WOMAN AWARDED $2.2 MILLION IN CHEMICAL SPILL

A federal court jury in Cape Girardeau has awarded $2.2 million to Katie Bonner of Parma, Mo., in a civil suit stemming from a 1995 chemical spill.

Bonner sued ISP Technologies after suffering permanent injuries from an industrial solvent spill at a Dexter. Mo., manufacturing plant where she was working. ISP Technologies manufactured the solvent.

Bonner's lawyers, Mike Ponder and Kathy Wolz of Cape Girardeau, welcomed Thursday's verdict by the eight-member jury. The verdict followed a four-day trial.

Wolz said it is one of the largest jury awards ever in federal court in Cape Girardeau.

Lou Huber, a Kansas City, Mo., lawyer, represented ISP Technologies.

Huber said the company planned to appeal. Huber said there isn't any "scientific evidence" that ISP's product caused Bonner's injuries.

It was the second time a federal jury had ruled for Bonner and against ISP Technologies, manufacturer of an industrial solvent called FoamFlush.

"This lady had her life ruined and they should have to pay for it," Wolz said.

ISP Technologies, headquartered in New Jersey, sold some of the industrial solvent to the Purlator air filter plant at Dexter in 1995. On March 14, 1995, a day after the plant began using the solvent, the chemical leaked from hoses on industrial machinery in the building. Bonner was engulfed in a chemical mist.

Bonner began to shake. Her head hurt. She had difficulty breathing. She passed out and was taken to Dexter Memorial Hospital.

"She inhaled a bunch of it," Ponder said.

Ponder and Wolz said their client suffered permanent brain damage from the toxic chemical. "She essentially shakes like she is cold all the time," Ponder said. Bonner has tremors in her legs and hands.

Ponder said when the solvent gets into the body it is a transformed into the "date rape drug" and damages the brain.

Wolz said Bonner's life has been ruined. She can no longer work.

The Dexter plant closed in August 1995, but Ponder said the closing wasn't related to the industrial accident.

In the lawsuit, Bonner accused the chemical company of failing to disclose the dangers of the chemical when it sold the industrial solvent to Purlator.

Wolz said ISP had an obligation to disclose the dangers. "When you sell dangerous chemicals you have to take steps to warn the people who are using it," she said.

Wolz said ISP knew of the dangers but minimized them.

Ponder and Wolz said ISP's attorney told the jury that the chemical can be deadly, but the company wasn't aware of anyone suffering symptoms like Bonner's.

The case initially went to trial in federal court in St. Louis in December 1998. A jury there returned a $900,000 verdict.

But U.S. District Judge Charles Shaw, who presided over the trial, threw out the verdict and granted the defense's motion for a new trial.

Ponder and Wolz said the judge granted the defense a new trial because of "technicalities." Huber refused to discuss the issues surrounding the new trial.