Bottles of Johnson & Johnson baby powder line a drugstore shelf in New York. -Reuters
Johnson & Johnson is seizing upon a U.S. Supreme Court ruling from Monday limiting where injury lawsuits can be filed to fight off claims it failed to warn women that talcum powder could cause ovarian cancer. New Jersey-based J&J has been battling a series of lawsuits over its talc-based products, including Johnso-n's Baby Powder, brought by around 5,950 women and their families.
The company denies any link between talc and cancer. A fifth of the plaintiffs have cases pending in state court in St. Louis, where juries in four trials have hit J&J and a talc supplier with $307 million in verdicts. Those four cases and most of the others on the St. Louis docket involve out-of-state plaintiffs suing an out-of-state company.
On Monday, the Supreme Court ruled 8-1 in a case involving Bristol-Myers Squibb Co that state courts cannot hear claims against companies that are not based in the state when the alleged injuries did not occur there. The ruling immediately led a St.
Louis judge at J&J's urging to declare a mistrial in the latest talc case, in which two of the three women at issue were from out of state. It also could imperil prior verdicts and cases that have yet to go to trial. "We believe the recent US Supreme Court ruling on the Bristol-Myers Squibb matter requires reversal of the talc cases that are currently under appeal in St. Louis," J&J said in a statement.
The question of where such lawsuits can be filed has been the subject of fierce debate. The business community has argued plaintiffs should not be allowed to shop around for the most favorable court to bring lawsuits, while injured parties claim corporations are trying to deny them access to justice.
Along with talc cases, large-scale litigation alleging injuries from Bayer AG's Essure birth control device in Missouri and California and GlaxoSmithKline's antidepressant Paxil in California and Illinois are examples of other cases where defendants could utilize the Supreme Court decision.
-Reuters
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