WASHINGTON – The U.S. Supreme Courtroom on Tuesday declined to listen to Johnson & Johnson’s bid to overturn a $2.12 billion damages award to girls who blamed their ovarian most cancers on asbestos within the firm’s child powder and different talc merchandise.
The justices turned away a J&J attraction and left in place a Missouri state court docket ruling in litigation introduced by 22 girls whose claims have been heard collectively in a single trial.
The Missouri Courtroom of Appeals, an intermediate state appellate court docket, final 12 months dominated towards J&J’s bid to throw out the compensatory and punitive damages awarded to the plaintiffs however lowered the overall to $2.12 billion from the $4.69 billion initially determined by a jury.
J&J, which is able to make a fee of $2.5 billion this month together with accrued curiosity, stated in an announcement that there are unresolved authorized points that can proceed to be litigated. It beforehand has stated it faces greater than 19,000 related claims.
“The issues that have been earlier than the court docket are associated to authorized process, and never security. Many years of impartial scientific evaluations affirm Johnson’s Child Powder is secure, doesn’t comprise asbestos, and doesn’t trigger most cancers,” the corporate stated.
J&J shares have been down about 1.2% at $167.23.
J&J has argued {that a} resolution by a Missouri circuit court docket decide to consolidate disparate child powder-related claims from the plaintiffs – together with 17 girls from outdoors the state – for a trial earlier than a single jury violated the New Brunswick, New Jersey-based firm’s due course of rights below the U.S. Structure. J&J additionally has argued that the scale of the jury’s damages award violated its due course of rights.
The Missouri Supreme Courtroom, the state’s highest court docket, in November declined to listen to J&J’s attraction of the Missouri Courtroom of Appeals ruling, prompting the corporate to attraction to the U.S. Supreme Courtroom.
“This was a victory not only for the superb girls and their households who we have been privileged to signify, however a victory for justice,” stated Mark Lanier, a lawyer for the plaintiffs.
DISPUTE OVER JURISDICTION
The plaintiffs, 9 of whom have died and are actually represented by their estates, have argued that Missouri courts have jurisdiction over out-of-state claims like these introduced on this litigation. One of many merchandise that the out-of-state plaintiffs stated they’d used was manufactured in Missouri.
Legal professionals for the plaintiffs even have argued that the big punitive damages awarded by the jury on this case have been justified by J&J’s conduct. Legal professionals for the plaintiffs stated in court docket papers it’s common observe for courts to consolidate circumstances at trial when the details in every declare are primarily the identical.
The Missouri Courtroom of Appeals concluded that it was cheap to deduce from the proof that J&J “disregarded the protection of shoppers” in its drive for revenue regardless of understanding its talc merchandise induced ovarian most cancers. It additionally discovered “vital reprehensibility” in J&J’s conduct.
Along with lowering the damages, the Missouri Courtroom of Appeals dismissed two of the 17 out-of-state plaintiffs.
In court docket papers, J&J stated the case adopted a “profitable components” devised by plaintiffs’ attorneys of bringing claims in jurisdictions the place they will get dozens of out-of-state plaintiffs to testify in a single trial, prejudicing the jury and leading to “outsized” damages awards.
Within the Missouri trial, the corporate stated, the jury awarded every plaintiff an an identical punitive damages award of $25 million, whatever the details particular to every plaintiff or whether or not they have been alive or lifeless. The corporate additionally stated the jury awarded punitive damages a lot bigger than the “already staggering” compensatory damages, which J&J has referred to as an additional violation of its due course of rights.
Justice Samuel Alito didn’t take part within the Supreme Courtroom’s resolution to not hear the attraction, probably as a result of he owns J&J inventory. Justice Brett Kavanaugh, whose father – now retired – was a longtime lobbyist for the toiletries trade, additionally didn’t participate. The justices don’t clarify why they step apart in sure circumstances.
A 2018 Reuters investigation https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/johnsonandjohnson-cancer discovered that J&J knew for many years that asbestos, a carcinogen, was current in its talc merchandise. Inside firm information, trial testimony and different proof confirmed that from no less than 1971 to the early 2000s, J&J’s uncooked talc and completed powders typically examined constructive for small quantities of asbestos.
The corporate stated in Could 2020 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-johnson-johnson-babypowder/johnson-johnson-to-stop-selling-talc-baby-powder-in-u-s-and-canada-idUSKBN22V32U it could cease promoting its child powder talc in america and Canada, citing adjustments in shopper habits and what it referred to as “misinformation” in regards to the product’s security amid quite a few authorized challenges.
(Reporting by Lawrence Hurley; Extra reporting by Manojna Maddipatla and Mrinalika Roy; Modifying by Will Dunham and Anil D’Silva)