I caught a bit of this movie while channel surfing. It was about a lawyer, played by Travolta, who sued W.R. Grace Co. , for polluting the water supply of the town of Woburn, MA. The pollution apparently caused the deaths of several children in the town (they died of cancer). I have a few questions about the film:
(1) Is it accurate? Was the cancer definately proved to have been caused by contaminated water?
(2) Why was the town water dept. held blameless? From what I understand, the Woburn area had been contaminated for years (by the centuries-old leather tanning industry).
(3) The “crusading lawyer” -played by Travolta-did he make a lot of money on the case?
(4) W.R. Grace went bankrupt a few years ago-was this because of the settlement in this case?
I used to work in Woburn, and it was common knowledge that the water was hevaily contaminated-the plant I used to work at used the town water for cooling only-it was run through the system, filtered and then discharged. The filters had o be changed weekly-they were always FULL of black, sticky crud…it was gross! In addition, the bubblers always had green copper stains…needless to say, everybody drank only bottled water .