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Two Northern Illinois Neighbors Sue Modine, Two Other Companies Over Alleged Water Contamination that is Causing Brain Cancer

BY MICHAEL BURKE

RACINE - Modine Manufacturing Co. and two other companies are being sued by two next-door neighbors who have brain cancer.

Layser & Freiwald, the Philadelphia law firm that filed the suit Tuesday, said a separate lawsuit will be filed soon on behalf of a third neighbor who died of brain cancer.

The lawsuit, filed in Philadelphia, names three defendants: Modine, Rohm and Haas Co., and Huntsman. The suit alleges that spills of toxic chemicals polluted wells in McCullom Lake Village and caused the rare brain cancers. The community lies about 50 miles southwest of Racine in McHenry County, Ill.

Modine spokeswoman Wendy Wilson said the company does not comment on pending litigation. She also said Modine had not been served as a defendant as of Wednesday afternoon.

The plaintiffs in the lawsuit are Bryan Freund, 44, a longtime resident of McCullom Lake Village, and his next-door neighbor, Kurt Weisenberger, 64.

According to the suit, Freund was diagnosed in December 2004 with a rare brain cancer, oligodendroglioma. One month later, Weisenberger was diagnosed with the same cancer.

The previous June, Franklin Branham, 63, a longtime resident of the same community and another neighbor of Freund's, died of brain cancer, the suit also states.

The lawsuit contends that all three brain cancers were caused by toxic contamination of air and groundwater by the three defendant companies, located about one mile north of McCullom Lake Village.

The plaintiffs claim that Rohm and Haas, Modine and Huntsman are legally responsible for their brain cancers "because of years of toxic chemical spills that led to contamination with known cancer-causing compounds, including vinyl chloride and trichloroethene."

The law firm on Tuesday also filed a class action on behalf of all current and former residents of the 500-home residential community. That action seeks money to establish a medical monitoring program to determine whether anyone else may have cancer as a result of pollution by the defendants.

The class action also seeks money to "safeguard residents and their water supply" and to compensate them for lost property values, water purification costs and other expenses.

In a news release, Aaron Freiwald, lead counsel for the plaintiffs in both the lawsuit and the class action, stated, "It is no coincidence that three men, living as neighbors downstream from these toxic chemical polluters, all ended up with very similar brain cancers."

Modine opened a plant in Ringwood, McHenry County, in 1961. The plant manufactures cooling modules, condensors, evaporators and oil coolers for various markets; it employs about 250 people.

The plaintiffs' lawyers say that "newly uncovered documents" show that, starting in the 1960s, Morton dumped "massive quantities" of toxic chemical waste onto a landfill on its property. The landfill was eventually buried in the late 1970s, around the same time that a rail car spilled "huge" amounts of 1, 1 dichloroethene, another toxic chemical, on the property.

The law firm said that in 1985, Morton tested the groundwater underneath its facility and identified significant groundwater contamination with toxic chemicals - some of which, including vinyl chloride, are associated with cancer in humans. It was not until 1991 that Morton undertook a groundwater remediation program.

The plaintiffs contend that, in the 1990s, Modine identified toxic contamination on its property, which is adjacent to the Morton facility, in part from ruptured underground storage tanks that were leaching noxious, cancer-causing pollutants.

Meanwhile, the lawsuit claims, no efforts were made to notify residents of McCullom Lake Village, whose homes lay in the direct pathway of the toxic chemicals that were migrating underground from the Morton/Rohm and Haas, Modine and Huntsman facilities.

"Indeed," the firm stated, "plaintiffs in both lawsuits filed today, claim that defendants knowingly concealed evidence and information about the extensive toxic contamination on their sites."

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