Anderson v. Cryovac
E662015
Anderson v. Cryovac is a landmark environmental contamination lawsuit over industrial pollution of drinking water in Woburn, Massachusetts, that became widely known through the book and film "A Civil Action."
All labels observed (4)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| Anderson et al. v. Beatrice Foods Co. | 1 |
| Anderson et al. v. W.R. Grace & Co. | 1 |
| Anderson v. Cryovac canonical | 1 |
| civil lawsuit Anderson et al. v. W.R. Grace & Co. et al. | 1 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T7393722 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Anderson v. Cryovac Context triple: [A Civil Action, legalCaseInvolved, Anderson v. Cryovac]
-
A.
Wards Cove Packing Co. v. Atonio
Wards Cove Packing Co. v. Atonio is a 1989 U.S. Supreme Court case that narrowed the standards for proving employment discrimination under Title VII, prompting Congress to later revise those standards in the Civil Rights Act of 1991.
-
B.
Cook v. Gralike
Cook v. Gralike is a 2001 U.S. Supreme Court case that limited states’ power over federal elections by holding that Missouri could not use ballot notations to influence voters’ choices for congressional candidates.
-
C.
Lucas v. Earl
Lucas v. Earl is a landmark 1930 U.S. Supreme Court tax law case that established the principle that income is taxed to the person who earns it, regardless of contractual arrangements to split or assign that income.
-
D.
McDonald v. Smith
McDonald v. Smith is a 1985 U.S. Supreme Court case that held the First Amendment’s Petition Clause does not grant absolute immunity from libel suits for statements made in petitions to government officials.
-
E.
United States v. Darby
United States v. Darby is a 1941 U.S. Supreme Court case that upheld federal labor regulations under the Commerce Clause and marked a broad expansion of federal power over economic activity.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Anderson v. Cryovac Target entity description: Anderson v. Cryovac is a landmark environmental contamination lawsuit over industrial pollution of drinking water in Woburn, Massachusetts, that became widely known through the book and film "A Civil Action."
-
A.
Wards Cove Packing Co. v. Atonio
Wards Cove Packing Co. v. Atonio is a 1989 U.S. Supreme Court case that narrowed the standards for proving employment discrimination under Title VII, prompting Congress to later revise those standards in the Civil Rights Act of 1991.
-
B.
Cook v. Gralike
Cook v. Gralike is a 2001 U.S. Supreme Court case that limited states’ power over federal elections by holding that Missouri could not use ballot notations to influence voters’ choices for congressional candidates.
-
C.
Lucas v. Earl
Lucas v. Earl is a landmark 1930 U.S. Supreme Court tax law case that established the principle that income is taxed to the person who earns it, regardless of contractual arrangements to split or assign that income.
-
D.
McDonald v. Smith
McDonald v. Smith is a 1985 U.S. Supreme Court case that held the First Amendment’s Petition Clause does not grant absolute immunity from libel suits for statements made in petitions to government officials.
-
E.
United States v. Darby
United States v. Darby is a 1941 U.S. Supreme Court case that upheld federal labor regulations under the Commerce Clause and marked a broad expansion of federal power over economic activity.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (47)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
civil action
ⓘ
environmental contamination case ⓘ lawsuit ⓘ |
| allegation |
contaminated municipal wells G and H in Woburn
ⓘ
defendants improperly disposed of toxic chemicals ⓘ |
| attorneyForPlaintiffs | Jan Schlichtmann NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| causeOfAction |
negligence
ⓘ
personal injury ⓘ property damage ⓘ wrongful death ⓘ |
| country |
United States of America
ⓘ
surface form:
United States
|
| court | United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| defendant |
Beatrice Foods Co.
NERFINISHED
ⓘ
Cryovac, Inc. NERFINISHED ⓘ W. R. Grace & Co. NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| filingDate | 1979 ⓘ |
| fullName | Anne Anderson et al. v. Cryovac, Inc., et al. NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| healthEffectAlleged |
childhood leukemia
ⓘ
other serious illnesses ⓘ |
| impact |
influenced later environmental and toxic tort litigation strategies
ⓘ
raised public awareness of groundwater contamination risks ⓘ |
| inPopularCulture |
depicted in Jonathan Harr’s nonfiction book "A Civil Action"
NERFINISHED
ⓘ
dramatized in the 1998 film "A Civil Action" ⓘ |
| jurisdiction | United States federal court NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| legalIssue |
allocation of liability among multiple polluters
ⓘ
causation between chemical exposure and leukemia cluster ⓘ |
| legalSignificance |
illustrated difficulties of proving causation in environmental cases
ⓘ
important case in U.S. toxic tort litigation ⓘ landmark environmental contamination lawsuit ⓘ |
| location | Woburn, Massachusetts NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| outcome |
no final jury verdict on damages due to settlement
ⓘ
settlement with Beatrice Foods Co. after appeal ⓘ settlement with W. R. Grace & Co. ⓘ |
| phase |
damages phase
ⓘ
liability phase ⓘ |
| plaintiff |
Anne Anderson
NERFINISHED
ⓘ
families from East Woburn, Massachusetts ⓘ |
| pollutant |
perchloroethylene
ⓘ
trichloroethylene ⓘ |
| relatedInfrastructure | Woburn municipal wells G and H NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| relatedPlace | Aberjona River Valley NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| relatedWork |
A Civil Action (book)
NERFINISHED
ⓘ
A Civil Action (film) NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| subjectMatter |
groundwater contamination
ⓘ
industrial pollution of municipal drinking water wells ⓘ |
| timePeriod | 1970s–1980s ⓘ |
| trialStartDate | 1986 ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: Anderson v. Cryovac Description of subject: Anderson v. Cryovac is a landmark environmental contamination lawsuit over industrial pollution of drinking water in Woburn, Massachusetts, that became widely known through the book and film "A Civil Action."
Referenced by (4)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.
this entity surface form:
civil lawsuit Anderson et al. v. W.R. Grace & Co. et al.
this entity surface form:
Anderson et al. v. W.R. Grace & Co.
this entity surface form:
Anderson et al. v. Beatrice Foods Co.