Mass Tort Litigation Blog

Symposium on New Frontiers in Torts: The Challenges of Science, Technology & Innovation at Southwestern Law School in Los Angeles

The Southwestern Law Review Symposium, New Frontiers in Torts: The Challenges of Science, Technology, and Innovation, will take place on Friday, February 7, 2020 at Southwestern Law School in Los Angeles.  The Symposium is the inaugural event of Southwestern Law School’s Panish Civil Justice Program, which was endowed by one of the country’s leading trial lawyers, Southwestern Law School alumnus Brian Panish.  The Symposium's first panel will focus on tort practice, addressing an eclectic mix of subjects ranging from predictive analytics and e-discovery to scientific evidence and the cognitive science of jury persuasion.  Next, panel two will examine recent trends in financing lawsuits and proposals for changing non-lawyer relationships with law firms.  In panel three, the discussion turns to new forms of tort litigation, including recent developments in multidistrict, complex, class, and toxic tort actions such as the opioid mass litigation, among others.  The fourth panel will examine tort theory, analyzing both how traditional theories can deal with new tort problems and how new theories may help place old quandaries in sharper focus.  The Symposium will also include a luncheon keynote discussion on the past, present, and future of torts.  Registration for the symposium is available now.

Speakers and moderators at the symposium will include the following:

• Ronald Aronovsky, Professor of Law, Southwestern Law School;
• Mark Behrens, Partner and Co-Chair, Public Policy Practice Group, Shook, Hardy & Bacon;
• John Beisner, Partner and Leader, Mass Torts, Insurance and Consumer Litigation Group, Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom LLP;
• Alan Calnan, Professor of Law, Southwestern Law School;
• Fiona Chaney, Investment Manager and Legal Counsel, Bentham IMF;
• James Fischer, Professor of Law, Southwestern Law School;
• Manuel Gomez, Associate Dean of International and Graduate Studies and Professor of Law, Florida International University College of Law;
• Michael Green, Bess and Walter Williams Professor of Law, Wake Forest University School of Law;
• Gregory Keating, Maurice Jones, Jr. – Class of 1925 Professor of Law and Philosophy, University of Southern California Gould School of Law;
• Richard Marcus, Coil Chair in Litigation and Distinguished Professor of Law, UC Hastings College of Law;
• Francis McGovern, Professor of Law, Duke Law School;
• Linda Mullenix, Morris & Rita Atlas Chair in Advocacy, University of Texas at Austin School of Law;
• Brian Panish, Founding Partner, Panish, Shea & Boyle;
• R. Rex Parris, Founding Partner, Parris Law Firm;
• Christopher Robinette, Professor of Law and Director, Advocacy Certificate Program, Widener University Commonwealth Law School;
• Michael Sander, Managing Director and Founder, Docket Alarm, and Director, Fastcase Analytics;
• Victor Schwartz, Partner and Co-Chair, Public Policy Practice Group, Shook, Hardy & Bacon;
• Anthony Sebok, Professor of Law, Yeshiva University Cardozo School of Law;
• Catherine Sharkey, Crystal Eastman Professor of Law, New York University School of Law;
• Kenneth Simons, Chancellor’s Professor of Law, UC Irvine School of Law;
• Byron Stier, Associate Dean for Strategic Initiatives and Professor of Law, Southwestern Law School;
• Dov Waisman, Vice Dean and Professor of Law, Southwestern Law School; and
• Adam Zimmerman, Professor of Law and Gerald Rosen Fellow, Loyola Marymount University Law School Los Angeles.

The Short Guide To Mass Tort Deals: Backroom Bargaining in Multidistrict Litigation

Over at our sister blog, Business Law Prof Blog, Professor Ben Edwards has been making his way through my recent book, Mass Tort Deals: Backroom Bargaining in Multidistrict Litigation.  He does an excellent job of both summarizing and commentating on each chapter. So, if you just don't have the time to do a deep dive into a new book right now but want the quick and dirty takeaway alongside thoughtful, insightful commentary, here are the links to his posts so far:

Chapter 1 - Mass Tort Deal Making - on the nuts and bolts of class actions vs. multidistrict proceedings

Chapter 2 - Mass Tort Deals - on whether quid-pro-quo arrangements exist between lead plaintiffs' attorneys & defense lawyers 

Chapter 3 - Mass Tort Deals - on repeat player dynamics in aggregate litigation (leadership appointments, etc.)

