Latest news with #JohnDurnell
E&E News
2 days ago
- Health
- E&E News
Cancer patient urges SCOTUS not to dismiss Roundup verdicts
A Missouri man who developed non-Hodgkin lymphoma after using a popular weedkiller for decades wants the Supreme Court to reject the manufacturer's request to grant it immunity from his lawsuit and thousands of others. John Durnell in a brief filed Monday says a jury found that Monsanto's Roundup caused his blood cancer and that the company is liable for damages. But, he added, the company is arguing 'as it has argued with little success for years' that it should be immune from lawsuits that it says are barred by federal law. His filing comes after Bayer in April asked the high court to determine whether the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA) should invalidate thousands of lawsuits that claim the company has a duty to warn about health risks from the product. Advertisement Bayer acquired Monsanto in 2018, and the company has been inundated with what it says were 'unfounded' legal challenges across the country from customers alleging the weedkiller was responsible for their cancers.
Reuters
04-04-2025
- Business
- Reuters
Bayer renews bid for US Supreme Court to curb glyphosate cases
April 4 (Reuters) - Bayer ( opens new tab said on Friday it was again petitioning the U.S. Supreme Court to sharply limit legal claims that its Roundup weedkiller causes cancer, seeking to avoid potentially billions of dollars in damages. Bayer said in its petition, opens new tab that consumers should not be able to sue it under state law for failing to warn that Roundup increases cancer risk because the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has found no such risk and requires no such warning. In fact, it argued, federal law does not allow it to add any warning to the product beyond the EPA-approved label. here. The company tried to make that case to the Supreme Court and was rebuffed in 2022, but a federal appeals court has since agreed with the company in a split from other appeals courts. The Supreme Court is generally more likely to take cases where federal appeals courts are divided. A Supreme Court victory for Bayer would likely make it much more difficult for the lawsuits to continue, though it is not clear whether it would eliminate them entirely. Friday's petition came in the case of John Durnell, who in 2023 won a $1.25-million verdict in a St. Louis, Missouri state court. Bayer has been hit with much larger verdicts over Roundup, most recently a $2.1-billion award last month to a plaintiff in Georgia. The company has paid about $10 billion to settle claims that Roundup, based on the herbicide glyphosate, causes cancer. About 67,000 further cases are pending, for which the group has set aside $5.9 billion in legal provisions. CEO Bill Anderson has struggled to revive a share price that has plunged by more than 70% since Bayer's $63-billion acquisition of Monsanto in 2018 that saddled it with costly litigation and debt. The company's problems include the glyphosate litigation, a 2023 development setback for its most promising experimental medicine, weak agriculture markets and pressure from some investors to separate or sell businesses. Bayer plans to seek shareholder approval to raise equity capital worth close to 35% of its outstanding shares over the next three years to cover possible costs of U.S. litigation. The company has warned U.S. lawmakers it could stop selling Roundup, which is widely used by U.S. farmers, unless they can strengthen legal protection against the litigation. It has already replaced glyphosate with other ingredients in the home consumer version of Roundup.
Bloomberg
04-04-2025
- Business
- Bloomberg
Bayer Appeals Roundup Case to Supreme Court as Legal Woes Mount
Bayer AG said it's seeking a US Supreme Court review of litigation over the weedkiller Roundup, its latest effort to get beyond a mountain of legal woes. The German company asked the high court on Friday to take up its appeal of a 2023 verdict from a St. Louis trial in which a jury ordered Bayer to pay $1.25 million in compensatory damages to plaintiff John Durnell, according to a statement. No punitive damages were awarded in the case.
