Class Action

A news story on the latimes.com website reported that the California attorney general’s office has settled a toxic tort lawsuit with Toys R Us, Kmart, and Target. They were found to be guilty of selling toys with high levels of lead, exposure to which can be dangerous especially in young children whose nervous systems are developing. The attorney general’s office and the Los Angeles city attorney filed a laws [...]

A Philadelphia jury awarded $2.5 million to a woman from Bensalem. The jury found that Paxil had caused heart problems in her 3-year-old son who required several surgeries after his birth to fix his heart. They ruled out additional punitive damages. The case was the first of about 600 lawsuits to go to trial on claims that the GlaxoSmithKline’s Paxil antidepressant caused birth defects in children whose mothers [...]

According to an article on Philly.com, a $4.85 billion fund was set up so that Merck & Co. Inc. can compensate kin of those who died of heart attacks or strokes. The claims are from the families of more than 3,100 users of its Vioxx painkiller who died of heart attacks or strokes because of the drug. The fund will pay about 3,000 claims for heart-attack deaths and at least 122 for strokes. Merck launched Vioxx i [...]

On September 15, an attorney told a Philadelphia jury that GlaxoSmithKline P.L.C. ignored evidence for years that its antidepressant Paxil may have caused birth defects. According to an article in The Philadelphia Inquirer, this attorney represents a woman who says that taking the drug during her pregnancy caused her three year-old son’s heart problems. The Bucks County resident, a former cheerleader for the Ph [...]

The Ford Motor Co. has settled a lawsuit filed by residents of a northern New Jersey town over toxic waste dumped there nearly 40 years ago. According to an article, the settlement was announced in state Superior Court. The residents of Ringwood, about 25 miles northeast of New York City, will receive about $10 million. An attorney for the Plaintiffs alleged that they had been injured by exposure to toxic chemical [...]

A patient sued a New Jersey oncologist who health officials suspect was responsible for a hepatitis B outbreak this year. According to this article by the Associated Press on Philly.com, one man from Manchester, NJ said he contracted the disease after being treated for prostate cancer at the office of suspected doctor this year and last year. The affected man sued the doctor for medical malpractice in a state cou [...]

John Parkhurst, a single father of Capitol Hill, is suing the D.C. Water and Sewer Authority (WASA) for $200 million. He claims lead-contaminated tap water poisoned his twin sons as infants, causing them ongoing health problems. According to this article by the Associated Press that appeared on Philly.com, Parkhust claims that the water utility hid elevated levels of lead from customers and federal authorities bet [...]

Jim Sullivan III, a Gloucester County, NJ real estate broker who acquired a contaminated building and rented it out as a day-care center says he did not believe an environmental cleanup was necessary. According to this report in the Philadelphia Inquirer, he did not tell Kiddie Kollege Day Care operators that the building was once a thermometer factory with a history of mercury spills and vapors. The statements a [...]