Ovarian cancer
injuries are not the only injury of which plaintiffs have filed against Johnson
& Johnson concerning their talcum based powder, generally known as baby
powder. Earlier this month, a California jury on Thursday sided with Johnson
& Johnson and its talc supplier of any liability for a woman’s
terminal mesothelioma, an asbestos-related cancer, holding that there was
no evidence that the companies’ talcum powder was unsafe.
The jury deliberated for nearly two days after
an almost four-week trial. The jury found that J&J did not negligently design
or sell its talc, that the talc did not fail to perform as safely as a
reasonable consumer would have expected, that the talc was not defective, and
that J&J did not fail to warn of any potential risks, "known or
knowable based on general scientific knowledge at time of sale."
Most of the cases we
have seen so far involve claims that the talcum-based powder causes ovarian
cancer. In one of those cases, a Missouri state judge
upheld a jury’s $110 million verdict against Johnson & Johnson for selling
ovarian cancer-causing products, saying the conduct on which the claims are
based occurred in Missouri even though the woman who brought them is from
Virginia.
Since J&J used a
Missouri-based company, Pharma Tech, to "manufacture, mislabel and
package" the talc products at issue, Judge Rex M. Burlison found that the verdict
for the plaintiff was within the jurisdictional standards laid out by the U.S.
Supreme Court in its June decision in Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. v. Superior
Court of California. This finding means that non-Missouri plaintiffs may
continue pursuing their cases in Missouri, which has been home to a large
amount of talc litigation in recent years.
Booth Samuels and the
attorneys at Pittman, Dutton & Hellums, P.C. are currently accepting talc-injury
cases. If you or someone you love is a female that regularly used J&J Baby
Powder or Shower to Shower and, since the year 2000, have been diagnosed with ovarian
cancer, please contact Booth Samuels at 1-866-515-8880 or by email at booths@pittmandutton.com for a free
consultation.
