Defective Products Legal News Articles & Interviews

Grand Rapids, MI: Military veterans nationwide are hopeful that they can bring to court an injury you cannot see and prove why they cannot hear too well. More than 600 military service members have filed defective earplug lawsuits against 3M, the manufacturer.

Philadelphia, PA: The FDA has finally ordered the last two medical device companies selling transvaginal mesh products to pull them from the market. The agency said it is “committed to patient safety” but hundreds of thousands of women –victims of surgical mesh--would disagree. And the lawsuits are still pouring in.

Oakland, CA The jury in Pilliod v. Monsanto Co, the third Monsanto glyphosate lawsuit to go to trial, awarded Alva and Alberta Pilliod $55 Million in compensatory damages and a staggering $1 billion each (that’s $2 billion) in punitive damages for their Roundup-linked cancers. This is reportedly the largest award personal injury award this year and the eighth largest in US history. Although the punitive portion of the award will likely to be reduced under U.S. Supreme Court precedent, the trend in jury sentiment is clear.

Oakland, CA Pilliod v. Monsanto Co., the latest a Monsanto glyphosate lawsuit to go to trial, has focused squarely on the quality of the scientific evidence. Relying on expert testimony, counsel for Alberta and Alva Pilliod has accused Monsanto of outright fraud in securing regulatory approval for Roundup. Counsel for Monsanto has tried to undermine expert Charles Benbrook’s testimony by questioning his credentials.

Philadelphia, PA: Back in the late 1980s merchant mariners began filing asbestos mesothelioma lawsuits against ship owner and manufacturing defendants in the Northern District of Ohio. Most of the claims languished in the court system – until April 9, 2019 when a U.S. District Court Appeals for the Third Circuit reinstated two lawsuits filed by the estates of two merchant marines.

Boulder, CO: Nicole had over two dozen MRI’s with gadolinium contrast dye before she discovered the risks and side effects associated with this heavy metal – side effects the FDA has known of since at least 2007, when it slapped a black-box warning on all gadolinium-based contrast agents for MRI, detailing an increased risk of nephrogenic systemic fibrosis with kidney-disease patients.

San Francisco, CA On March 27, a jury in Hardeman v. Monsanto Co., a Monsanto glyphosate lawsuit awarded Edwin Hardeman more than $80 million. A third trial, Pilliod v. Monsanto Co. is well under way. Allegations have flown about untoward jury influence, and U.S. District Judge Vince Chhabria has begun to push the parties’ attorneys toward settlement. Things are now moving very fast in the world of Monsanto glyphosate lawsuits.

Industry, CA: Simon Chu and Charley Loh, part-owners and former executives of Chinese appliance manufacturer Gree Electric Appliances and a company that imported, distributed, and sold China-manufactured dehumidifiers to retailers, allegedly knew the dehumidifiers caught fire but failed to report and recall (too expensive) the defects for at least six months. According to the indictment, the two men “deliberately” withheld information about the defective dehumidifiers.

Tallahassee, FL: Shirley had abdominal mesh implanted following the resection of colon cancer. That was in 2008 and she has been in debilitating pain ever since. And taking Oxycodone to numb the crippling abdominal pain not only resulted in an addiction to opioids; she had to give up her job as a federal prison officer. Wait, it gets worse: her surgeon said all the mesh cannot be removed because it has eroded into her bowel.

San Antonio, TX On March 8, 2019, Joe William Contreras, along with 17 other service members filed a 3M Combat Arms defective earplug lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas. According to the Complaint, Contreras and the other plaintiffs suffer from hearing loss because 3M Company and its predecessor sold millions of dollars’ worth of Combat Arms earplugs to the military without disclosing design flaws that rendered the product useless.