The "problem," as Sasha later learned, was that three men who had worked with her husband in a lab at an Amoco research facility 30 miles west of Chicago had been diagnosed with malignant brain tumors known as gliomas. What she could not know was that within a decade, Karayannis himself, a native of Greece, holder of 29 U.S. patents and a passionate opera buff, would die from the same disease.
Before his death in 1998, Karayannis urged his oldest son to take legal action. Now 38 and a partner in an Elgin, Ill., law firm, Mario Karayannis has done just that, filing a civil suit on behalf of his father and five others—one of whom has also died—charging Amoco with negligence and demanding more than $600,000 in compensation. "Unfortunately, in a legal context, the only thing you can do is to put a price on what a father's life is worth," says Mario.
For its part, the company "is doing everything that we can to try and find answers," says Michael Wells, an epidemiologist on Amoco's Brain Tumor Task Force. Tragically, Karayannis and his five colleagues were not the only employees affected. To date, six cancerous brain tumors (at least eight times the normal rate) have been found in former Amoco workers, and lawsuits have been filed on behalf of 15 others diagnosed with benign brain tumors and lung, thyroid and liver cancers. "These are our colleagues who are developing cancers," says Wells, "and it is extremely frustrating for everyone involved."
But it was the Karayannis case that focused widespread public attention on Amoco's cancer cluster. According to Mario, employees had been complaining since the '70s about odors in Building 503, where researchers were trying to improve production of the plastic polypropylene. But it was not until the spring of 1989, after the first three reported brain tumors, that management hired experts from the Mayo Clinic and the University of Illinois to investigate. A month later the company issued a report stating that "the occurrence of three gliomas over a 19-year period is probably not unusual."
It was at about that time that Sasha, a homemaker, now 66, first noticed that her absentminded husband was showing more erratic behavior—driving on the wrong side of the road or pouring wine into his coffee cup. Doctors at first suspected high cholesterol, but in 1996, two years after Karayannis, a 24-year employee, retired from Amoco, he collapsed while having breakfast with a friend; an MRI revealed a possible brain tumor. Only then did Mario learn of his father's workplace concerns. "If he was worried, he never conveyed it to us before he got sick," says Mario, who is married to an attorney, Kathy, 39, and is the father of two children, Katy, 6, and Niko, 5. "That was typical for him." On Feb. 5, 1998, after a long illness, Karayannis died.
Although their civil case may not be settled in the near future, the Karayannises recently received some small vindication: On Aug. 5, after an exhaustive study of 7,000 employees, Amoco's study stated that most likely six of the reported gliomas are work-related. Still, "if you ask me if I want justice or would rather have my father walking around today," says Karayannis, "it is an easy answer."
Susan Schindehette
Giovanna Breu in Chicago
- Contributors:
- Giovanna Breu.
Saved by the Bell Reunion
The hookups, the meltdowns, the memoires
The case reveals what was really going on what they think of each other now!
