The Ivory family’s dreams of a relaxing retirement on Florida’s Gulf Coast were put on hold when they discovered their new home had been built with Chinese drywall that emits sulfuric fumes and corrodes pipes. It got worse when they asked their insurer for help — and not only was…
Thirty members of the West Virginia National Guard filed a lawsuit in Marshall County Circuit Court, WVA, alleging that they were negligently exposed to a highly toxic chemical as they guarded a rebuilding project in Iraq in 2003. The lawsuit contends that members of the Moundsville-based 1092nd Engineer Battalion of…
The Southern Union gas company was ordered to pay $18 million for illegally storing mercury waste, which was exposed to the public five years ago when vandals stole the hazardous liquid from a rundown building and spilled it at an apartment complex. U.S. District Judge fined the Texas company $6…
Asbestos lawsuits are filed by plaintiffs who have suffered as the result of asbestos-related illness. Plaintiffs in asbestos lawsuits can include the victims of asbestos exposure, or their families or loved ones. Defendants against asbestos lawsuits are those parties considered responsible for the asbestos exposure. In the past, targets of…
A faint rotten-egg smell drifts off a covered lagoon a hundred yards from a well-traveled Missouri gravel road. This is battleground — ground zero in what some see as a high-stakes fight for the future of Missouri agriculture. But in Kansas City law offices 80 miles away, combatants prepare for…
When he began getting weak, 61-year-old Ronald Beaver figured he might just be feeling his age. Eventually his problem was traced to a serious blood disorder caused by low levels of copper. It wasn’t until several weeks later — after the man from Tamarac, Fla., started getting daily doses of…
Oklahoma brought a pollution lawsuit in 2005 against the Arkansas poultry industry, suggesting the threat of legal action may have spurred the companies to do better at policing themselves. ”The water quality is getting better, and this year, especially, we had very little algae,” said Archie ”Trey” Peyton III, 35,…
New environmental tests confirm extremely high levels of dioxin, the toxic ingredient of Agent Orange, in people, fish and soil near a former U.S. air base where American troops stored the herbicide during the Vietnam War. “Time is of the essence” to finish cleaning up the site, now home to…
ACROSS THE NATION: Controversies brew over possible toxic emissions Almost a year after tests by USA TODAY found significant levels of two potentially toxic metals in the air outside the school, local health officials expanded their own monitoring efforts here. The reason: Air samples taken by the county earlier this…
A lawsuit alleging that Merck & Co’s osteoporosis drug Fosamax caused jaw damage ended in a mistrial on Friday . U.S. District Judge John Keenan declared the mistrial two days giving the New York jury considering the case a “cooling off period” in light of supposed acrimony among jurors. A…