Chapter 4 - Mass Tort Deals - on judges coercing facilitating mass tort settlements 

Chapter 5 - Mass Tort Deals - on the likeness between MDL deals and arbitration

Chapter 6, on reform proposals, will be coming next week.

If you're interested in all of the data and documents in the book, they are all available for free online. That site also has some data visuals that aren't in the book, like this one (clicking the image will bring up an interactive version):

 

Roundup Verdict Tracker

California State Court 

Johnson v. Monsanto,  compensatory: $39 million, punitive: $250 million.  Verdict reduced to $78 million, currently on appeal.

Pilliod v. Monsanto, compensatory: $55 million, punitive: $2 billion. 

 

Federal Court  

Hardeman v. Monsanto, Northern District of California, compensatory: $5 million, punitive: $75 million.  

 

MDL Data, Free & Searchable MDL Docs, MDL Rules, and a New Book on Mass Torts

For judges, lawyers, and even academics toiling away in the world of mass torts, getting a handle on the big picture can be tough.  I've seen many empirical claims made when it comes to the push for or against creating federal rules specific to mega-MDLs, all of which are mass torts.  Yet, most lack real, empirical data.

For the past six years, I've been collecting data on all of the products-liability proceedings that were pending on the MDL docket as of May 2013. (Yes, yes, I live a thrilling life.) Like a hoarder, I've squirreled away data on Lone Pine orders, Daubert motions, class-certification motions, plaintiff fact sheets, summary judgment motions, census orders, class action settlements, private aggregate settlements, and on and on and on. Those data-collection efforts have culminated in a book that is out today, Mass Tort Deals.  There is ton of information in the book's appendix on all of the information I just mentioned.  Here's a way to Download Index to Data.

One thing I noticed along the way was that neither Pacer nor Bloomberg Law allow you to search inside the text of MDL dockets, which can be long and unwieldy in and of themselves, as many of you know.  So, with the help of the wonderful UGA Law School IT department, I've created a free website that allows you to search the text of the thousands of MDL documents that I've been stockpiling for the past six years.  It includes all of the documents that I relied on for the book and I will continue to update it periodically.

The Book, Mass Tort Deals: Backroom Bargaining in Multidistrict Litigation:

As for the book, Mass Tort Deals marshals this wide array of empirical data to suggest that the systematic lack of checks and balances in our courts may benefit everyone but the plaintiffs. Multidistrict proceedings, which place a single judge in charge of similar lawsuits filed across the country, consume a substantial portion of the federal courts’ civil caseload.  As the figure below shows, many MDLs are product liability proceedings (for an interactive version, click here):

And if you consider not just the number of proceedings, but the number of actions pending in those proceedings, products-liability suits dominate (for an interactive version, click here): 

Of course, most of these product-liability proceedings are not run-of-the-mill disputes. Litigation over products like pelvic and hernia mesh, opioids, Johnson & Johnson’s baby powder, Roundup, and hip implants are headline-grabbing media magnets.

Federal judges certify a small handful of these proceedings (principally those without personal injuries)  as class actions, which affords them judicial safeguards. But as tort reform has made its way into civil procedure, it has effectively clamped down on class actions.  As you can see from the graphic below, most product-liability proceedings within my dataset ended in private, aggregate settlement (click here for an interactive version):

As readers of my work know, I've voiced some concerns with adequate representation and repeat players in MDLs. Judges and academics have long raised questions about arms-length bargaining and adequate representation in the class-action context, even though Rule 23 builds in some safeguards. In class actions, for example, judges have the authority to appoint class counsel; consider whether counsel adequately represents class members; ensure that any class settlement is fair, reasonable, and adequate; and award class counsel’s attorney’s fee.

But worries about collusion, self-interest, and overreaching don’t disappear just because mass litigation can’t be certified as a class action. Instead, we might worry more because the judge lacks any clear-cut authority to police the proceedings in the same way.

