CHICAGO -- The family of an East Chicago man who suffered "a horrible death" last summer in an industrial accident are seeking millions of dollars in damages in Cook County Circuit Court.

A suit filed by Kenneth Allen, a Valparaiso lawyer, alleges eight industrial firms are responsible for 57-year-old Carlos Ponce dying in an oven-like structure called a bag house, in temperatures as high as 500 degrees.

"Mr. Ponce died the most horrible death imaginable, a death which a jury verdict of several hundred million dollars could not adequately compensate," Allen said.

It names as defendants seven corporations either based in or doing business in Illinois, including Carmeuse Lime Inc., a Pittsburgh firm that operates the Marblehead Lime Plant Inc., on North Clark Road in Gary's Buffington Harbor area.

The plant cooks lime into calcium carbonate and other industrial and agricultural products. He said the bag house is used to scrub toxic dust out of the air and into bags, as required by environmental laws.

Ponce, who lived at 1008 W. 145th Ave., East Chicago, had worked in maintenance for more than two decades at the Marblehead plant.

Ponce was inside the bag house that day when the door to the only exit was slammed shut by the vacuum effect of machinery pumping superheated air into it. The Lake County coroner's office said Ponce's charred body was found hours later. His death was listed as an accident caused by severe burns.

Allen said Ponce couldn't open the door, which latched from the outside, and no one knew he was trapped inside, because the staff had been reduced by recent layoffs.

"This tragedy is the result of poor design of the bag house," Allen said.

Derald Bogs, area operations manager for Carmeuse, said Friday, "The bag house was operational when Mr. Ponce entered the bag house. ... All they know is he entered the room to check on something. Mr. Ponce entered the bag house alone, which is against company policy."

Bill Dolan can be reached at bdolan@nwitimes.com or (219) 662-5328.