The Seattle Times
By Taylor Blatchford Seattle Times engagement reporter
Ten students and parents who say they suffered serious neurological injuries from chemical exposure at a Monroe school have been awarded $275 million by a King County jury.
The lawsuit against Bayer Pharmaceuticals — which owns chemical giant Monsanto, the manufacturer of polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs — is the fourth to result in a multimillion-dollar verdict. The first three resulted in jury verdicts of $268 million distributed to 14 plaintiffs. One lawsuit is ongoing and 16 more lawsuits are awaiting trial.
In all, more than 200 students, parents and teachers from the Sky Valley Education Center, an alternative school in Snohomish County, have sued Monsanto over environmental contamination at the school.
They claim the Monroe School District knew as early as 2014 that PCBs were found on the campus, but, despite cleanup efforts, toxins were still being found into 2019.
A Seattle Times and ProPublica investigation this year found that the district was slow to respond to environmental hazards even while publicly reassuring staff, students and their parents that the school was safe.
