3M, DuPont notch 'forever chemicals' court win
3M (MMM), DuPont (DD), and other companies were delivered a win in the ongoing legal battles over PFAS, which are commonly known as "forever chemicals." The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals rejected certification of a class-action claim that could have included nearly every Ohio resident. The court argued the complaint was too broad and instructed a lower court to dismiss the case. Yahoo Finance's Legal Reporter Alexis Keenan joins the Live show to break down the court case and the decision from the judges.
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Video Transcript
AKIKO FUJITA: Well, 3M and DuPont got a big win in what plaintiffs hoped would be a class action lawsuit over the companies so-called forever chemicals. A US appeals court rejected a lower court's ruling, which would have allowed nearly 12 million residents in Ohio the ability to sue. Yahoo Finance's Alexis Keenan joins us with the details. Alexis.
ALEXIS KEENAN: Hi, Akiko. Yes, this would have been just a monster class action had it been allowed to go forward. The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals here saying that they reject certification of this class. It would have included basically all of the residents in the state of Ohio. You mentioned there about 12 million people.
Now, the court said here-- it's a three-judge panel. They said that the lead plaintiff, and therefore the rest of the claimants, the plaintiffs as well here, that they didn't show that 3M, DuPont, and other PFAS manufacturers, who were named as defendants, caused their blood to be contaminated with these chemicals, that they didn't know what company it was, that they couldn't attribute one company to that exposure, and also didn't have any current illness that they could point to.
So a big win here for those defendants because a class of this size would really set a precedent for these cases to proliferate across the country. Now, what is PFAS? Let's talk about that. These are five similar types of chemical compounds. They're called forever chemicals because of their near inability to decompose.
They're used in products from fabrics to cookware when you think about Teflon cookware. And they're now found in the blood of nearly every single American as well as in marine life. They are linked to cancers. They're linked to thyroid disease, fetal development problems, liver damage, just to name a few there.
Now, I wanna also show you a map of the EPA's accounting of PFAS contamination and waterways and other locations across the country. As of August, you have 3,186 confirmed sites that includes, like I said, drinking water.
But, look, this litigation is not new. If you go back to August of last year, there had been already 6,400-plus cases filed in federal courts across the country, most of those against DuPont and its subsidiaries, though 3M has also emerged as a major target.
These cases, though, just the tip of the iceberg probably despite this judgment reached in the Sixth Circuit. Although it's a win for these defendants, there are expected to be a mountain of-- mountains of litigation to continue as we go forward.
RACHELLE AKUFFO: And Alexis, there have been some settlements reached. Can you tell us about those?
ALEXIS KEENAN: Yeah. So just in September of this year, 3M was a big one. They agreed to a $12.5 billion settlement that also included DuPont and its subsidiaries to the tune of about $1 billion and change. That was reached with 19 public waterways arguing that the PFAS chemicals contaminated the drinking water across the country. Also with 22 states, they were included as well.
But legal experts, they do caution here that these claims are really in their infancy at this standpoint. They do predict that these costs will potentially eclipse that of the huge 1998 settlement with Big Tobacco, the four major tobacco producers, and 50 states. They came in 1998 to an agreement, a settlement of $206 billion, ladies.
