A lawsuit against chemical company Rohm and Haas has resumed in a Philadelphia courtroom, after the judge abruptly dismissed the jury last October because a plaintiff’s expert witness had changed his epidemiological report after the trial started.

 

Judge Allan Tereshko had characterized the changes as “tantamount to a fraud on the court” and ordered the testimony of Columbia University epidemiologist Dr. Richard Neugebauer stricken from the record.

 

This led to the unusual situation of the plaintiffs asking for a mistrial because of misbehavior by their own witness, so that they can start the case over. Rohm and Haas, on the other hand, contend that the case should be thrown out completely.

 

The controversy has left the residents of the 1,000-person village of McCullom Lake, Illinois, in limbo. The 32 plaintiffs claim that Rohm and Haas, a subsidiary of Dow Chemical, knew for years that a massive plume of carcinogenic groundwater had migrated from its plant to the drinking water of McCullom Lake, located about a mile downstream. The contamination resulted in a cluster of rare brain cancer cases. Twenty-five of the plaintiffs were diagnosed with brain tumors, five with pituitary tumors, one with both brain and pituitary tumors and one with liver cirrhosis.

 

The former owner of the plant, Morton International, dumped its chemical waste, including the carcinogen vinyl chloride, into an 8-acre pit during the 1960s and 1970s. Rohm and Haas bought Morton in 1999 and Dow Chemical bought Rohm and Haas in 2009.

 

Judge Tereshko listened to arguments from both sides on April 21 and told them to expect a decision within two weeks as to how the case will proceed. The current case only involves 8 of the 32 plaintiffs.

-David Wallechinsky, Noel Brinkerhoff

 

'Cancer-Cluster' Case Takes a Toxic Turn (by Reuben Kramer, Courthouse News Service)

Residents Share Worries over Cancer Cluster Fears (by Duaa Eldeib, Chicago Tribune)

Judge Ends First McCullom Lake Brain Cancer Trial (by Kevin P. Craver, McHenry County Northwest Herald)

Trial Opens against Chemical Company Accused in Brain Cancer Cluster Case (by David Wallechinsky and Noel Brinkerhoff, AllGov)

Coincidence or Cluster: Six-Part Series (McHenry County Northwest Herald)