After a long legal battle, a judge ruled in favor of Homer Salinas - a Mission firefighter denied workmen's compensation after he was diagnosed with kidney cancer.
"When I went ahead and submitted all the paperwork, the TML, which is the insurance carrier for the city, denied me," Salinas said.
The city's insurance carrier claimed that his diagnosis was unrelated to his work and refused to cover treatment costs, but Salinas appealed that decision last November and finally got the answer he'd been waiting for.
"We showed them that all the carcinogens, all the hazardous materials that I've been exposed to, all the number of calls," said Salinas. "And the judge ruled in our favor - that our risk was higher than their risk they were trying to fight."