Erin Brockovich

Birthname

Erin Brockovich-Ellis

Birthdate

June 22, 1960

Birthplace

Lawrence, Kansas, United States

Height

1.77 m

Education

Kansas State University, Wades Business College

Profession

Lawyer

Net worth

$10,000,000

Source of Wealth

Law

Nationality

United States

Country

United States

Marital Status

Divorced

Children

3 (Matthew, Katie, Elizabeth)

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Erin Brockovich has an estimated net worth of $10 Million. He is a famous American environmentalist who had been involved in a number of anti-pollution lawsuits against large companies in the US, Erin Brockovich is best known for upholding the case against the Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) in 1993 in California.

The legal case was the subject of a film released in 2000, called Erin Brockovich, with Julia Roberts in the starring role. The film was directed by Steven Soderbergh and written by Susannah Grant. It was a dramatization of the true story of Brockovich's fight against PG&E regarding its culpability in the Hinkley groundwater contamination incident. Receiving five Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture and Best Actress - which Roberts won. Brockovich herself had a small cameo early in the film, as a waitress named Julia. The film grossed $28.1 million on its opening weekend and went on to make $126.6 million in North America and $130.7 million in the rest of the world. Brockovich claims the movie is 98% accurate, with some details changed for creative reasons.

The case came about while Brockovich was a legal clerk without any legal, scientific, or medical qualifications. Locals asked Brockovich to help them, and she pushed for the case to go to court. The case was settled in 1996 for $333 million, the largest settlement ever paid in a direct-action lawsuit in United States history. The law firm for which Erin Brockovich was a legal clerk, Masry & Vititoe, received $133.6 million of the settlement, and Brockovich herself walked away with $2 million.

With the settlement, Brockovich could move out of a cockroach-infested house and into a mansion in Agoura Hills, San Fernando, Los Angeles. The dramatic change in lifestyle came at a price though, with her teenage children ending up in rehabilitation clinics later, due to habits they acquired after the settlement. Of the $2 million, it's reported Brockovich had to pay $1 million in taxes and $250,000 in rehab fees. Brockovich still lives in the Agoura Hills mansion.

Born Erin Pattee in Lawrence, Kansas, she's the daughter of Cindy - a journalist - and Frank Pattee, an industrial engineer and football player. She attended Lawrence High School then went on to study for an Associate in Applied Arts degree at Wade College, Kansas State University.

Erin Brockovich has been married and divorced three times. She has three children: Matthew and Katie, from her first marriage to Shawn Brown; and a daughter Elizabeth from her second marriage, to Steven Brockovich.

Following on from her win against PG&E, she participated in other anti-pollution lawsuits including against Whitman Corporation in Willits, California; and against PG&E in Kings County, California, which listed over 1,200 plaintiffs and was settled for $335 million in 2006.

In 2003 she experienced problems with mold contamination in her own home and received settlements of $430,000. In 2020 she helped the Pawnee Nation take on oil and gas companies in Oklahoma as part of her work with law firm Weitz & Luxenberg.

A successful author, Brockovich's first book, Take It From Me: Life's a Struggle But You Can Win was published in 2001. She released a second book, Superman's Not Coming, on 25th August 2020. She appeared in the 2012 documentary Last Call at the Oasis, which focused on water scarcity in the United States. She's hosted TV series including Challenge America with Erin Brockovich on ABC and Final Justice on Zone Reality.  

She's received honorary doctorates from Lewis & Clark Law School, Portland, Oregon; Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles; and an honorary Master of Arts, Business Communication from Jones International University, Centennial, Colorado.

Apart from being a consultant for Girardi and Keese, Erin is also serving as the President of the Brockovich Research and Consulting Firm. She is also a consultant for Shine Lawyers, which is based in Australia, and Weitz and Luxenberg, a New York-based law firm that focuses on personal injury claims for exposure to asbestos. She still receives thousands of emails every month from people in need of environmental advocacy, so she has created resources to self-report the health effects of environmental pollution and find others nearby with the same symptoms.

Sources: Brockovich.com, Wikipedia, The Atlantic, Guardian

This article was updated on April 7, 2021 by Poppy O'Neill

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