The document provides an analysis of the film A Civil Action. It discusses how the film depicts a personal injury lawyer, Jan Schlichtmann, taking on a civil case in Woburn, Massachusetts concerning a local tannery that had polluted the water supply. Several families believe their children were poisoned by contaminated drinking water from wells. The film examines the complex legal system and interface between science and law. It also shows how money influences litigation outcomes as the well-funded corporations have advantages over Schlichtmann's small firm.

1. Film: A Civil Action
#1 A Civil Action is a tragic movie informing viewers about a case that should have more light on
it. A Civil ACtion is based on the Woburn Toxic Trial, Anne Anderson et al. v. W.R. Grace & Co.
et al. It takes place in 1982, in the town of Woburn, Massachusetts and it about eight families. The
major partie in the trial and movie include the plaintiffs who were a group of eight families that
lived in a part of town served by the two municipal wells. The defendants who were W.R. Grace &
Co., owner of the Cryovac Plant, UniFirst Corporation, owner of Interstate Uniform Services, and
Beatrice Foods, Inc., owner of the John Riley Tannery (kennedy). Six people were treated for died
from leukemia, a form of blood cancer. The jury deliberated...show more content...
Trials do this in many ways, one way is by letting both sides speak. Whenever there is a problem
the first thing that happens is that both sides of the problem have a story. Trials let both sides tell
there story, therefore resolving the conflict. Trials also seek the truth to provide justice for the
side that is "hurt." The interface between science and law are so testy because science provides
an answer and the law seems to always want to stretch the answer and bend the words. Law takes
the science and tries to make it appear as the law wants. Science and law also have a testy
interface because science continues to push the law to the limit. Expert witnesses are sages.
They are sages because they tell the truth, the holy truth, and nothing but the truth. They provide
the solution the problem and end the dispute. An expert witness can make or break a trial
depending if you are prosecuting or defending. For a jury, the choice of experts or peers comes
down to a few things. One of the things being the situation you are in and which way you want
the jury to be persuaded toward. If it is a sad case, like this one, you would want peers that would
have feelings and would feel bad and give the people more and help them. If you were trying to
prove something you would want experts because they would feel less and be less affected by
feelings. Citizens have a voice in government but the
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2. A Civil Action Film Analysis
In the movie, "A Civil Action", Jan Schlichtmann, a personal injury lawyer, takes on an orphan case
from Woburn, Massachusetts concerning a local tannery that had polluted the water supply in the
town. Several families (Toonneys, Auferios, Anderson, Kaynes, and Robbins) all had children who
died from leukemia. (1) The devastated parents believed their children were slowly poisoned by
drinking water from the town's contaminated water supply. Schlichtmann, being a man only about
the money rather than the justice, decides to take this case because he finds reason to believe that
trichloroethylene (TCE) from Riley's Tannery, a subsidy for Beatrice Foods, and chemical company,
W.R. Grace are both very powerful and wealthy companies. Schlichtmann
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3. A Civil Action
A Civil Action
The movie A Civil Action is focused on describing and explaining what really goes on in a court
of law. The case the movie deals with is a small firm going after a national corporation in order to
get them to apologize for what they did to the city's water. It is believed that the company would
dump harmful waste such as trichloroethylene into the back of their site where the company was
located into a small running river. However, the river was connected to the city's water wells and
caused harm to many children that drank the water. The way each lawsuit is handled can be related
to a sociological perspective. The Marxist approach can best explain the process and outcome of the
case in A Civil Action.
Section 1:...show more content...
Schlichtmann knows that him and his small firm, Schlichtmann Conway & Crowley, need lots of
money in order to get an apology from whoever was responsible for contaminating the city's water.
Despite the need for more money in a large case like this, Jan Schlichtmann and his firm stop
working on all cases except the Anne Anderson at el., case. His firm began to have no other
income for the expenses of the case. In this situation, Schlichtmann's firm decides to pursue
Beatrice Foods and the W.R. Grace and Company for the losses of children these families had to
deal with. Originally when this case was presented to the major firms in the area, no one wanted
accept the case. It was unwanted, so it became known as orphan case because it was believed that
there would be no financial gain from the case. Similar to an orphan waiting to be brought into a
home, there were many victims waiting to be brought justice by a lawyer. With this case being a
civil case and a personal injury lawyer on the plaintiff's side, there was room for questions about
why Jan Schlichtmann wanted to take this case. Many personal injury lawyers are viewed in the
public as bottom feeders or vultures that prey on the misfortunes of others. For example, in the
beginning of the film there is a scene where Schlichtmann sees a man holding his head after a car
accident. The lawyer from Cornell (Schlichtmann) instantly gives the man in pain his business and
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4. A Civil Action Film
In the movie A Civil Action we see many different concepts, terminology, and an over all realistic
view into the litigation process. This movie shows us what really life lawyers have to deal with
while their case is going though the legal system. A Civil Action gives the view great insight on
how the litigants and judges play a roll in this complex legal system we have that is not just black in
white.
Here we get a glimpse of what it is like to be a personal injury lawyer taking on a civil trail case in
a U.S. court. He we see that Jan Schlichtmann, the lead attorney in this case, is like many of todays
real life personal injury lawyers that work on contingency, where they only gets paid if they win the
case or settles.
One of the first legal...show more content...
Facher gets his way in not letting the families testify because the judge agrees with him that it
would be too much for the families. When repeat players and relationships between lawyers and
judges come into play this can change the course of a case as it has severely hurt Mr.