 

Those concerns can be exacerbated if repeat players exist leadership positions, which they do. The graph below shows who those players are and you can click here for an interactive version:

 

Some judges appoint more lead lawyers than others, as the graphic below illustrates (click here for an interactive version):

 

 

That repeat players exist isn’t surprising in and of itself. Attorneys specialize all the time. It might be that they use their expertise to generate better outcomes for their clients. But playing the long game may also mean that repeat players develop working relationships with their opponents such that each side can use private settlement to bargain for what matters to them most from a self-interested standpoint.

 

For corporate defendants and their lawyers, this means ending the litigation with the least cost. For lead plaintiffs’ lawyers, this typically means attorneys’ fees—specifically common-benefit fees (the fees they receive for the work they do on behalf of the group as a whole).  As Chapter 3 of Mass Tort Deals details, repeat-player attorneys are prevalent in leadership positions on both the plaintiff and defense side in products-liability multidistrict proceedings.  Here's a look at the major law firms involved in these proceedings on both sides (interactive version):

 

To the extent possible given that most of the mass-tort settlements were private, Chapter 2 examines the deals that these repeat players negotiated with one another. After confirming that one of the top five most connected repeat players participated directly in each settled proceeding’s leadership, I identify the provisions within those settlements that are arguably more beneficial to plaintiffs’ lead lawyers or to the defendants than to the actual plaintiffs.

 

How do these provisions work? To stymie the lawsuits against them, for example, defense corporations include settlement provisions designed to push as many plaintiffs as possible into the settlement program. These "closure" clauses might require plaintiffs’ lawyers to recommend that all their clients accept the settlement offer and, if the client refuses, take steps to withdraw from representing that client.

 

To enter a settlement program, plaintiffs must typically dismiss their lawsuit. But, as I explain in Chapter 5, those plaintiffs often don’t know what, if anything, they will receive under that program. So, plaintiffs may be giving up their lawsuit in exchange for no compensation whatsoever.

 

For example, in litigation over the acid-reflux medicine Propulsid, out of the 6,012 claimants who entered into the settlement program, only 37 received any money. The rest received nothing, but had already dismissed their lawsuit as a condition of entering into the program. Those 37 plaintiffs collectively received little more than $6.5 million.

 

The lead plaintiffs’ lawyers in Propulsid, however, negotiated their common-benefit fees directly with the defendant, Johnson & Johnson, and received $27 million. Much of the remaining funds then reverted back to Johnson & Johnson.

 

Lead plaintiffs’ lawyers in Propulsid announced that they were creating a template for all future deals. Chapter 2 of Mass Tort Deals shows that they did exactly that.

 

Considering settlements that occurred over a 14-year span, Chapter 2 shows that every deal contained at least one closure provision for defendants. Nearly all settlements also contained some provision that increased lead plaintiffs’ lawyers common-benefit fees. Bargaining for attorneys’ fees with one’s opponent is a troubling departure from traditional contingent-fee principles, which are designed to tie lawyers’ fees to their clients’ outcomes.

 

In short, Mass Tort Deals raises the concern that as repeat players influence practices and norms in mass torts, they may undermine plaintiffs’ ability to freely consent to the settlement. That may or may not affect the substantive outcome. Unfortunately, most of the data on how plaintiffs fared under settlement programs was not publicly available.

 

Rules for MDLs?

Given my qualms about what lawyers are doing (Chapter 2 and 3) and what judges are doing (Chapter 4), should we implement rules for MDL proceedings? Not necessarily. Our system needs a makeover, yes.  But Chapter 6 uses basic economic and social principles as the bedrock of reform.

I suggest ways in which we can build opportunities for dissent and competition into the fabric of multidistrict proceedings and incentivize lawyers to use them.

But doing so relies on judges. Educating judges and encouraging them to select leaders via a competitive process, tie leaders’ fees to the benefits they confer on plaintiffs, open the courthouse doors to hear about those benefits (or not) directly from the plaintiffs, and remand those litigants who don’t want to settle can allow the vibrant rivalries within the plaintiffs’ bar to see to it that dissent and competition flourish.

As attorneys object and compete, they are likely to divulge new information, thereby equipping judges with pieces of the puzzle that they currently lack. In short, Chapter 6 explains how arming judges with procedures that better align plaintiffs’ attorneys’ self-interest with their clients’ best interest equips courts to hold parties accountable even without legislation or rulemaking.

