A Utah man who was diagnosed with cancer after working five years as a groundkeeper for his church in water contaminated after the Red Butte Creek oil spill is suing The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and the oil and gas company responsible for the leak for his medical expenses.
Allan Flandro’s acute myeloid leukemia is now in remission, but in July 2016, when he was first diagnosed, physicians were worried he wouldn’t survive. Flandro underwent multiple surgeries and invasive treatments after his diagnosis, which came as a surprise to physicians, since Flandro, then 40, was so young, didn’t have a history of the disease, had never smoked and hadn’t been around any dangerous chemicals or known carcinogens, according to the lawsuit, filed Friday in Utah’s Third District Court.