et al. v. W.R. Grace Anne Anderson and Beatrice Foods: 1986

For the plaintiffs to prevail, they had to prove that the chemicals repeatedly detected in the wells by the Environmental Protection Agency came from the Grace and Beatrice properties. They then had to prove that drinking water contaminated with these chemicals in the proportions found in the wells could cause leukemia and the other related illnesses. They partly succeeded on both accounts. On May 28, 1986, the six-member jury found that W.R. Grace's plant in Woburn had been negligent in dumping substances regarded as potential human carcinogens that could also cause liver, kidney, and nervous system damage when ingested in high doses, on their property. The jury also found that W. R. Grace was responsible for the contamination of the ground water serving the residents of east Woburn, where the leukemia cases were clustered. But the jury cleared Beatrice Foods and its subsidiary, the J.J. Riley Co., the owner of a tannery in the same area accused of contaminating the ground water. Attorneys for W.R. Grace argued that without a specific date, it was impossible to know whether the chemicals contaminated the aquifer before the illnesses began. The trial judge, U.S. District Court judge Walter Skinner, threw out the jury's verdict against W.R. Grace, holding that the jurors could not know with certainty when the pollutants penetrated the water supply. On September 22, 1986, with an appeal pending, W.R. Grace settled with the Woburn families for a reported eight million dollars. Jan Schlictmann, the plaintiffs' attorney, claimed that the settlement "showed that companies can be made to pay for poisoning their community." In return for the payments the families agreed to drop their suit against W.R. Grace. Michael Keating, the company's chief counsel, said that the settlement agreement did not mean that the company acknowledged any responsibility for the pollution or the deaths. He said that the company settled in order to avoid "additional strain on the families" and to cut further litigation costs.