Camden High School class action: why Leonie Curry is our Erin Brockovich

Leonie Curry was given just one year to live after being diagnosed with not one but two brain tumours.

When the former Camden High School student reached that milestone alive and kicking, she and husband Rodney sat down for a discussion about what to do next.

Leonie, who died last year, had started an awareness campaign about former Camden High students getting sick.

But the tumour diagnosis derailed her focus, so during their chat Rodney asked her what she was going to do now.

“I asked Leonie if she wanted to keep doing the Camden High campaign,’’ he tells the Voice in Macarthur during an interview at the house the couple built before Leonie passed away last June.

“So she had a think and said: Yep, we’re alive so let’s get on with it.

“From that moment on she was full steam ahead,’’ says Rodney Curry.

Eventually Leonie approached Marsdens Law Group to find out if a class action would be the way to go.

But there were two pivotal moments that led to the class action which is now inevitable and will be heard either in the Federal Court or the NSW Supreme Court this year.

The late Leonie Curry was at the heart of both these pivotal moments, and without her initiative and drive this class action would not be possible.

Rodney Curry explains how Leonie made the connection between Camden High School and former students getting sick and, in some cases, dying.

[social_quote duplicate=”no” align=”default”]“Leonie, who also had multiple sclerosis (MS)  was getting treatment down here at Camden Hospital, but whenever we went in we’d hear one of the nurses say – ‘oh, oh, another one’.[/social_quote]

“So one day Leonie asked a nurse – what do you mean another one?

“And the answer was – another one who went to Camden High; there seems to be a high rate of ex students getting sick.

“We came home and Leonie said to me, somebody needs to find out about this, who’s going to do it.

“She then spoke to a few people who went to Camden High School and came back to me and asked me if she could be the one to start something about this.

“And I said, do it.’’

Leonie didn’t waste a minute, getting on the computer to create a Facebook page and asking anyone who went to Camden High and had got sick to register on the social media page.

“The first couple of days, I’d be coming home from work and Leonie was in tears reading stuff out as people posted their stories,’’ says Rodney Curry.

Within two weeks more than 100 former students had contacted her and Leonie Curry had to make a decision about what to do next.

And that’s where the second pivotal moment comes in.

Having read that the famous American whistleblower Erin Brockovich was in Australia to work with Shine Lawyers in Brisbane, Leonie knew what her next move was.

She picked up the phone and called Ms Brockovich to tell her all about the Camden High School situation.

“Brockovich told Leonie: you’ve got a case, but this is too big for me to do from Queensland,’’ recalls Rodney Curry.

So Leonie called on Joe Bonura, compensation lawyer and partner at Marsdens Law Group.

That was in 2012 and as a result of Leonie Curry’s courageous stand 621 people have now registered with Mr Bonura for the class action.

Tragically, 52 of these former Camden High students have died.

Leonie Curry was absolutely convinced that going to Camden High School made her and many others seriously sick and Mr Bonura firmly believes she was right.

“Yes, I do. I think that when we first started collecting names it was a speculative enquiry,’’ he says.

“But as we have seen these numbers continue to roll in, just the sheer number of them seems to be overwhelming,’’ Mr Bonura said.

[social_quote duplicate=”no” align=”default”]“These poor people did nothing wrong, just went to school.[/social_quote]

“It would be awful to think it was caused by the school, but these are also people who are sick

“And caused by the school or not caused by the school people are ill, suffering and all that.

“The department of education is responsible for all of that harm and it is not just bad luck,’’ Mr Bonura said.

♦ The NSW Department of Education and Communities told the ABC program 7.30 that the former Camden High School site was “closed and relocated for several reasons, including the small size of the site, the relationship of the site to the one in 100 year flood line, and tests indicating that the adjoining former gasworks site, which was purchased by the Department in 1981 and amalgamated into the school site, was contaminated.
“The Department of Education and Communities commenced acquisition of land for the former Camden High School in June 1934. The school opened on the site at 2 John Street, Camden in 1956. The Department holds no records of remediation works undertaken prior to the opening of the school.’’

Camden High was located right next door to Camden Gas Works from the very beginning in 1956.

When the Gas Works ceased operating the education department bought the land and extended the school in 1981.

Contaminants associated with gas works such as cyanides, sulphates, hydrocarbons and benzene were discovered in 1995 and the school was finally closed down and relocated in 2001.

If Leonie Curry is right, they’d locked the gate after the horse had bolted.

Says Joe Bonura: “A lot of the enquiries we get are from people who are not ill but are concerned that something may happen in the future, and they’ve got to be on the lookout I guess, for signs or symptoms, the possibility of ‘I may have been exposed’

“The issue here is not whether or not there was present carcinogenic material.

“We know from the information we have that there were these materials because it was built on the site of the previous gasworks.

“In all negligence cases you’ve got to prove that whatever exposure or failure or act actually caused the condition that you complain of.

“And that can be difficult in all sorts of ranges of cases – in some cases that’s an easy thing – you’re involved in a motor vehicle accident, you break your leg, that’s easy.

“But it’s harder in more complicated matters like a medical negligence case or these types where there is exposure or potential exposure,’’ Mr Bonura said.

♦ When Leonie and Rodney Curry tied the knot in 2011 at Appin House they were two very happy people who were unaware that in just a few months their lives would be turned upside down.

I ask Rodney to tell me about Leonie, what was she like, what did he love about her.

“She was a funny bugger,’’ he says.

“She was honest as and it was all black and white with Leonie.

“We had some arguments about things being black and white – I nearly got her to admit one day there was a little bit of a grey area, but she said, nah, no grey area.

“The first couple of years we were together I was working a lot, had the usual stresses, but the day we decided to get married we just clicked and changed, it was great.

“It was the best time of your life sort of thing,’’ he says.

Then Leonie started feeling unwell and everything changed, except Leonie, says Rodney Curry.

“She saw the funny side of things even in the worst of times,’’ he recalls.

“If people suggested she was brave she railed against it: ‘I am not brave, I just want to live’, Leonie would say. I’m not giving up.

“She never gave up and wasn’t one to blame anyone, including her old school.

“She was just focused to get awareness out there. To get people to get checked if they went to Camden High.

“Just awareness, that was it.

“She said, look, if this ever goes to court I won’t be around to see it, it’s going to take years and years,’’ Mr Curry said.

He says he remembers the day Leonie got a message from one of the other former Camden High girls saying her brother was alive because he had a tumour removed from his throat just in time.

“The message said to Leonie, ‘thank you, he’s alive today, thank you, thank you, thank you’, and Leonie went: Job’s done.’’

Mr Curry says he hopes the class action goes ahead.

[social_quote duplicate=”no” align=”default”]“There’s so many people out there who need help, they’ve lost houses, jobs, they’re living at their parents’ house, who are struggling to look after them, they need money, they need help, its expensive being sick,’’ he says.[/social_quote]

“Leonie never expected a cent, we got through alright, but when you hear the number of people out there who lost everything, marriages, houses, jobs, and they’re struggling to pay for stuff, well.’’

If you’d like to register your name visit Marsdens Law Group website here, and click on Camden High School Class Action in red.