From diagnosis to reforms, my goal in Mass Tort Deals isn’t to eliminate these lawsuits; it’s to save them.

Hillel Bavli on the Logic of Comparable-Case Guidance in the Determination of Awards for Pain and Suffering and Punitive Damages

Hillel Bavli (Ph.D. Candidate in Statistics in Law & Governance, Harvard; Counsel, Boies, Schiller & Flexner LLP) has posted to SSRN his article, The Logic of Comparable-Case Guidance in the Determination of Awards for Pain and Suffering and Punitive Damages, U. Cin. L. Rev. (forthcoming 2016).  Here is the abstract:

Little guidance is provided to fact-finders in arriving at awards for pain and suffering and punitive damages. Such awards are therefore highly variable. This article explains why methods involving comparable-case guidance — information regarding awards in comparable cases as guidance for determining damage awards — are generally effective in reducing unpredictability and improving the reliability of awards for pain and suffering and punitive damages. The article addresses major objections to such methods, and provides relevant legal context and direction for implementation.

Appellate Court in NJ Upholds Verdict Against J&J

Alison Frankel at Reuters explains.  The opinion is here. 

GM Ignition Switch Litigation Bellwethers

Lance Cooper, a lawyer with ignition switch cases against GM, has made a motion to remove the MDL plaintiffs counsel in the ignition switch litigation.  You can find some coverage by Sara Randazzo & Mike Spector at the Wall Street Journal. (I haven't seen the motion). 

The first lawsuit to proceed to trial - of a total of six, three picked by plaintiffs, three by defendants - has ended with a dismissal with prejudice under a cloud of allegations of fraud.  What does this say about bellwethers?

I think it says nothing about the underlying cases, or not very much.  (It does tell you something about lawyer error, but that's a topic for another day).  However, the recent events at trial do show that the way bellwether trials are structured is deeply flawed.  If the cases tried are going to be meaningful, they should be randomly selected and the number of trials should be related to the variation in the underlying group of cases.  If there is a high variation, you will need more trials to tell you much about the underlying run of cases.  A number that is convenient (six, for example) is just that, convenient, but convenience should not be confused with meaningful.  Now a lot is riding on this case because one would imagine, since plaintiffs picked it and they only get three, its a really good case for plaintiffs.  So a skewed sample can tell you something - but what it ends up telling you is more about the lawyers than the underlying run of cases. 

To understand this, imagine you have a jar full of marbles.  If you know all the marbles are the same color, you can just pick one marble out of the jar to find out what the color of all the marbles is.  But if the marbles are of various colors picking one marble is not enough.  If you have a sense of the distribution of colors in the jar - say you know that there are some black and some red marbles - you can calculate how many marbles to pick out so that you will have a pretty good estimate of the proportion of red to black.   The same with cases.  If your cases are homogeneous, you can just try a few to get a sense of their value.  The more heterogeneity, the greater the number of cases that need to be tried.  This was the basis for Francis McGovern's idea of maturation of mass torts - you try lots of cases, and over time a value emerges.  It was also the basis for the structure of bellwether trials in the 9/11 First Responders' Litigation.  

Of course, its easy for me to say this. I am not running an MDL and I don't have to pay for all those trials, which are expensive. But that said, if you want to get a sample that could mean something, the sample size needs to be related to the variance of the underlying class and the method of selection needs to be random.  That's basic statistical methods.  I think that MDL judges need to partner with statisticians and have a serious conversation about what bellwether trials are trying to achieve and how best to do this.  Judges have a lot of discretion and they can use it wisely to lead to fair and equitable results for everyone. There are ways to do better, we just need to find them.  

