{"id":21397,"date":"2016-03-16T11:32:17","date_gmt":"2016-03-16T18:32:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cjnotebook.com\/?p=21397"},"modified":"2016-03-16T11:32:17","modified_gmt":"2016-03-16T18:32:17","slug":"lead-poisoning-lawyers-make-2-million-victims-average-17000","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cjnotebook.com\/?p=21397","title":{"rendered":"Lead poisoning lawyers make $2 million; victims average $17,000"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/object><\/p>\n

By Richard A. Webster, NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune<\/strong>
\n Email the author | Follow on Twitter<\/strong>
\n on March 16, 2016 at 9:57 AM, updated March 16, 2016 at 11:26 AM<\/strong>
\nBridgette Kinard remembers the men in the “white suits.” They came to her apartment in the B.W. Cooper housing development in the 1990s, wrapped head to toe in specialized clothing to protect them from hazardous materials. They were testing for lead, a toxic metal once found throughout the city’s public housing complexes.<\/p>\n

“It’s five, six, seven, eight people at one time coming into your unit, and they’re all covered up and you’re not and you’re wondering, ‘Am I contaminated? Is there something wrong with me?'”<\/p>\n

The lead levels in Kinard’s apartment registered high enough that the Housing Authority of New Orleans decided to relocate her family, including her four young children. But instead of moving them to another part of the city, Kinard said, HANO simply gave them the keys to a different unit in the same complex.<\/p>\n

Today, two of her children struggle with upper respiratory issues, stomach ailments, and attention deficit disorder, Kinard said. These are all common symptoms of lead poisoning, according to the Mayo Clinic. “My son is still suffering from it. He can’t keep food down,” she said.<\/p>\n

Kinard said she had little hope of receiving financial assistance until 2011, when insurance companies for HANO settled a long-running class action lawsuit over lead poisoning for $67 million. It seemed like a significant victory for thousands of public housing families facing a lifetime of mounting medical bills.<\/p>\n

Lead paint haunting HANO
\nThe attorneys filed a motion to haul HANO back into federal court for allegedly violating a five-year-old order meant to protect children.<\/p>\n

But it didn’t quite work out that way. A NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune review of hundreds of pages of court documents has discovered that the roughly 2,000 eligible victims of lead poisoning in the city’s public housing developments received, on average, no more than $17,000. Meanwhile, three lawyers appointed by the court to help administer the settlement fund were paid, in total, almost $2 million, with one of them making almost half a million dollars for four months of work.<\/p>\n

Kinard’s children didn’t receive a dime. Their medical records had been lost during Hurricane Katrina.<\/p>\n

“We might as well have just floated away with the water,” Kinard said. “I don’t know what situation my children will face in their life, dealing with what’s inside of them.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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