Pesticide Poisoning

SUMMARY

On November 29, 1996, our family - Joe Crozier, wife Yvette Maiangowi, and four-year-old son James Maiangowi - moved into a home in Scottsdale, Arizona that we had bought the month before. We were healthy when we moved in, but over the next few months we all became sick with many serious ailments, including digestive, respiratory and neurological problems.

On May 20, 1997 Joe saw a medical doctor who specializes in environmental illness (EI). He diagnosed pesticide poisoning.

Clinical evaluation and laboratory tests showed that chemicals had damaged our immune systems. An environmental engineer found airborne Dursban (chlorpyrifos), a neurotoxic pesticide. She also measured soil concentrations of Dursban, in two places, 2.5 and 8.5 times the Arizona Administrative Code limits.

Arizona Structural Pest Control Commission records showed that on nine occasions from March 3, 1993 to November 2, 1995, a pesticide company hired by the previous owner sprayed more than 758 gallons of five different pesticides-in the attic, in the walls, and under the foundation.

Convincing medical and epidemiological evidence links pesticide poisoning with long-term neurological illnesses such as depression, headaches, reduced concentration and decision-making abilities, visual disturbances, memory impairment, neurobehavioral effects; allergies and asthma; sensitivity to chemical odors previously tolerated; immune system diseases.

Our doctor put us on a chemical detoxification program using nutritional supplements. We switched to organic foods to minimize further poisoning by pesticides. We tested allergic to numerous foods and inhalants, and started immunotherapy. We can only tolerate low-toxicity cleaning products and must operate air purifiers continually in our living space. We've all developed sensitivities to many substances that never bothered us before, including perfume, conventional cleaning products, swimming-pool chlorine, phenol, formaldehyde, and the pesticides in widespread use throughout the Phoenix area. Our digestive, respiratory and neurological symptoms recur if we stray too much from our rotation-elimination diets.

No government agency-federal, state, county, municipal-has helped us. They all say they have no authority or jurisdiction in these matters.

34 months after being driven from our home, 12 government departments and 200 lawyers later, with evidence of causation and liability so complete and convincing that a top US Environmental Protection Agency health statistician - the nation's expert on the epidemiology of Dursban poisoning - declared the quality of our documentation to be "excellent," we aren't any closer to seeing justice served for ourselves and our son.

This situation has cost us many tens of thousands of dollars. Prolonged acute pesticide poisoning is associated with many long-term health problems, and the cost of coping with these is much higher still. In October 1998 a real estate appraiser told us the home is uninhabitable, worthless. Our savings ran out three months ago-we're now bankrupt. We can no longer afford medical and each month without the needed treatment increases the probability that our immune system damage will be permanent.

If justice is not done in our case, what hope is there for all the people injured by pesticides who don't know in detail who, what, when, where or how it happened? Who may not even realize their illnesses are due to pesticides? Public service employees won't help these people. Lawyers won't help these people. Who will help them? What greater good is served by not permitting these people to secure justice for the violence committed against them?

Our report, addressed to the members of the Legislative and Executive Branches of the Governments of the State of Arizona and the United States of America, and accompanying appendices provide the details of our ongoing ordeal.


 

James Maiangowi, October 1994

  Filename       Size        Date      Description of File
------------   ---------   --------  --------------------------------------------
poison01.PDF     658 kB    04/02/00   Appendix 1
                                      Home inspection agreement
poison02.PDF    2379 kB    04/02/00   Appendix 2
                                      Home inspection report
poison03.PDF     183 kB    04/02/00   Appendix 3
                                      Scale plan drawing of the home
poison04.PDF    2921 kB    04/02/00   Appendix 4
                                      Purchase/sale agreement
poison05.PDF     521 kB    04/02/00   Appendix 5
                                      Realtor's disclosure and release
poison06.PDF     197 kB    04/02/00   Appendix 6
                                      Fact sheet on TCE contamination situation in Indian Bend Wash, Scottsdale
poison07.PDF     813 kB    04/02/00   Appendix 7
                                      Arizona Structural Pest Control Commission pre-purchase reports on home
poison08.PDF     733 kB    04/02/00   Appendix 8
                                      Seller's Property Disclosure Statement
poison09.PDF     522 kB    04/02/00   Appendix 9
                                      Information about air system rebuild
poison10.PDF     356 kB    04/02/00   Appendix 10
                                      Information on germicidal ultraviolet light
poison11.TXT       1 kB    08/24/01   Appendix 11
                                      Material safety data sheets
poison12.PDF    2224 kB    04/02/00   Appendix 12
                                      Test results from Accu-Chem Laboratories
poison13.PDF    1149 kB    04/02/00   Appendix 13
                                      Fact sheets on substances tested by Accu-Chem Laboratories
poison14.PDF    2492 kB    04/02/00   Appendix 14
                                      Test results from Antibody Assay Laboratories
poison15.TXT       1 kB    08/24/01   Appendix 15
                                      Environmental Medicine and Engineering-proposal and agreement
poison16.PDF    4237 kB    04/02/00   Appendix 16
                                      Indoor air quality study-report by Environmental Medicine and Engineering
poison17.PDF    1094 kB    04/02/00   Appendix 17
                                      Information on quality of water supplied by City of Scottsdale
poison18.PDF    9976 kB    04/02/00   Appendix 18
                                      James's chart from Environmental Health Center - Dallas
poison19.PDF    9544 kB    04/02/00   Appendix 19
                                      Arizona Structural Pest Control Commission's file on our case
poison20.PDF    4277 kB    04/02/00   Appendix 20
                                      Demand letters
poison21.PDF     483 kB    04/02/00   Appendix 21
                                      Letter from Dr. Lanson to Ed Hendricks Jr., May 1998
poison22.PDF    1177 kB    04/02/00   Appendix 22
                                      Ginter's responses to demand letter
poison23.PDF     152 kB    04/02/00   Appendix 23
                                      Patriot's response to demand letter
poison24.PDF     243 kB    04/02/00   Appendix 24
                                      Warning notice posted outside home, August 1998

Related links and Documents

• United States Environmental Protection Agency's Home page
   
• US EPA Office of Pesticide Programs
   
• US EPA Organophosphate Pesticides: Chlorpyrifos Review
   
• US EPA, Office of Prevention, Pesticides and Toxic Substances Endocrine Disruptors
   
• Environmental Working Group's BanDursban.org
   
• GAO Study Finds Little is Known About Pesticide Use in Schools and Health Risks to Children
   
• Statement of Senator Joe Lieberman on Pesticide Use in Schools
   
• GAO Report on Pesticides in Schools
   
• NPTN Home Page
   
• USGS Pesticide National Synthesis Project - Annual Use Maps
   
• ATSDR - Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry - U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services
   
• Daubert and Toxic Torts - How to Prepare a Daubert Case
   
• Clary Meuser Research Network
   
• Get Set, Inc. Non Toxic Pest Control
   
• Society of International Chlorpyrifos Studies (RedHen)
   
• ABC News Case Study in Pesticide Exposure Risk
   

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