Health issues ranging from diabetes to congestive heart failure and birth defects have led some area residents to believe their lives have been altered due to chemically-treated wood used for many years in their homes.

That concern led some of these residents to file a lawsuit in 2001 against American Woods, a Richton industry.

Now, nearly seven years later, these residents are still seeking compensation.

Dana G. Kirk, an attorney with Kirk Law Firm, said he filed the initial lawsuit in December 2001 in Jasper County on behalf of some people who believed using the wood made them sick.

Kirk said the lawsuit listed Joslyn Danaher, owner of the Richton plant in 1983, and Powe Timber, which was doing business as American Woods.

“We filed the lawsuit based on my clients’ chemical exposure from wood from the (Richton) plant,” the attorney said.

Now officials report that the case involving the wood company was settled last year and compensations for those persons who were identified as victims are being distributed now.

Several residents from Richton and Jasper County came to the Jasper County Courthouse in Paulding this week to protest their elimination from the settlement.

Lirissa Vickers, one of the original eight plaintiffs in the case, said she and more than a thousand other people were left out of the settlement.

Vickers said her family used the wood blocks, which is believed to have been treated with cresol, as a source of heating.

“I was a little girl when we started using it and now I’m 36 years old,” Vickers explained. “There were 1,300 clients named and I was one of the ones they dropped.

“I have congestive heart failure. I also have a child who was born with Patent Urachus — a rare kidney disease — and they dropped me,” she said. “They picked and chose who they wanted to pay. A lot of the people have the same illnesses as the ones they picked.”

Mildred Moody, who lives in the McSwain Community near Richton, said she has diabetes and irritable bowel symptom.

“I had surgery in 2000 in Gulfport and they tested my blood and I had arsenic in my blood work and in my body,” Moody said. “Our houses were tested for dioxin and they said we had a high level of dioxin and that it was unsafe to stay in our house.”

Moody said “they told us that some things were not associated with the wood, but we have some of the same illnesses as those people who they say illness was caused by the wood.”