On September 19, 2022, oral argument was held before the Third Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia during which attorneys for talc injury victims urged the Court to allow their clients to pursue their claims against Johnson & Johnson maintaining their...
Social Media Addiction Lawsuits Consolidation Update
On August 20, 2022, Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, asked the Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation (JPML) to consolidate a number of social media addiction lawsuits filed by plaintiffs who have targeted the company, alleging they have...
Judge Rules Earplug Litigation Cases Will Proceed Despite Aearo Technologies’ Bankruptcy
On August 26, Judge Jeffrey J. Graham of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of Indiana ruled that the bankruptcy of 3M’s subsidiary Aearo Technologies did not halt the earplug litigation cases pending against the parent company, and denied Aearo’s...
JPML Consolidates Gardasil Vaccine Claims Before District Court Judge
On August 4, 2022, the U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation (JPML) consolidated claims related to the use of the Gardasil vaccine before Judge Robert J. Conrad, Jr. of the U.S. District Court for the Western District of North Carolina. Manufactured by Merck...
Judge Raises Concerns about 3M Placing Aearo Technologies in Bankruptcy
At a July 27 hearing in Pensacola, FL, U.S. District Court Judge M. Casey Rodgers expressed concerns regarding 3M’s decision to resolve the more than 230,000 lawsuits pending against it by putting its Aearo Technologies division into bankruptcy, in what appears to be...
Potential Consolidation of 27 Exatech Implant Device Liner Litigation Cases into MDL Proceeding
Exactech, a manufacturer of knee, ankle and hip implant devices, has issued a series of product recalls that have resulted in a number of lawsuits being filed. In June 2021, the company wrote to healthcare professionals, notifying them of concerns it had with the...
Health Care Data Breach Class Action Lawsuits Filed in Federal Court
Data breach class action lawsuits involving two health care organizations have sparked new filings in federal court. There are currently 11 cases filed in federal courts in California and Washington against MCG Health, LLC (MCG). A separate hacking incident against...
Litigation Update: Logan Health Medical Center Data Breach Causes Filing of Class Action
On February 22, 2022, patients of Logan Health Medical Center (formerly Kalispell Regional Healthcare) were notified that some of their personal information may have been subject to a hack on November 18, 2021. The medical center became aware of the breach on November...
Litigation Update: FTC Announces Settlement Finalization on 2017 Equifax Data Breach Claims
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) announced that in January 2022 it had finalized a settlement in the 2017 data breach involving the credit reporting company, Equifax. The data breach that exposed the personal information of approximately 147 million people was,...
Litigation Update: T-Mobile Attempts to Use Arbitration Clauses to Limit Data Breach MDL Class
In an effort to limit the number of potential class members in the T-Mobile data breach multi-district litigation, lawyers for T-Mobile USA, Inc. have taken the position that “a significant portion of this class is bound by arbitration agreements that would preclude...