Lawsuit Information Center Blog

September 15, 2021

Settlement Amounts in Paraquat Parkinson’s Lawsuits

People who have developed Parkinson’s from Paraquat want to better understand the range of settlement amounts they can expect in their Paraquat lawsuit.

It is early in the Paraquat litigation so settlement compensation payouts are speculative. But we can look at other similar injuries to try to get a settlement range if plaintiffs’ lawyers are successful, as expected, in this litigation. The expected Paraquat settlement amounts will fluctuate as the litigation progress. So our lawyers will continue to update this page. The last update was on September 20, 2021.

Paraquat Lawsuits

September 9, 2021

Defense Wins Opening Round in Hernia Mesh Bellwether Trials

by Ronald V. Miller, Jr.

Yesterday afternoon, the first bellwether test trial in the hernia mesh litigation against C.R. Bard ended in a surprising loss for the plaintiff. The jury ruled in favor of the defense on all of the plaintiff’s product liability claims and award zero damages. In this post, we will look at how this happened and explain why it won’t have much impact on the big picture outcome of the hernia mesh litigation.

Johns v. Davol Inc., et al.: The First Hernia Mesh Bellwether Case

Utah resident Steven Johns underwent abdominal hernia repair surgery back in 2015. As part of the procedure, Mr. Johns’ surgeon implanted a Ventralight ST hernia mesh patch to help support and strengthen the surgically repaired muscle tissue. The Ventralight is part of a new line of permanent hernia mesh patches designed and manufactured by C.R. Bard Inc. (“Bard”).

September 8, 2021

Status of Hernia Mesh Lawsuits Against C.R. Bard

by Ronald V. Miller, Jr.

Medical device company C.R. Bard Inc. is currently defending over 12,000 lawsuits alleging that its hernia mesh devices were defective and resulted in injuries and complications for thousands of hernia surgery patients.

This post will provide a brief historical overview of the hernia mesh lawsuits against C.R. Bard and look at the current status of the Bard hernia mesh class-action MDL as of October 25, 2021.

October 25, 2021 Bard Hernia Mesh Lawsuit Update

September 7, 2021

Tasigna Lawsuits Against Novartis

by Ronald V. Miller, Jr.

Tasigna is a relatively new drug developed by Novartis for the treatment of leukemia. Not long after Tasigna was released in the U.S., evidence emerged indicating that Tasigna could cause a dangerous condition called atherosclerosis (narrowing of the blood arteries to the heart).

Plaintiffs’ lawyers claim that Novartis knew or should have known about this dangerous side-effect, but failed to include a warning in the prescribing information.

Users of Tasigna who suffered vascular damage from this undisclosed side-effect may be entitled to compensation for their injuries. Novartis has already been sued in a growing number of Tasigna lawsuits and a new “class-action” MDL has been created for consolidated handling of the Tasigna cases.

September 3, 2021

3M Earplugs Trials

by Ronald V. Miller, Jr.

On May 28, 2021, 3M won their first trial in the 3M earplug lawsuits. The jury found that an Ohio Army veteran’s tinnitus was not caused by 3M’s negligence in selling and distributing the Combat Arms earplugs. Plaintiffs came back three weeks later with a $1.7 million verdict in the Baker case.

If you think Baker was a great verdict, check out the $8.2 million 3M earplug verdict on October 1, 2021 in the Adkins case!

3M Earplug Lawsuit Record of Wins and Losses

September 2, 2021

Status of Ethicon Hernia Mesh Lawsuits

by Ronald V. Miller, Jr.

Ethicon (a Johnson & Johnson subsidiary) is defending over 3,000 lawsuits alleging that the defective design of its Physiomesh® hernia mesh product caused serious complications and injuries for surgery patients who had it implanted inside them.

The Ethicon Physiomesh hernia mesh lawsuits have been pending for 4 years and progress was significantly delayed by COVID shutdowns in 2020.

In this post, we will take a brief look at the Ethicon Physiomesh lawsuits and the current status of the Physiomesh class-action MDL as of September 2021.

August 31, 2021

Update on the Atrium C-Qur Hernia Mesh Lawsuits

by Ronald V. Miller, Jr.

In this post, we will provide a status update on what’s happening in the Atrium C-Qur hernia mesh litigation.

The Atrium hernia mesh MDL (Atrium Medical Corp. C-Qur Mesh Products Liability Litigation) has over 2,500 cases consolidated in the U.S. District Court for New Hampshire. This is the smallest of the three hernia mesh MDLs that are currently pending around the country.

The Atrium C-Qur Mesh Backstory

August 28, 2021

Missing Witness Rule in Maryland

by Ronald V. Miller, Jr.

Testimony from a key witness can often make or break a tort case at trial. But sometimes the witness testimony that the jury never hears can be even more critical in shaping the outcome. This leads to frequent battles over absentee witnesses.

In this post, we will take a look at the so-called “missing witness rule” under Maryland law and how it may come up in the context of a personal injury trial.

Hypothetical Scenario for Missing Witness Rule

August 25, 2021

What Happens to Newly Filed Roundup Cases?

by Ronald V. Miller, Jr.

Roundup is one of the most popular and widely used weed killers in the world. Roundup was first released in the early 1970s by Monsanto (now owned by pharma giant Bayer) and it eventually came to dominate the weed killer market, both commercial and residential. Roundup was everywhere and there was never any question about whether it was safe.

The end of Roundup’s success story began about 5 years ago when it was discovered that chronic exposure to the active ingredient in Roundup (glyphosate) could cause certain types of cancer. This discovery was followed by an inevitable tidal wave of lawsuits by individuals who were diagnosed with cancers such as non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma after prolonged use of Roundup.

The Roundup lawsuits soon numbered in the thousands and were consolidated into multidistrict litigation (MDL) in the Northern District of California. Monsanto (and its successor Bayer) has repeatedly refused to admit that Roundup is unsafe and aggressively defended its product in the courts. After years of civil discovery and a series of “test trials” that resulted in massive plaintiff verdicts, Bayer finally gave in and announced in 2020 that it was going to pay a staggering $10 billion to settle all of the Roundup lawsuits.

August 13, 2021

Survey Finding Flaws in MDL System Misses the Mark

by Ronald V. Miller, Jr.

Last month, Elizabeth Burch (University of Georgia School of Law) and Margaret Williams (Johns Hopkins) published a paper entitled Perceptions of Justice in Multidistrict Litigation. The paper was based on a survey of 217 women who are plaintiffs in various mass tort MDLs. Based on this survey, the authors conclude that the MDL system for handling mass torts in federal court is deeply flawed and fails to deliver justice to victims.

This paper has been making the rounds in legal academic circles and received some attention from national news outlets like Reuters. In my humble opinion as a lawyer directly involved in the MDL mass tort system, this paper is based on an absurdly flawed survey that is not reflective of most MDL plaintiffs.

Summary of the Survey