Example 8

Copyright 1988 Globe Newspaper Company

The Boston Globe

December 14, 1988, Wednesday, City Edition

Woburn case families press claim with aid of ruling

By Jerry Ackerman, Globe Staff

Eight families who blame a high rate of leukemia in Woburn between 1973 and 1983 on industrial dumping of toxic wastes near two municipal drinking-water wells will get another chance today to pursue their claims at a hearing in federal court in Boston.

Armed with a federal appeals court ruling, the families plan to ask US District Judge Walter Jay Skinner to reinstate their claim that Beatrice Foods Co., which once owned a tannery near the polluted wells, should be held liable for the leukemia cases and the deaths of at least five children and one adult.

The families previously reached out-of-court settlements with two other companies, W.R. Grace Inc. and UniFirst Corp., for a total of more than $ 9 million, although both firms continued to deny responsibility in connection with the leukemia cases. Beatrice, the last of three firms accused by the families, was absolved of responsibility midway through a jury trial in 1986.

The US Court of Appeals ordered new hearings earlier this month to determine whether the company or its lawyers "knowingly or intentionally" withheld evidence during pretrial proceedings.

The appeals court ruling involved a possibly incriminating technical report commissioned by Beatrice in 1983 that found that land near the tannery was contaminated with many of the chemicals that allegedly got into Woburn's drinking water.

At a news conference yesterday, parents of four of the five children who died of leukemia during the 1970s and early 1980s told reporters that a newly released US Environmental Protection Agency report supports their contentions about Beatrice. "This report will confirm how contaminated" the land was. "They can't hide anymore," said Lauren Aufiero, now of Louden, N.H. Her son Jarrod died of leukemia in 1982 at age 3.

The report, a 300-page technical document, confirms previous findings by the federal agency that the former Beatrice land was the most polluted of several sites near the wells.

It also concludes, as earlier reports did, that water flowing through the property could have reached the wells "given the right pumping conditions," said Paul G. Keough, the agency's deputy regional administrator.

The EPA is currently negotiating with Beatrice, W.R. Grace, UniFirst and other companies to pay for the cost of cleaning up the East Woburn area under the federal Superfund law.

Richard Toomey of Woburn, whose son, Patrick, died of leukemia in 1981 at age 11, affirmed the families' intentions of pursuing Beatrice, telling reporters yesterday, "We will never settle until they admit what they have done.

"We want these people to say, 'Yeah, we done it, yeah, it's there, yeah, let's get it cleaned up,' " he said. "I want it cleaned up so that my daughter doesn't get killed, too. If it can kill my son it can kill her, too."