Law Firm Launches Web Site in Class Action Against Freeport-McMoRan
Nix, Patterson & Roach, LLP and other attorneys representing the plaintiffs in a major class action lawsuit against mining giant Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold, Inc. have launched Cleanupblackwell.com, a Web site focusing on the legal action and the environmental contamination underlying it.
Blackwell is a town of 7,000 located in north-central Oklahoma. The community is contaminated with 58 million pounds of lead, arsenic, and other toxins left behind by the Blackwell Zinc Smelter, at one time the largest smelter of its type in the world. As successor-in-interest to the company that owned the smelter, Freeport-McMoRan is legally responsible for any related contamination.
Exposure to lead and arsenic can cause a wide variety of serious health problems, and Cleanupblackwell.com includes important information for Blackwell residents who are concerned about the health of their families and the contamination of their homes and properties.
The lawsuit demands that the defendants thoroughly and completely clean all property contaminated by the smelter waste and provide for a medical-monitoring program open to all Blackwell residents. It is styled Coffey, et al. and Others Similarly Situated v. Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold, Inc., Phelps Dodge Corporation, et al., Case No. CJ-2008-68.
The suit was filed earlier this year in Kay County, Okla., but was removed at the defendants' request to a federal court in Oklahoma City.