Mass Tort Litigation Blog

Civil Justice Fest Panel Videos from the Law & Economics Center at George Mason University Scalia Law School

The Law & Economics Center at George Mason University Scalia Law School has posted online the videos for all of the panels for Civil Justice Fest: A Month of Dialogues on the Most Pressing Civil Justice Issues.

Plaintiffs' Attorney Shanin Specter Critical of Certain MDL Practices

Article in Legal Newsline -- Plaintiffs lawyer rips colleagues over multidistrict litigation fees, pressure tactics, by Daniel Fisher:

Federal multidistrict litigation, a procedure intended to resolve mass-tort lawsuits fairly and efficiently, has mutated into an unethical moneymaking machine for lawyers that is badly in need of reform, a prominent plaintiff attorney says as he prepares to lobby for changes.

Conservatives and tort-reform groups have long criticized MDLs as a form of asymmetric warfare against defendants in which thousands or even tens of thousands of lawsuits are gathered before a single federal judge who frequently sets settlement, not trial on the merits, as the goal. But it is unusual for a plaintiff attorney to lodge such a fierce critique on the procedure that has earned his colleagues billions of dollars in fees.

Law360 Names King & Spalding a Defense Product Liability Group of the Year

Article on Law360 -- Product Liability Group Of The Year: King & Spalding, by Daphne Zhang:

King & Spalding's product liability group notched victories this year, such as erasing a $454 million defective medical equipment verdict against Kimberly-Clark Corp. at the Ninth Circuit and helping Honda toss $1.7 billion worth of defect claims, landing the group a spot among Law360's 2020 Product Liability Groups of the Year.

Andy Bayman, head of the firm's trial and global disputes practice group and a product liability lawyer himself, told Law360 that product liability is "a big and important practice" of the firm. The practice group's 170 lawyers, with more than 60 partners, work from nine of the firm's offices, including locations in Atlanta, Houston, Los Angeles and New York.