David Logan on Judges, Juries, and the Politics of Tort Reform

Professor David Logan (Roger Williams) has posted to SSRN his article, Judges, Juries, and the Politics of Tort Reform, 83 U. Cin. L. Rev. 903 (2015).  Here's the abstract:

The civil justice system has many repeat players with a deep interest in the civil justice system because they are often the target of personal injury lawsuits, most prominently product manufacturers and physicians, and the companies that insure them. Following a blueprint drafted by leading corporate lawyer Lewis Powell, prior to his appointment to the Supreme Court of the United States, these deep pocket interests have spent four decades and tens of millions of dollars maligning the civil jury and trying, with notable success, to influence legislators, administrators, and judges, both state and federal, under the catchy, but misleading banner of “tort reform.” These campaigns have been amplified by media coverage of the civil justice system that has been unsophisticated, and at times misleading.

This article argues that separation of powers concerns counsel that we should be cautious about constricting the role of the jury, one of our most democratic institutions. Juries provide checks and balances on government; juries are independent; juries bring community values into the judicial system; juries are fair; juries legitimatize the civil justice system; and, juries generally “get it right.”

Instead of draconian reforms like damage caps, the article argues for the primacy of judges when adjustments to the civil justice system are called for. Judges bring legal experience and knowledge not shared by most legislators and administrators; the nature of the judicial process makes judges predictable and their work transparent; judges are far less likely to be “captured” by special interests than legislators and administrators; and state judges have the best perspective of how the civil justice system works and are thus in the best position to implement reforms when necessary.

The article concludes with a survey of various tools, some time-tested and others novel, by which judges can oversee the work of juries, and the civil justice system more generally.

 

John Beisner, Jessica Miller and Nina Rose on the Glazer Consumer Class Action Trial

John Beisner, Jessica Miller, and Nina Rose (all of Skadden) have posted a short analysis of the Glazer consumer class action trial as part of Skadden's 2015 Insights -- Global Litigation.

LSU Symposium on Multidistrict Litigation

Louisiana Law Review is hosting a symposium on Multidistrict Litigation this Friday, March 7, 2014, that focuses on remand and may be of interest to our readers.  The title of the symposium is "The Rest of the Story: Resolving Cases Remanded by MDL Here's the link for registration and additional information.

Here's the list of Panels and Panelists:

8:25-8:30: Welcome Address & Opening Remarks

• Chancellor Jack Weiss; LSU Law School

 8:30-9:30: Panel 1: Collaboration of Judges and Attorneys in MDL Case Management

The panel will discuss how attorneys and judges can successfully collaborate to use disaggregation as a tool of effective case management.

Moderator: Francis McGovern; Professor of Law, Duke Law School

• Judge Eldon Fallon; U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana
• Richard Arsenault; Neblett, Beard, & Arsenault
• James Irwin; Irwin Fritchie Urquhart & Moore, LLC

 9:40-10:40: Panel 2: Effectively Planning for Disaggregated Discovery

The panel will discuss when discovery issues should be disaggregated for separate resolution, and the costs, benefits, and challenges of reserving issues for separate discovery. 

Moderator: Judge Lee Rosenthal; U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas

• Mark Lanier; The Lanier Law Firm
• James Irwin; Irwin Fritchie Urquhart & Moore, LLC
• Dean Edward F. Sherman; Tulane University Law School

 10:50-11:50: Panel 3: Integrating Aggregated and Disaggregated Discovery Issues

The panel will discuss various kinds of discovery (e.g., E-Discovery, expert discovery, and specific discovery), and the strategic and case management challenges each method presents in the context of MDLs, including both aggregated and disaggregated discovery issues. 

Moderator: Mark Lanier, The Lanier Law Firm

• Judge Lee Rosenthal; U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas
• Francis McGovern; Professor of Law, Duke Law School
• Richard Arsenault; Neblett, Beard, & Arsenault
• David Jones; Beck Redden, LLP

 11:50-12:10: Lunch Break

12:10-1:10: Panel 4: (Lunch Presentation) The Real Story: FJC Data on What the Empirical Data on MDL Remands Shows

Federal Judicial Center researchers will present findings from their research on multidistrict litigation. The analysis will focus on two sets of cases: (1) cases that are considered for transfer but not transferred, and (2) cases that are transferred and that are subsequently remanded back to the transferor court. Understanding these cases, and the cases that are resolved in the transferee court, may provide some insight into the effects of aggregation on various kinds of cases

Moderator: Judge Lee Rosenthal; U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas

• Emery G. Lee, III, Federal Judicial Center
• Margaret Williams, Federal Judicial Center
• Catherine Borden, Federal Judicial Center

 1:20-2:20: Panel 5: When Remand is Appropriate

The panel will discuss at what stages plaintiffs, defendants, and judges perceive optimal windows to disaggregate various kinds of issues, and the factors that influence the decision and timing.

