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More Cancer Lawsuits Filed

BY KEVIN P. CRAVER

Nancy Smith knew that she was right about the cause of her mother Marion Kane’s splitting headache as she rushed her to the emergency room last month.

All Smith could think about was the 20 years that the family lived near McCullom Lake, and the lawsuits of brain-cancer victims against several Ringwood manufacturers accused of fouling air and groundwater with volatile organic compounds. Among the plaintiffs is her brother, Patrick Kane, who died of cancer in 2005 and whose widow sued on his behalf.

Marion Kane, 74, underwent brain surgery last week to remove her malignant glioblastoma multiforme. And now Smith worries that the alleged contamination will claim a second loved one.

"I had a terrible feeling all week when she said her headache just won’t go away; she generally doesn’t get them," Smith said. "I had this sick feeling all week. I hated to be proved right, but I knew it all along.

"I wish I was wrong."

Philadelphia attorney Aaron Freiwald filed suit Monday on behalf of Kane and three other brain-cancer victims.

The new lawsuits bring to 22 the number of plaintiffs who blame their illnesses, mostly brain and nerve cancers, on Rohm and Haas, subsidiary Morton International, and Modine Manufacturing.

All three manufacturers’ plants in Ringwood are about a mile and a half north of the village of McCullom Lake.

Freiwald filed the first lawsuits in April 2006 on behalf of three former next-door neighbors in McCullom Lake who contracted rare brain cancers. He also filed a class-action lawsuit on behalf of current and former residents to start a medical monitoring program, get access to clean water, and guarantee home values.

"I think [the new lawsuits] provide further evidence in a case where the evidence is mounting every day, unfortunately," Freiwald said Tuesday. "This is a case where the hydrogeology, the epidemiology and really all of the science we are finding, supports what we’ve said from the beginning."

Although Rohm and Haas and subsidiary Morton have acknowledged the contamination and have made efforts to remediate it, they steadfastly deny that the contaminated groundwater ever reached the village of 1,000 people through air or groundwater. They furthermore point to recent tests of village wells, all but one of which tested free of the organic solvents in question.

"The tests are the tests, and the science is the science, and that’s all we can say, aside from the fact that this doesn’t appear to be about science, but about litigation," Rohm and Haas spokesman Syd Havely said. "Unfortunately for these people, I don’t know what they’re being led to believe."

A call to Modine’s spokesmen for comment was not returned Tuesday.

Marion Kane lived for 20 years on the McHenry side of the lake, where she raised Patrick. But the coincidences don’t end there among the new lawsuits – plaintiff Sandra Kemmerer grew up across the street in McHenry, south of the lake, from brain-cancer victim Lance Kuhns, who filed suit last December.

The other plaintiffs include Judith Roszak, who died of glioblastoma multiforme four days before Freiwald filed the first lawsuits, and Michael Smulski, who lives in McHenry and used to live just west of the lake.

Smulski and Kemmerer were diagnosed with meningioma, which usually is benign and accounts for 27 percent of all primary brain tumors, according to the National Brain Tumor Foundation. Glioblastoma multiforme, which accounts for 23 percent of the same, is malignant and aggressive, and victims have a 3 percent chance of living longer than five years after diagnosis.

Smith said her mother had been given 90 days. Her older brother, Patrick, was diagnosed as a young adult with a pituitary tumor that caused him to grow more than 7 feet tall. Two other plaintiffs also were diagnosed with pituitary cancers.

And Smith said she could not help but wonder about her mother’s three surviving children.

"It’s unbelievable. It’s like, well, which one of us is next? Should I go get an MRI?" Smith said.

"There’s too big a cluster for them to deny anything at this point."

The New Plaintiffs

• Marion Kane, 74, glioblastoma multiforme
• Sandra Kemmerer, 54, meningioma
• Judith Roszak, glioblastoma multiforme (died last year at age 68)
• Michael Smulski, 58, meningioma

The Brain/Nerve Cancers

• Meningioma makes up 27 percent of all primary brain tumors. They are most often benign, but can recur years or decades after treatment. Two of the plaintiffs have this cancer.
• Glioblastoma multiforme, or stage four astrocytoma, makes up 23 percent of all primary brain tumors. It is malignant, grows rapidly, and survivability is low. Nine of the plaintiffs have this cancer.

Of the remaining plaintiffs, five have oligodendroglioma, and one apiece has hemangioblastoma or schwannoma. Three plaintiffs have pituitary gland tumors, and one has cryptogenic cirrhosis, meaning its cause is unknown.

Five plaintiffs have died.

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