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Erin Brockovich-Ellis
Director of Environmental Research Masry & Vititoe Law Offices
A lot of people ask me, and I ask myself more often than not, How in the hell did I ever get where I am today?
I'm not really sure sometimes. I was born and raised in Lawrence, Kansas. I had the most honorable, wonderful parents who gave me the greatest foundation to go from.
I have had more obstacles in my life to overcome: I'm dyslexic; I've suffered through anorexia; I have panic disorder – I demonstrate that frequently on an airplane; I've been a single mom with three children and I've had some really, really rough roads to hoe.
But what I hang on to more than anything is just sheer persistence and determination.
As for Hinkley, California; I stumbled upon it. Mr. Masry came into my office one day, looking for a different secretary. He ignored me most of the time. As a matter of fact I remember the first day I was at the office, he asked Jim Vititoe, "With the exception of sitting up by herself, what can she do?" You don't want to know what I said to him, but he came into my office with that box that contained the files for Greg and Roberta Walker and their two children.
They lived in Hinkley, California. All I wanted was to do a good job for Mr. Masry. I had three children to feed. I became very curious about the medical records contained inside the box. They weren't difficult to read; they had an in-range and out-of-range and all the descriptions of the blood tests that they had taken, and I could clearly see that their T-cells were out-of-range, their white counts were high, their immune systems seemed to be suppressed. That is what started this whole thing with Hinkley.
I got out to Hinkley and got to know those people. They wanted to live in Hinkley because they wanted good health care for their families, happy children, away from the city, away from gangs. People often ask me, "When you were in Hinkley, did you ever think this would happen?" And I say, "Are you kidding me?
If you think for one minute while I was out in Hinkley, California I stopped to ponder the fact that, okay, we're going to sue PG&E, we're going to get $333 million dollars from them, there's going to be a movie about it – as a matter of fact, Julia Roberts is going to star in it – and they are going to name it after me, I would have been committed." I was simply only out there to do a good job, and I truly care about those people.
Let there never be any mistake about what Pacific Gas and Electric did to those human beings. One of my greatest achievements was an honor from the Beacon Awards for Best Use of Public Records, because it was those records that made all the difference in the world.
You cannot assume something in a toxic case; you cannot assume anything when you are suing PG&E. Those records provided us with the real facts, and without a doubt the company has known since 1960 that they have poisoned the water and they made a corporate decision to look the other way.
As I discussed with everybody in Hinkley, whether you win, lose, or draw, in this lawsuit, somebody has lied to your face, and that lie has caused serious, irreversible harm to you, to your health, and to your family, and by God, I am not going to go away. I will be a pain in their ass as long as I live.
Every single step along the way, whether it be PG&E in Hinkley, Kettleman; cases against Lockheed, Dole, Del Monte, or refineries; every one of them has told a lie, and those lies to me represent the worst destruction of all. They strip us of our health; they strip us of our dignity.
Most of the time I'm doing motivational work now. In Hinkley, California, in Kettleman, and in every single toxic litigation we've had, one of the biggest hurdles I've had to jump is getting a group of people such as yourself to believe what I'm saying to you.
I have confidence that there is not one of us here in this room today that hasn't been frightened, hasn't been sad, hasn't been lonely, didn't know who to turn to, and I believe in the power of people. I could be here with every single one of you today sitting on a toxic site – there's probably one pretty near us – and believe that we still have the ability to make a difference. So I am not ever afraid to sit down and talk to you.
Sometimes I wonder what has happened to us as a society, that we have forgotten what our priorities are and what they should be. I am just here to share a story with you and hopefully can pass on and share with you something that I believe in from the bottom of my heart: the power of people, being persistent, being determined, and having every bit of gumption you have to get over any obstacle that comes in front of you, because you're going to have them.
You've got to get through them and you've got to get over them. The legacy that we leave behind for our children isn't really necessarily our house, our money, our cars or anything else; it's the philosophy of what we believe in. It's that power that can be carried on that makes a difference for all of us.