Moderator: Dean Edward F. Sherman, Tulane University Law School

• Judge Fallon; U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana
• Professor Elizabeth Burch, University of Georgia School of Law
• David Jones, Beck Redden, LLP

2:30-3:30: Panel 6: How Remand Should be Effectuated

The panel will discuss how judges and attorneys work together to effectuate remand of MDL cases, including methods for ensuring smooth transitioning of work product, case management, and expertise to state and federal judges upon remand. 

Moderator: Francis McGovern; Professor of Law, Duke Law School

• Judge Fallon; U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana
• Professor Teddy Rave, University of Houston
• Professor Elizabeth Burch, University of Georgia School of Law

 3:30-3:45: Closing Remarks

 

ECB

Ecuador high court affirms but cuts Chevron judgment

As the trial continues to unfold in New York in Chevron's RICO lawsuit against plaintiffs' lawyer Stephen Donziger -- amid accusations of judicial bribes, ghostwritten opinions, and sex scandals -- it is worth noting what happened in Ecuador this week.

On Tuesday, Ecuador's high court, the National Court of Justice, affirmed the underlying judgment against Chevron but reduced the amount from about $19 billion to $9.5 billion. The court eliminated the portion of damages that had been imposed as punishment for Chevron's failure to apologize. Here are news accounts from the Wall Street Journal and Reuters. Chevron's suit against Donziger contends that he engaged in fraud and other misconduct to obtain the massive judgment in the Lago Agrio environmental litigation.

HME

Cheng on Trial Sampling in Mass Torts

Edward Cheng (Vanderbilt) has posted his paper, "When 10 Trials are Better than 1000: An Evidentiary Perspective on Trial Sampling," on SSRN.  It's also available through Penn's website.  Here's the intro on Penn's website:

In many mass tort cases, individual trials are simply impractical. Take, for example, Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. v. Dukes, a class action employment discrimination suit that the Supreme Court reviewed last Term. With over 1.5 million women potentially involved in the litigation, the notion of holding individual trials is fanciful. Other recent examples of the phenomenon include the In re World Trade Center Disaster Site Litigation and the fraud litigation against light cigarette manufacturers, in which Judge Weinstein colorfully noted that any “individualized process . . . would have to continue beyond all lives in being.”

Faced with an unserviceable number of plaintiffs, courts have proposed sampling trials: rather than litigating every case, courts would litigate a small subset and award the remaining plaintiffs statistically determined amounts based on the results. But while sampling is standard statistical practice and often accepted as evidence in other legal contexts, appellate courts have balked— based on due process concerns—at the notion of court-mandated, binding trial sampling.

Despite this appellate reluctance, the controversy continues unabated. Trial courts have soldiered on by using nonbinding sampled trials (dubbed “bellwether trials”) to induce settlement, and a few brave appellate courts, including the Ninth Circuit in Dukes, have even hinted at an increased receptivity to sampling. Given that trial courts have few practical alternatives, one wonders if it is just a matter of time before their appellate brethren recognize the necessity of sampling.

And here's the SSRN abstract:

In many mass tort cases, separately trying all individual claims is impractical, and thus a number of trial courts and commentators have explored the use of statistical sampling as a way of efficiently processing claims. Most discussions on the topic, however, implicitly assume that sampling is a “second best” solution: individual trials are preferred for accuracy, and sampling only justified under extraordinary circumstances. This Essay explores whether this assumption is really true. While intuitively one might think that individual trials would be more accurate at estimating liability than extrapolating from a subset of cases, the Essay offers three ways in which the “second best” assumption can be wrong. Under the right conditions, sampling can actually produce more accurate outcomes than individualized adjudication. Specifically, sampling’s advantages in averaging (reducing variability), shrinkage (borrowing strength across cases), and information gathering (through nonrandom sampling), can result in some instances in which ten trials are better than a thousand.

