlot between the Aberjona River and the Boston & Maine
railroad line, an area where there was suspected dumping of
TCE, PCE and other liquid industrial toxics by John Riley Tannery
and others throughout the 1960's and 1970's. For more information see
the website http://www2.shore.net/~dkennedy/woburn_trial.html
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RILEY TANNERY
The Riley Tannery was opened in 1910. Tanneries are notoriously dirty.
They use and dispose of all kinds of chemicals, metals and acids, in the
curing and processing of cattle hides into fine leathers for shoes, belts,
and jackets. Northeast of the tannery was the 15acre parcel, undeveloped
land that the tannery had purchased in the 1950s for its water supply.
Schlichtmann alleged that the Riley Tannery regularly dumped the used
waste chemicals on the ground at the plant an on the adjacent 15 acre
property, allowing the toxic chemicals to leach down into the
aquifer and pollute the drinking water supplies. Schlichtmann alleged
that the chemicals flowed about 700 feet northeast into wells G and H.
Riley sold the tannery to a group of longtime employees in 1985. Riley
Tannery shutdown its business permanently January 1, 1989.
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UNIFIRST PROPERTIES
UniFirst Properties Inc. in East Woburn, was an industrial dry cleaning
operation that used perchloroethylene and other solvents to clean
thousands of pounds of dirty clothes weekly. Unifirst was suspected
of dumping in barrels and on the ground thousands of gallons of the
chemical cleaners. It is interesting to note that UniFirst settled in 1985
out of court with Schlichtmann and the citizens prior to trial for about
US$1.1 million without admitting responsibility.
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FINDING OF GUILT IN THE COURT TRIAL
In July 1986, following a 78day trial, a sixmember federal jury found
that W.R. Grace had negligently contaminated the wells. But US District
Judge Walter Jay Skinner threw out that verdict because of inconsistencies
as to when the wells had become contaminated a ruling that led to
an $8 million out of court settlement with no admittance of wrongdoing
on Grace's part. Unfortunately, already, over $6 million was used by
Schlichtmann and his law group just to pay the legal, research, drilling,
and scientific bills.
The jury dismissed the charges against Beatrice (Food) Properties. But
a three judge panel for the US Court of Appeals for the First Circuit ruled
in late 1988 that Beatrice's lawyers engaged in “misconduct" by failing prior
to the trial to give Schlichtmann test results of which they had knowledge.
This is according to Dan Kennedy who was a staff reporter for the Woburn
Daily Times Chronicle, from 1979 to 1989. He covered the trial for which he
won the 1987 New England Press Association's top newsreporting award for
his coverage of the Woburn civil action. See his complete comments on website
http://www2.shore.net/~dkennedy/woburn_trial.html
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THE PROBLEM BEGAN WITH GOVERNMENT OFFICIALS
It was the municipal government that allowed the pollution and ignored
the warnings. Hungry for industry employment and the tax dollars from
those companies to fill the municipal bank account, they turned a blind
eye to the serious pollution in the area. For decades Woburn's municipal
works had drawn water from six wells A through F. The water was generally
clean and healthy. No problems. But in the 1950s, as demand for water
increased, city officials considered drilling wells in groundwaterrich East
Woburn. However, some officials warned that the water obtained from such
wells would be of poor quality. But the city moved ahead and drilled well
G in 1964, near the east bank of the Aberjona River, south of Route 128 and
north of Salem Street. In 1967, Woburn municipality drilled well H about 500
feet north of well G, even closer to the polluted river. Almost from the
moment
the new wells went on line, residents of East Woburn complained the water
smelled and tasted bad. The municipality said that while the water tasted
bad, there were no health effects. Don’t worry, you can drink the water, they
said.
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MUNICIPALITY WARNED NOT TO DRILL DRINKING WATER WELLS
Engineers hired by the City of Woburn issued a report in 1958 warning
that groundwater in the Wells G & H area was "too polluted to be used
for a public water supply." Entitled, the “Report on Improvements to the
Woburn, Massachusetts Water System”, it was prepared by the engineering
firm of Whitman & Howard, Inc., in August 1958. They wrote that,
"The Aberjona River Valley still has a potential for ground water supply
for certain industrial uses, but the ground waters of this valley are, in
general, too polluted to be used for a public water supply." (Page 34)
The report appears to have been ignored.
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DISCOVERY OF TOXIC BARRELS AND THE CLOSING OF
WELLS G AND H
Dan Kennedy reported that repeated tests of wells G and H by
local and state health officials showed the water was unpleasant
but was what said “safe”. Then, in 1976, a state official nearly
stumbled on the truth. While testing an experimental instrument
designed to detect extremely small quantities of organic solvent
chemicals, he came across inexplicably high readings from wells
G and H. But rather than explore the matter further he assumed the
readings were wrong, and used them to calibrate the testing device.
The truth was finally learned in May 1979. Officials discovered that
in a "midnight dumping" incident someone had ditched a large quantity
of barrels several thousand feet north of the wells. The Massachusetts
Department of Environmental Quality Engineering (DEQE) [now the
Department of Environmental Protection, or DEP] immediately tested
the wells to determine whether the water had been contaminated. The
agency found that while there was not enough time for the contents of
the barrels to leached through the soil to the wells, they still found
that the wells were contaminated with several chlorinated organic
compounds, including trichloroethylene (TCE) and tetrachloroethylene,
also known as perchloroethylene (PCE).
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LEUKEMIA RATE FOUR TIME HIGHER
The wells were closed on May 22, 1979 and have not been used as a
source of drinking water since. The Metropolitan District Commission
[now the Massachusetts Water Resources Authority] agreed to replace the
lost water by connecting East Woburn to the state’s regional distribution
system. The discovery of contaminants in the wells led to numerous
community meetings and to the formation of the local citizen group called
FACE which stands for “For a Cleaner Environment”. The discovery also
led to studies that showed Woburn's leukemia rate was as much as four
times higher than would be expected for a community of its size and
that most of the leukemia cases were among families who had received
most of their water from wells G and H. For an excellent article go to
website
http://www.bostonphoenix.com/archive/features/98/01/01/DON_T_QUOTE_ME.html
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INDUSTRY AND CHEMICAL COMPANIES DID THE POLLUTING
While those three companies were charged, there appeared to be many
other sources of toxics to the drinking water, in addition to the three that
were pursued by the citizens and Schlichtmann. For example, about two
miles upstream from the wells on the Aberjona River was the former site
of the Woburn Chemical Works, a leading producer of arsenicbased
insecticides. Between 1853 and 1933, Woburn Chemical Works was one
of America's largest industrial complexes. From 1934 to 1969, numerous
other chemical companies occupied the site that was to become known as
the Industriplex Superfund Site, with an arsenic pit, chromium lagoons and
numerous buried piles of animal hides topping EPA concerns.
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U.S. $70 MILLION CLEAN UNDERWAY IN EAST WOBURN
INDUSTRIAL AREA
Recently the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced a
plan to clean up the groundwater in East Woburn and restore it to drinking
water quality. It is expected to take between 30 and 50 years and cost as
much as $70 million. Much of the costs will be voluntarily contributed
by the responsible businesses in East Woburn.
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