Mother’s Suit Claims Fumigant Killed Daughter

The mother of a 36-year-old Toluca Lake woman who fell into a coma and died after a building next door to her home was fumigated has filed a wrongful death lawsuit against firms that manufactured and applied the pest killer.

The suit seeks unspecified punitive and compensatory damages from the death of Sandra Cornwall Mero, who died last month after she was discovered unconscious in her home March 8.

Seven pipes connected Mero’s home to a studio just 15 feet away that was being fumigated with toxic methyl bromide, according to Larry Feldman, Mero’s lawyer who is now representing her mother, Violet Cornwall, in the wrongful death suit.

Family members have stated that a doctor found 27 parts per million of methyl bromide in the victim’s blood--well above the lethal dose of 24 ppm.

“The fact she ingested it and had it in her system is really all one needs to support the conclusion that she was fumigated,” said Feldman. “Instead of the termites they got her.”

Mero, an assistant for an entertainment company, lived in a compound of buildings in the 10400 block of West Valley Spring Lane. Feldman said that on March 8, the day after the gas was used on the neighboring building, Mero called several friends and told them she woke up feeling sick.

Mero went back to sleep and was found unconscious in her home the next day by her landlady, Sally Stevens, who is also named as a defendant in the suit, Feldman said. Stevens could not be reached for comment, nor could co-defendant Robert Evans, owner of the Evans Exterminating Co. of Burbank, which used the gas on the neighboring structure.

But Evans previously stated that the studio was inspected before fumigation and was completely enclosed with a tent. He said he did not see the pipes extending from the wall because they were obstructed by a chair.

The California Department of Pesticide Regulation is investigating the case for methyl bromide poisoning, but is awaiting Mero’s autopsy results before issuing a conclusion.

“We suspect it was methyl bromide, but I can’t say anything beyond that,” said Bob Donley, chief of pesticide investigation for the county agricultural commissioner’s office.

In addition to Evans’ firm and Stevens, the lawsuit, filed last week in Los Angeles County Superior Court, also names Niklor Chemical Co. Inc. and Soils Chemicals Corp. as defendants. The suit alleges that Niklor manufactured and sold methyl bromide and chloropicrin, an irritating agent used to alert people when methyl bromide is in the air.

“It didn’t work,” Feldman said.

John Wilhelm, a corporate officer for Niklor, declined to discuss the details of the case other than to say, “It’s definitely a tragedy.”

“This is a fumigant that has been used for years, and when used properly it’s excellent for the control of termites,” Wilhelm said. “I don’t think it has been fully investigated as to what actually occurred, but we have ideas on what happened.”

If it is found that methyl bromide caused Mero’s death, she would be the 19th person to die of the gas in California during the past 13 years, according to state records. Many of the other victims were burglars or homeless people who entered fumigated buildings while the gas was present.

Methyl bromide fumes, which attack the central nervous and respiratory systems, cause dizziness, vomiting and disorientation, and have been associated with birth defects.

The chemical would have been illegal for use in California if a ban had not been delayed by the state Legislature three weeks before it was to have taken effect last year. Lawmakers acted at the request of farm groups and Gov. Pete Wilson, who called a special session of the Legislature to deal with the issue.

Methyl bromide will be outlawed in 2010 in the United States and many other countries under an international agreement signed in Montreal in 1993 for fears that it damages the ozone layer. Environmentalists have also voiced concerns that the chemical is a danger to farm laborers who work with it and harvest crops in fields where it has been injected into the soil.