ECB

The Upcoming Trial in the Deep Horizon Litigation

NPR has a story with lots of interesting quotes. My favorite:

"There's only one place where a waitress or a shrimper can be on equal footing with a company the size of BP, and that's a courtroom," says Rhon Jones, with the Montgomery, Ala., law firm Beasley Allen. Jones is part of the plaintiffs' steering committee, a group of lawyers coordinating the case.

The story raises a series of important questions about the purpose of litigation and settlement.  Is it best for society to funnel cases outside that system as in the BP and 9/11 cases? What is the use of a trial - to apportion liability? get to the truth? allocate damages? figure out difficult causation questions?  Are different plaintiffs to be treated differently - for example the waitress and the shrimper above as opposed to the attorneys general of the affected states?

Edited to add: I just saw the blog post by George Conk about the potential ineligibility of many plaintiffs who did not file claims with the compensation fund.  See here for more analysis.

ADL

Update on Bellwether Trials in Toyota Acceleration Cases

Today's Wall Street Journal Law Blog has an update on the state and federal Toyota acceleration cases.  California Superior Court Judge Anthony Mohr has penciled in bellwether trials to begin in April of 2012, but Judge Selna, who is presiding over the federal MDL, estimates that bellwether trials will not begin there until February 2013. Likewise, plaintiffs' attorneys litigating before Judge Robert Schaffer in Texas suspect that they too will not try a case until 2013.

ECB

Book on Vioxx by Snigdha Prakash

Snigdha Prakash has written an interesting book on the Vioxx litigation, "All the Justice Money Can Buy: Corporate Greed on Trial."  The book follows the early course of the Vioxx litigation and then turns its attention to the Humeston/Hermans trial, during which Prakash was embedded with Mark Lanier and his trial team.  Dramatic and well-written, and not shy about taking sides, the book is a great read and offers a rare inside look at the functioning of a trial team and the tensions that can arise among plaintiffs' lawyers in mass tort litigation.

HME

$322 Million Asbestos Verdict

Last Thursday, a jury in Smith County Mississippi awarded the largest asbestos verdict in United States history against Chevron Phillips Chemical and Union Carbide Corporation.  The award compensated Thomas "Tony" Brown, Jr. for future medical expenses, pain and suffering, and punitive damages.  Here's a link to the story from Laurel Leader-Call and the WSJ Law Blog story by Ashby Jones.

ECB

New York Jurors Find Merck Not Liable in Fosamax Bellwether Trial

Merck has won the second of three bellwether trials on Fosamax, Graves v. Merck & Co., 1:06-cv-05513 (S.D.N.Y.).  Judith Graves, a Florida resident, sued the company and alleged that Fosamax (an osteoporosis drug) caused her jawbone to deteriorate.  The jury asked the judge for the date of the first report from which Merck could have known of an association between Fosamax and jawbone problems and found that the report appeared six months after the plaintiff's problems started.  Accordingly, jurors might've decided that Merck couldn't have known about the risks in time to warn the plaintiff.

Merck faces more than 1,500 claims in federal and state courts alleging various defects in Fosamax.  So far it has won two of the three cases that have gone to a jury trial; the third awarded damages of $8 million to the plaintiff, which was reduced to $1.5 million.

The New York Times article on the trial is available here, and the Wall Street Journal article is available here.  TheStreet provides the most detailed coverage, which is available here.

ECB

Sept 11th First Responder Suits in Settlement Talks

The New York Times has published an article by Mireya Navarro entitled "Effort to Settle Sept. 11th Lawsuits".  The article describes (albeit without much detail) the efforts to settle the lawsuits brought by first responders against various contractors and New York City in the aftermath of the terrorist attack of September 11th.  Twelve cases have been scheduled to go to trial in May 16, ten thousand total have been brought against approximately 200 defendants.  Apparently there is a 70 page settlement plan and the judge says that the parties have been working "very hard."  The article also mentions a bill pending in Congress to compensate the workers at the disaster site, similar to that created to compensate the victims of the tragedy.  

The judge is using a relatively sophisticated approach to sampling, first surveying the class and using a severity chart to pick cases for trial.  The special masters that came up with it are both law professors and experts in mass torts: Aaron Twersky (Brooklyn) and James Henderson (Cornell).

