More than three years after lawmakers gave the go-ahead to people sickened by decades of toxic drinking water aboard Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune in Jacksonville to sue the federal government for illnesses cause by the contamination, thousands are still waiting for their cases to move forward.
The contaminants at Camp Lejeune came from leaking underground storage tanks, waste disposal sites, industrial area spills and an off-base dry-cleaning firm from the 1950s through the 80s – and testing found that three of the base’s eight water treatment facilities contained contaminants – including those that supplied water to barracks and family housing at several locations.
In 1982, Camp Lejeune’s water supplies were formally tested and found to be contaminated, but the worst of Camp Lejeune’s drinking water wells remained open until 1985.
Read more: Erin Brockovich speaks out for justice for victims of toxic water aboard Camp Lejeune
Widow Cathy Makely said her late husband Morgan Makely III served in the United States Marine Corps from 1981 through 1985, as a Morse code intercept operator, and was aboard Camp Lejeune for the final two years of his tour of duty.
“Because he was at the tail end of it, I guess we thought it wasn't as bad, which is the exact opposite,” she said, “It was worse because all of the toxins, for forever, were just piling up on top of themselves. And so, he was actually there at the worst possible time.”
A study published in Environmental Health in 2014 reported samples taken at Camp Lejeune between 1980-1985 primarily contained tetrachloroethylene, trichloroethylene and their breakdown products, trans-1,2-dichloroethyline and vinyl chloride. Benzene was also found in the water.
Cathy said they first learned about the toxic water while the couple, who met after Morgan’s military service came to an end, was living in Atlanta in 2002. “We got a letter that, said that the water was contaminated and we would get a letter every year after that,” she explained, “And, he always said, ‘hey, hold on to that. Just stick it in the file.’ You know, it was very kind of vague that, you know, there were toxins in the water and he might have been exposed.”
As he aged, Makely thought his back and knee problems were the lasting legacy of his military service … until January of 2020, about 35 years after his service in the USMC came to an end. Cathy said, “He was at a meeting in New Orleans and he called me and he's like, ‘I have really bad heartburn. My stomach is really upset.’ And I was laughing at him because it was like, ‘well, you're, you know, ha ha, you're in New Orleans and you're eating all the food.’ And he didn't drink, but I was like, well, you know, welcome to being in your late 50s with the rest of us. Because he had a cast iron stomach. He could eat anything. He never got sick. But when he came home, it was bad enough that he went to the doctor.”
When Morgan didn’t improve with the medication he was given, and because he was losing weight, Cathy said he went back to the doctor within a week and a CT scan was ordered, and, “It was like within 10 days of his first symptoms that we found out that he had stage 4 esophageal cancer.”
It had metastasized to his lungs, lymph nodes, and other parts of his body.
Because the diagnosis came amid the Covid-19 pandemic, Morgan’s first chemotherapy appointment was nearly canceled, but in the end the treatment was started within days of his diagnosis.
Cathy said, “He lost 60 pounds in three months, and we were about to do a feeding tube. And then whatever treatment he was on started to work. And so, he was able to do fairly well. He never had a clean scan, and he never got to stop treatment.”
“Because he was a Marine, he would go to chemo and he would come home and he would work. And he was able to play golf,” she added. “And, they originally, we thought maybe we would have six months and we had two years before the cancer just mutated so many different ways that there was nothing left for them to do.”
Morgan died on March 26, 2022, five months before the Camp Lejeune Justice Act was signed into law. It allowed people who lived, worked, or were exposed to the toxic water for at least 30 days between 1953 and 1987 to sue the U.S. government for harm caused by that exposure at Camp Lejeune.
Part of the Honoring Our PACT Act, it removed previous barriers to lawsuits and established a lower standard of proof, requiring plaintiffs to show the contaminated water was at least "as likely as not" the cause of their illness.
Initially, Cathy was hopeful that the bill would help the family recover from the medical bills incurred by Morgan’s illness, and the pain, suffering, and loss he and his family endured.
"It started with the Department of the Navy who just decided, ‘we're just going to ignore every single claim that was filed. We're just not going to do anything and make you sue us.’ And then we filed the lawsuits. And then the Department of Justice from the very administration that signed this into law said, we're going to throw everything we can at you,” she said.
Cathy said from the initial hearing, the federal government placed the blame on the victims of the water contamination. She heard, “We don't believe the water was contaminated. If it was contaminated, it didn't cause your cancer. And if it was contaminated and you drank it and it caused your cancer, you shouldn't have drank the water. I mean, it literally says that he should not have drank the water. The only water that was available to him, that they made them drink. They made them drink canteens of water. My husband had a buddy in the Corps and he said, ‘I can remember the sergeant just yelling at me because I didn't want to drink the water because it smelled bad.’”
With each passing day, Cathy said victims of the toxic water at Camp Lejeune not only continue to die while justice remains out of reach, and the impacts for some continue to compound into even greater tragedy.
“The people that are dying, and their widows and their families, are being evicted from their homes because they have a VA loan for their mortgage and they can't pay it. And so, the government is not only not doing what they should do, but now they're foreclosing on people's homes and they're not giving them health care,” she said, “And, I mean, why are we having to fight? Marines are fighters, but we shouldn't be fighting the U.S. government, the very people they served.”
Read more: 2025 Camp Lejeune Justice Act Series
North Carolina Congresswoman Deborah Ross introduced a bill early last summer that would make adjustments to the Camp Lejeune Justice Act. The Ensuring Justice for Camp Lejeune Victims Act has strong bipartisan support in both chambers, and is cosponsored by Congressmen Dr. Greg Murphy and Don Davis and many other North Carolina lawmakers. It expands the number of courts that can hear the cases, clarifies the right to jury trials, lowers the burden of proof for victims, and caps attorney fees.
Cathy said the fact that the bill has not been taken up is frustrating because, “It's a no brainer to correct this, that the DOJ is using these loopholes to continue to delay this and that we don't have jury trials and there's only four judges that can hear these cases. It's absurd. It's just stalled. It's been stalled for a year. People have been talking about how this needs to be corrected, and it doesn't change the law. It clarifies the law.”
Although she continues to appeal for support for Camp Lejeune’s sickened veterans, including through a petition on change.org, Cathy said she’s also frustrated by the snail’s pace of the court process.
"I wish they would have just said, screw you, we're not going to do it. We don't care. Go ahead and die. Stop holding out hope. Stop making us fight. You know, I mean, it's cruel,” she said, “It's so cruel.”
Cathy added, “I'm tired of talking about Camp Lejeune. I'm tired of being reminded every single day that Camp Lejeune is why my husband isn't here. I want closure for this. I want it to be done.”
