HILO — A husband and wife who operated a South Kona coffee farm are suing Monsanto Co., alleging the agricultural biotechnology corporation purposely downplayed carcinogenic properties of glyphosate, the active ingredient in Roundup herbicide, and are responsible for the woman’s cancer. 
 
 The Miller Firm of Orange, Virginia, and Honolulu attorney Brian K. Mackintosh filed the civil suit Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Honolulu on behalf of Christine and Kenneth Sheppard, former owners of Dragon’s Lair Kona Coffee Farm in Honaunau. 
 
 The suit alleges Christine Sheppard, who once was president of the Kona Coffee Council, was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma in 2003, after eight years of using Roundup on the farm, and that the Sheppards were forced to sell the farm and relocate to California in 2004 “where she continues to undergo treatment and surveillance for her lymphoma.” 
 
 The lawsuit seeks unspecified monetary damages, including compensatory damages, punitive damages and attorneys’ fees and court costs. 
 
 Attorney Michael Miller accused Monsanto of a “misinformation campaign” and said the Sheppards’ lawsuit will “force Monsanto to face the human consequences of their lies.” 
 
 “She’s been diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, a very serious form of cancer that’s gone to stage four,” Miller said. “She’s had enormous treatment and now is in remission, but is in fear of it coming back. So we’re seeking a fair amount of damages — her medical expenses, her pain, her suffering and her mental anguish. And we’ll ask a jury to put a number on that at an appropriate time.” 
 
 The suit comes a week after Monsanto filed a lawsuit in California seeking to prevent that state from adding glyphosate to its list of known carcinogens. The state’s Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment announced in September that it planned to add glyphosate to the list after the World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer classified it as a probable human carcinogen last March. 
 
 Monsanto maintains Roundup is safe to use. 
 
 “While we are sympathetic to anyone suffering an illness, these claims regarding glyphosate are baseless and without merit, and we will defend against (the Sheppards’) suit vigorously,” Monsanto said in a statement Wednesday. “Glyphosate has a 40-year history of safe use, and based on the overwhelming weight of evidence, regulatory agencies around the world have concluded that glyphosate can be used safely according to label instructions. No regulatory agency in the world considers glyphosate to be a carcinogen.” 
 
 The suit claims Monsanto “knew or had reason to know that its Roundup products were defective and were inherently dangerous and unsafe when used in the manner instructed and provided by defendant.” 
 
 Miller said the Sheppards, who are originally from England, had a dream of owning a coffee farm and achieved it, but “the dream had to die.” 

 Monsanto Can't Duck Woman's Cancer Claims HONOLULU (CN) — A federal judge this week refused Monsanto's request to dismiss a lawsuit by a former Kona coffee grower who claims she got cancer from the company's weed-killer Roundup. 
 
 Christine and Kenneth Sheppard, former owners of Dragons Lair Kona Coffee Farm in Captain Cook on the Big Island, accuse the agribusiness giant of concealing risks associated with glyphosate, which the World Health Organization recently classified as a likely carcinogen and Christine Sheppard believes caused her to develop non-Hodgkin lymphoma. 
 
 From 1996 through 2004, the Sheppards sprayed their farm with Roundup. In 2003, Christine Sheppard was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin lymphoma. 
 
 "Why me?" she asked in a 2009 editorial for the newsletter of the Kona Coffee Farmer's Association. 
 
 The Sheppards had never lived near any industry and were "turning organic," living in Kona, where in spring flowers stick to coffee plants like snow on steep volcanic slopes above a cobalt sea. And the smoky smell of roasting "cherries" fills the air at harvest time. 
 
 Then Christine saw a report from Sweden that linked Roundup with non-Hodgkin lymphoma. "Was this my link?" she wrote. She bookmarked the report to read later, but found it had been removed from the web, "rumor says under pressure from chemical giants," the Sheppards say in their complaint. 
 
 In its motion to dismiss the Sheppards' claims, Monsanto seized upon Christine's editorial as proof that she suspected Roundup long before filing the action on Feb. 2, 2016, and as a result should be dismissed as outside the two-year statute of limitations for tort claims. 
 
 However, U.S District Judge Michael Seabright said Monsanto's dismissal motion relies on disputed "evidence" — Christine Sheppard's editorial — that is inappropriate to consider at this stage in the case. 
 
 Furthermore, Seabright said, "it is not apparent on the face of the complaint that the statute of limitations has run, especially considering the allegations regarding the 2015 designation [of Roundup as a probable carcinogen] by the WHO." 
 
 Monsanto also argued that "warnings-based" claims are preempted by the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act, or FIFRA. The same question of federal preemption is at the heart of four other cases currently before the Ninth Circuit involving county initiatives across Hawaii to regulate GMOs and pesticide use. 
 
 However, Seabright said the Sheppards' warnings-based claims "are fully consistent with FIFRA's labeling requirements, and thus are not preempted." 
 
 He added, "The complaint is not attempting to impose a different warning label, such as in Marzaie v. Monsanto Co., in which the plaintiff sought injunctive relief requiring Monsanto to alter its label. Rather, plaintiffs contend that Monsanto's existing label (or the label used from 1995 to 2004) is 'misbranded' because it misrepresents Roundup's safety, and is an inadequate warning. A pesticide is 'misbranded' under FIFRA if its label is 'false or misleading in any particular,' or omits necessary warnings or statements. The product is 'defective' under either theory." (Parentheses in ruling) 
 
 Because the Sheppards claim the Roundup label is "misbranded" in violation of FIFRA and Hawaii law, their failure-to-warn claims are not preempted, Seabright ruled. 
 
 The judge noted Monsanto's filing of "voluminous material primarily from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency largely regarding glyphosate tolerances related to food and recent assessments evaluating the carcinogenic potential of gyphosate by an EPA cancer assessment review committee," but said they don't provide a basis for dismissal on preemption grounds at this stage. 
 
 Christine Sheppard is in remission, though she continues her treatments. The couple sold the coffee farm and has since moved to California. 
 
 Brian Mackintosh, the Sheppards' lead attorney in Hawaii, did not return an email requesting comment by press time. 
 
 An email sent late Friday to Monsanto's representatives was not returned by press time. 
 

– A former coffee farmer who says Monsanto's widely used Roundup herbicide caused her cancer scored a win last week when a federal judge rejected the company's request to dismiss the case. Christine Sheppard was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma in 2003, seven years after she started using Roundup at her coffee farm in Hawaii, Courthouse News reports. Her lawsuit, like one filed by three cancer-stricken farmers in Nebraska, accuses Monsanto of falsely claiming that glyphosate, the herbicide's active ingredient, was safe. The World Health Organization published a study last year that concluded glyphosate is "probably carcinogenic to humans." When Sheppard—whose cancer is in remission—and her husband filed their lawsuit earlier this year, attorney Michael Miller accused Monsanto of running a "misinformation campaign" and said the suit would "force Monsanto to face the human consequences of their lies," West Hawaii Today reported. In last week's hearing, US District Judge Michael Seabright decided that a 2009 editorial in the Kona Coffee Farmer's Association newsletter in which Sheppard expressed misgivings about Roundup did not mean the 2-year statute of limitations for claims had passed—especially considering the WHO's designation of Roundup as a probable carcinogen. (On French TV, a lobbyist defending Monsanto said glyphosate was safe to drink, but then refused to drink it.)