Mohawk suing chemical companies over “fraud” related to forever chemicals

DALTON, Ga. (WDEF)- A few months ago, a group of conservationists raised alarm bells about the presence of dangerous chemicals in Northwestern Georgia waterways.

This they say were caused by decades of irresponsible discarding of those chemicals by manufacturers, primarily in the carpet industry.

Now, one of those carpet manufacturers has filed a lawsuit claiming that they were misled.

Mohawk Industries has long been a fixture of the carpet industry in northwest Georgia.

They, along with other carpet manufacturers have become increasing targets over the spread of PFAS, otherwise known as the forever chemical.

However, Mohawk in a lawsuit filed in Whitfield County, says that they themselves were defrauded by two chemical companies.

Mohawk argues in the lawsuit that DuPont and 3-M did not properly inform them of the dangers of P-FAS.

That chemical, according to Georgia PFAS attorney Ben Finley, who is part of an organization fighting the chemical’s spread but is not directly involved in this lawsuit, says hundreds of water tests across Northwest Georgia have shown elevated levels of its presence, and say it can lead to various illnesses.

Finley said, “They’ve been purchasing products including P-FAS since the 1970s from manufacturers such as 3M, but were not aware of the dangers associated with PFAS.”

He says that the companies knew about its dangers since the 1970s.

Finley said, “They’ve had thousands and thousands of scientists, Mohawk alleged they’d ( 3M) had over 8,000 scientists who spent over $1.9 billion dollars in one calendar year alone in research and development and so they were keenly aware of the dangers that we know now.”

This, Finley says, was extremely dangerous.

Finley said, “If you fill up your bathtub full of sand, you take out four grains of sand, and that’s four parts per trillion, and that tiny, miniscule amount in the human body is toxic.”

He hopes that this propels more action forward towards cleaning up the chemicals.

Finley said, “We believe that the Mohawk lawsuit, which was filed recently, is of great significance for the overall project… If a company like Mohawk, which has 43,000 employees and $11 billion dollars in revenue can be defrauded in working closely with 3M, a Fortune 500 company, then certainly businesses and in Northwest Georgia in particular were misled.”

He adds that there is a lot more to be done to fix this issue.

Finley said, “The only way we can overcome this is by banding together.”

This case is still pending in Whitfield County Superior Court.

PFAS Georgia will be holding some more town halls in the coming weeks in the Dalton area with famed activist Erin Brockovich.