Steve Esmond, Theresa Devine and their teenagers Ryan and Sean all became seriously ill shortly after arriving at their vacation home on St. John last year. The boys - who had been students and athletes at Tatnall - spent weeks in medically induced comas. (YouTube) 
 
 He said that the sons, who played lacrosse at the Wilmington private school where their dad was an administrator, were conscious but barely able to move. Six months after the horrifying incident, their father, Steve Esmond, is slowly getting better as well, but suffers from severe tremors, struggles to speak and can't turn the pages of a book, Maron said. Their mother, Teresa Devine, had less exposure to the toxic gas than the rest of the family and has made the strongest recovery, but she spends her days and nights keeping vigil over her boys. Methyl bromide was banned for indoor residential use in 1984, though some agricultural uses are permitted. Terminix has admitted that one of its workers sprayed the apartment below with methyl bromide, an odorless gas that was banned from indoor use in 1984 and can cause severe damage to the nervous and respiratory systems. The family was on vacation at the Sirenusa resort on St. John when two employees of the local Terminix fumigated the villa below theirs March 18 with methyl bromide, even though it is not approved for residential use. Terminix USVI also agreed to pay $1 million to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for the cost of cleaning up the condos. Other pest control companies on the Virgin Islands were found in possession of methyl bromide and officials said they are checking records to see whether it was used improperly. Neither the company nor James J. Maron, an attorney who was representing the family, responded to a request for comment Friday. The plea calls for the first subsidiary to pay a fine to the federal government in the range of $800,000 to $5 million, while the second subsidiary would pay a fine in the range of $800,000 to $3 million, according to the ServiceMaster earnings report.
– A Delaware family poisoned by a toxic pesticide during their 2015 Virgin Islands vacation will receive an $87 million settlement from the parent company of Terminix, which admitted using the banned chemical at the resort where they stayed, CBS News reports. Per the New York Daily News, a ServiceMaster Global Holdings earnings report released Thursday first made mention of the payout "to settle all civil claims of the affected family related to the US Virgin Islands matter." The company has already paid $3 million to cover the insurance deductible for the Esmonds, who were severely injured after Terminix workers sprayed methyl bromide—banned for indoor residential use since 1984—in the St. John condo unit below their own, per the Philadelphia Inquirer. A September CNN report documented the horrifying consequences of the neurotoxin suffered by the Esmonds. Dad Stephen Esmond could barely speak at the time, was unable to turn the pages of a book, and suffered from tremors, while his two teen sons, former athletes who were in medically induced comas for weeks after the incident, were barely able to move. "Neurologically, it's like being in a torture chamber," a family attorney said. Mom Theresa Devine recovered more quickly and was looking after her family. (The Daily News and Inquirer note that no further word on their progress has been made available.) ServiceMaster has also agreed to pay up to $10 million in "fines, community service, and government costs" as part of the settlement, which is subject to court approval at an Aug. 25 hearing. An investigation by the DOJ is also in the works.