Contaminated Water Causes Big Problems For Some Carthage Residents

No running water, septic tanks leaking into yards, and enough contamination to make a whole neighborhood sick are all problems Carthage residents face living at the duplexes on 19th Street.

"I'm disgusted," resident Brandi Piescheo says. "It's not humane it's not right."

Resident Brandi Piescheo first noticed there was a problem when her water looked gray.

She resorted to using bottled water to shower, cook, and clean even before her landlord shut her water completely off last Friday.

"It's just sediments that flow to the top, "Piescheo says. "It just smells it smells really bad."

Piescheo asked the Jasper County Health Department to test the water.

"We have e-coli," Piescheo says. "It's high in iron, magnesium and cadmium. We are unable to drink the water."

"Little by little, the more we find out the more just totally devastated we are," residents' mother Kathy Stines says.

The contamination in the water has some residents sick for months.

"We have a one sick child out here who has a bacteria that's eating at his intestines and stomach lining," Piescheo says.

Part of the problem are the duplexes are rent to own. The point of contact to pay rent is David Jagensieker.

When KSN/KODE talked to him on the phone, he claimed to have no association with the complex and says it is the resident's responsibility to fix the tainted well.

Though the Jasper County Assessor's Office says "Sieker 5" is registered as the property's owner.

Hagensieker has been in trouble before. He was convicted in 2008 for stealing $24,000 worth of sewer services from the city of Carthage.

Now, Hagensieker is named in a lawsuit claiming he's failed to fix the contamination in the well.