Schilichtmann's plan. This led to no closing augments in the trial in Beatrice Foods being found
not liable and the trial against W.R. Grace continues. The reason W.R. Grace is able to continue is
because they have deep pockets and can afford to continue in a trail. However, Schilichtmann and
his firm did not have deep pockets and after a long trail finally took a settlement and this was the
end of their fight. Schilichtmann later went on and had the case sent to the EPA where they were
able to appeal it because they had the money and the resources to unlike Schilichtmann. So from this
we can see that money plays a huge roll in the litigation
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5. Essay on Civil Action
Civil Action
The legal system is an essential element in the successful operation of this country. It is a system
that is utilized every day, by every type of person, from the average blue–collar worker to the
average Wall Street broker. There is a multitude of ways that the legal system is put to use. One
such way is the class action lawsuit. A Civil Action, by Jonathan Harr, uses the account of a single
case, Anne Anderson, et al., v. W.R. Grace & Co., et al, to illustrate the power and importance of
class action lawsuits in the civil justice system.
The purpose of class action lawsuits is to give the common man the ability to take on the largest
corporate or private entities, who can afford the very best legal services,...show more content...
The harm must be linked to the behavior of the defendant, a factor often hard to prove.
The attempt to link the harm to the behavior of the defendant produced its share of successes and
failures for the Schlichtmann team. Not only did the plaintiffs have to prove that the corporations
contaminated the water, but they also had to show that the contamination caused the leukemia and
the other health problems. To do this they enlisted the help and expertise of numerous doctors and
specialists. Naturally the defending side recruited their own set of experts. As in any case, each
side is going to have an expert who will refute the testimony of the other side's expert. This is a
normal part of arguing a case, but can cause confusion and complication on the part of the jurors.
A lesser–anticipated pitfall associated with expert witnesses, is the possibility of them making a
mistake. Especially in a case such as Woburn, where both sides have a slew of expert testimony,
lawyers such as Schlichtmann aren't able to catch or prevent every mistake. Even if eventually
caught and corrected, one mistake can prove to be very damaging. In A Civil Action, George Pinder,
Schlichtmann's expert in hydrology and groundwater movement, made a minor calculating mistake.
Although minor, "Schlichtmann knew that Facher and Keating would not miss this mistake, and
that they would use it on cross–examination to attack Pinder's credibility" (Harr 327). An expert
witness whose credibility is
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6. Essay about A Civil Action
There are few things in life that could be worse than loosing you child to such a horrible disease as
leukemia. One can only imagine having such a tragedy repeat itself throughout you community time
after time. To compound such tragedies, imagine being poisoned yourself and having to fight some
of the largest local corporations to prove the truth and get it stopped. This is the community setting
for Jonathan Harr's true–to–life legal thriller A Civil Action. The book was an award winner for "Best
Seller" in 1995 and was named the 1995 National Book Critics Circle Award.
The setting of the book is in the New England state of Woburn, Massachusetts. This is a sleepy little
community that is overcast by local factories. The factories...show more content...
The W.R. Grace Company, Riley Eannery, and Unifirst Corporation were prominent factories in
Wobourn. Jan speculated they were to have illegally dumped a dangerous carcinogen known as TCE
into the ground, sewer, and water systems of the Woborn community. These poisons were thought by
Jan, and the community, to have polluted two water wells that acted as a water supply for the
community. Many of the people who worked at the factories experienced many medical problems
such as cancer and died at young ages. Community members experienced numerous medial problems
such as flu–like symptoms, memory loss, cancers, leukemia, burning eyes, and skin, and death. The
water over the years was said to have gone from natural, to smelling, to dark and dangerous.
Though Jan put off the Woburn case for a long time, he took it thinking that a public interest firm
would brunt the cost and workload. As it turned out, he and his associates had to take on the
companies, and their prominent attorneys, single handedly. Even the EPA couldn't conclude a
connection in the poisoning and refused to "help an attorney collect a settlement fee." As Jan
became obsessive with the Woborn case, a reader is able to tag along on a host of legal battles put
forth by the opposing counsel. Rarely used legal rules, such as "Rule 11", were put forth to destroy
Jan and the case itself. This is further complicated by the trial judge, Judge
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7. A Civil Action Term Paper
A Civil Action Paper
In class, we have learned many important topics in the legal, ethical, and regulatory environment of
business. However in the classroom setting, we have examined each of these topics individually.
Jonathan Harr's A Civil Action allows us to see how the topics learned relate to one another in the
context of a real world setting. His book provides an engaging read about the legal practice action
while connecting the topics of the relationship between law, business, and ethics; the court system
and litigation; alternative dispute resolution; and the nature of the corporation. A Civil Action
complements the material learned in class, and it helps to create an overall cohesiveness between the
topics learned in class that...show more content...
A court can exercise personal jurisdiction over any person or business that abides within a certain
geographic area, or any out of area defendant as long as there was minimum contact with the area to
justify jurisdiction. Each state has its own long arm statue in place that defines minimum contact.
Personal jurisdiction for federal courts is broad, extending to any persons within the United States,
whereas personal jurisdiction for state courts is much more narrow. Different courts have the
authority to hear different kinds of cases. Subject matter jurisdiction for federal courts is relatively
narrow. There must be an issue of federal law, or there must be a dispute between citizens or
businesses of different states and the amount in question must at least $75,000. States have a much
more broad subject matter jurisdiction; they can hear pretty much any matter, whether involving
state or federal law. Jurisdiction played a key role in the outcome of the lawsuit in A Civil Action.
The plaintiff's lawyer, Jan Schlichtmann, filed the original complaint against W. R. Grace and
Beatrice Foods in state court. Schlichtmann, a personal injury attorney, spends most of his time
there; personal injury is heard much less frequently in federal court. William Cheeseman, the
attorney for W. R. Grace, almost immediately removes the case to federal court since W. R. Grace's
headquarters is in New York and the amount in question is clearly over
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