Jan Shlichtmann Water Contamination Case

In Woburn, Massachusetts, a water contamination was believed to take the innocent lives of six family’s children that developed Leukemia. Donna Robbins and Anne Anderson were the moms of 2 of the victims, and with the help of other worried residents in the area, they formed a group ‘For A Cleaner Environment’. Jan Schlichtmann an attorney, had heard about the issue, and initially refused to tackle the case. Schlictmann states,”A dead plaintiff is rarely worth as much as a living, but the death is long, slow, and agonizing death, the value can rise.” (1) Not long after, Schlichtmann found himself pulled over for a speeding ticket, that coincidentally overlooked the companies waste of toxic chemicals into a lake. This sight drew Jan to become suspicious and conduct …show more content…
When asked if he was concerned about the water quality in Woburn 10 years ago, Love responded, “Yeah I was concerned.” (1) The help of this witness provided Schlichtmann with the confidence and belief that with escalating evidence would be able win the case. A year later, Jan filed a lawsuit against two companies; W.R. Grace & Co. and Beatrice Food Inc., on behalf the families of the victims. He supposed that toxic chemicals used by the defendants’ were wrongly disposed of, contaminating the groundwater in that area, which would flow into the town’s water supply. Due to the fact that Schilctmann’s firm was small, he normally took on cases that didn’t require a lot of money and he was sure he would win; he knew he would have to take loans out in order for this case to be successful. Jan says, “The whole idea of lawsuits is to settle...and you do that by spending more money than you should, which forces them to spend more money than they should, and whoever comes to their senses first loses.”(1) When the trial began Mr. Love decided to side with the plaintiffs and testify against his