The article quotes two law professor mass tort experts.  Anthony Sebok (Cardozo) explains the difficulty of the causation issues: "“There’s not a lot of experience with this kind of risk, [i]t may be very difficult from a technical point of view to get testimony from experts.”

Richard Nagareda (Vanderbilt) explains “Ultimately, everybody understands there’s going to be some sort of comprehensive settlement. The question is, what is the price?”  

I am working on a paper that attempts to answer this question - what is the best way to determine the price. I think holding some sample trials is the best way, but it sounds like the players in this litigation disagree and would prefer to reach a settlement prior to trial.  The judge is prepared for this and apparently has suggested having multiple judges try the sample cases rather than trying them together.

Impending trials have a way of focusing the mind. I predict a settlement by May. 

ADL

Florida Verdict Against Philip Morris

Earlier this week, a Florida jury returned a $300 million verdict in Lucinda Naugle's individual lawsuit against Philip Morris.  The jury awarded $56 million in compensatory damages plus $244 million in punitive damages. Here's a WSJ Health Blog post, as well as an editorial in today's NY Times urging that "There should be more lawsuits seeking not only monetary damages, but changes in how the tobacco industry markets its products."

The Naugle action is one of over 8000 post-Engle lawsuits in Florida. Engle was the massive statewide Florida class action against the tobacco industry that resulted in a 12-figure punitive damages verdict against the cigarette companies. When the Florida Supreme Court decertified the class in 2006, the classwide punitive damages verdict was lost, but the Florida Supreme Court held that the classwide factual findings would be given preclusive effect in subsequent individual trials. Thus, when Engle class members (Florida smokers) go to trial on cigarette claims, certain facts are already established without the need for new proof:  that nicotine is addictive, that cigarettes cause certain diseases, that the tobacco companies knew of certain dangers but failed to disclose that information, and so on. The post-Engle individual lawsuits began to reach trial this year, and so far they have mostly resulted in big wins for plaintiffs.

As I commented on this blog nine months ago, if the post-Engle plaintiffs continue to win at this rate, it may turn out that the Florida Supreme Court's decertification of the class action -- which at the time seemed like an important victory for the tobacco industry -- was an even greater victory for tobacco plaintiffs.

HME

Plaintiff Verdicts in Prempro Trials

In the hormone replacement therapy (HRT) litigation, plaintiffs won substantial verdicts in two trials in state court in Pennsylvania.  In the trial that concluded yesterday, the jury imposed punitive damages of $28 million on top of the $6.3 million in compensatory damages it had already awarded to plaintiff Donna Kendall.  In the other case, the court yesterday unsealed a punitive damages verdict of $75 million for plaintiff Connie Barton, who had been awarded $3.7 million in compensatory damages. When the Barton punitive verdict was reached in late October, the court took the unusual step of sealing the amount of punitives (see here and here) while the Kendall trial was pending.  Here's an excerpt from today's Philadelphia Inquirer article:

Pfizer Inc. has been hit with more than $100 million in two punitive-damage awards - one decided and the other unsealed yesterday - from Philadelphia juries.

Both cases involve Prempro, a hormone-replacement drug made by Wyeth, which recently was acquired by Pfizer. Plaintiffs said the drug was linked to their breast cancer.

The total includes $28 million awarded yesterday to Donna Kendall of Decatur, Ill.

In the second case, Philadelphia Common Pleas Court Judge Sandra Moss yesterday unsealed a verdict reached earlier this year that awarded $75 million in punitive damages to another Illinois resident, Connie Barton, over her Prempro-linked breast cancer. ...

About 1,500 of 10,000 similar cases are pending in Philadelphia, a common jurisdiction for large liability cases, attorneys say.

With the momentum in plaintiffs' favor and 10,000 cases remaining, one has to wonder whether Pfizer will seek some sort of global settlement.  We can't help comparing Pfizer's position to the position of Merck before it settled the Vioxx litigation.  After a similar but slightly higher number of trials, Merck abandoned its try-every-case-individually strategy and negotiated a mass aggregate settlement.  Merck, however, settled when it had a favorable trial record; so far the defendants have not prevailed in most of the HRT trials. 

HME