Baum, Hedlund, Aristei & Goldman and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. have filed lawsuits on behalf of 136 plaintiffs from across the country who allege exposure to Monsanto's Roundup weed killer caused them to develop non-Hodgkin lymphoma.
Three bundled complaints were filed in 22nd Circuit Court St. Louis, Missouri under case numbers 1722-CC00796, 1722-CC00796 and 1722-CC00799.
The lawsuits seek compensatory and punitive damages for wrongful death and personal injuries against defendants Monsanto Co., Osborn & Barr Communications, Inc. and Osborn & Barr Holdings, Inc., all based in St. Louis, Missouri.
The first three counts are only against Monsanto: Strict Liability – Design Defect; Strict Liability – Failure to Warn; Negligence; Fraud, Misrepresentation and Suppression; Violation of the Consumer Fraud Acts and; Survival and Wrongful Death.
In 1970, Monsanto discovered the herbicidal properties of glyphosate and began marketing it in 1974 under the brand name Roundup®. Osborn & Barr Communications was responsible for marketing Roundup and related Monsanto products until approximately 2012.
In 2015, the World Health Organization's International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) concluded that glyphosate is a Group 2A herbicide, which means that it is probably carcinogenic to humans. The IARC report further concluded that the cancers most associated with glyphosate exposure are non-Hodgkin lymphoma and other hematopoietic cancers.
The lawsuits allege Monsanto continues to proclaim to the world that Roundup creates no risks to human health or to the environment. Moreover, the lawsuits allege that Monsanto championed falsified data and attacked legitimate studies that revealed Roundup's dangers in order to prove that Roundup is safe for human use, while also ghostwriting studies and leading a prolonged campaign of misinformation to convince government agencies, farmers, and the general population that Roundup was safe.
"Whenever you encounter large-scale environmental injuries of this kind, you see the subversion of democracy and the corruption of government agencies and public officials who are supposed to protect us," says environmental attorney RFK, Jr., who is working with Baum Hedlund on these cases. "This litigation makes clear that Monsanto's expertise in deploying these techniques is unparalleled."
More than 700 Roundup cancer claims have now been filed in state and federal courts. Most of the claims are filed in St. Louis City and in the multidistrict litigation (MDL 2741) in federal court in Northern California.
About Baum, Hedlund, Aristei & Goldman
Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and Baum Hedlund are co-counsel on the Monsanto Roundup litigation and are working together with many other environmental and plaintiff lawyers across the nation in representing individuals who claim that exposure to Roundup caused them to develop non-Hodgkin lymphoma. The judge overseeing the MDL appointed Baum Hedlund senior partner, Michael Baum, and five attorneys from other top tier law firms to serve on the Executive Committee for the recently consolidated federal Monsanto Roundup lawsuits.
Baum, Hedlund, Aristei & Goldman has successfully handled thousands of cases across the nation and secured over $1.5 billion in verdicts and settlements* on behalf of clients. With decades of experience handling personal injury and wrongful death cases, the firm has developed a reputation for holding Fortune 500 companies accountable, influencing public policy, raising public awareness and improving product safety.
Read more about the lawsuits here
*Past results are not a guarantee of future outcomes.
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