Parents Sue Chemical Firm in Son’s Death : Aerosols: Chatsworth boy and a friend drowned after inhaling a cleaner. The court action also lists the other youth’s mother and a camera store.

The parents of a Chatsworth teen-ager who drowned with a friend after they got high on a cleaning chemical filed a $2.5-million wrongful death suit Tuesday against the manufacturer of the cleaner, the store where it was allegedly purchased, and the dead friend’s mother.

The suit was filed in San Fernando Superior Court by John and Domitila Vega, whose son, Jeffrey, 16, died with Kyle A. Sickinger, also 16, in Sickinger’s back yard swimming pool May 3.

Police found an aerosol can of Dust-Pro Plus, a cleaner for computer parts and camera lenses, floating with the bodies of the two Chatsworth High School students. The cleaner contains chlorodifluoromethane, a chemical that police say has become popular as a drug among teen-agers, who inhale the fumes to induce dizziness. Health officials warn that it also can cause irregular heartbeat and breathing problems.

A coroner’s report attributed the boys’ deaths to drowning after they passed out from sniffing the aerosol cleaner.

The suit contends that Sickinger’s mother, Sharon Nilson, failed to properly supervise her son and his friends at her home, although, it contends, she knew that he “commonly engaged in the practice of ingesting and/or inhaling various substances, including Dust-Pro” and encouraged others to use them.

The suit also names as defendants Peca Products, which manufactures Dust-Pro, and ABC Camera & 1 Hr Photo, where the product was allegedly purchased. The suit claims that the two companies had “reason to know” that the product could be dangerous if misused and “negligently and carelessly failed to give such warning.”

The suit asks for $10,000 in actual damages and $2.5 million in general damages.

Suzanne Ahn, one of the owners of ABC Camera, said she had not yet been served with the lawsuit, but said: “I have no idea why they are suing us. There is no evidence that they bought it from us. Just because we are near Chatsworth High School doesn’t mean they bought it here.”

Nilson said she was previously notified of the Vegas’ intention to file suit, but she denied that she knew of her son’s alleged use of intoxicating substances or that she failed to properly supervise the teen-agers when they visited her son.

She said she was disappointed that the Vegas decided to sue her instead of aiding a campaign that she has begun to fight the misuse of inhalants.

“This will not bring back Jeffrey or Kyle,” Nilson said. “They should be helping us.”

In a written statement, the Vegas’ attorney, Gregory James Owen, said the lawsuit is aimed at accomplishing the same goal. There are no laws governing the sale and distribution of aerosol cleaning agents with known dangerous and debilitating substances, but the lawsuit could provide a base for passage of such laws, he said.

“Although there is an age limit in every state . . . governing the sale of alcohol, no such laws apply” to aerosol cleaning agents, Owen said. “This case and its corporate ramifications will involve not only a point of future law, but a forum for logic, ethics and just plain old morality.”