Personal Injury Law Podcast by Rosenfeld Injury Lawyers

In May 2021 a Federal Court jury awarded three plaintiffs 7.1 million in compensation for their hearing loss related to the defective earplugs after a five week trial. The award was composed of $830,500 in compensatory damages and $2.1 million in punitive damages for each plaintiff.

The basis of the claims were focused on the fact that 3M knew or should have known that the earplugs they distributed to military members between 2007 and 2013 were defective and provided inadequate hearing protection. This is the first of several 'bellwether' trials in the pending 3,349 pending lawsuit that have been filed against 3M.

Data shows that many U.S. veterans have hearing loss related to defective earplugs. Reuters reports that more than one million veterans have filed for disability related to complications from various types of hearing loss and deafness.

If you think you may qualify for a case, now is the time to talk to an attorney who can evaluate your legal rights and options. Talk to our legal team today for a free consultation.

Read the Transcript here: https://www.rosenfeldinjurylawyers.com/news/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/JR-3M-Full.pdf

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In this episode Jonathan Rosenfeld chats with Martin D. Gould an Attorney at Romanucci & Blandin, LLC. Here, they discuss:

Zantac Lawsuit Update 2021

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Jonathan Rosenfeld:

Hello. I am Jonathan Rosenfeld, and today I am joined by my colleague Marty Gould, and we are going to talk about the Zantac litigation. Marty, first off, thank you for joining me today. I appreciate it.

Marty Gould:

Thanks for having me on, Jon.

Jonathan Rosenfeld:

Marty, to begin with I want to talk about Zantac lawsuits in 2021. I'd like you to bring us up to date in terms of what the status of the Zantac litigation is. Lots of cases have been filed, lots of news headlines, but can you bring us up to date in terms of where the litigation stands as of today in 2021?

Marty Gould:

Sure. Thanks for having me on, Jon. In terms of where we're at with the Zantac cases, hundreds and hundreds of cases have been filed across the country, thousands of cases. They've been consolidated into a multi-district litigation in Florida, in the Southern District of Florida. This is done for efficiency purposes so that the discovery in the case can be performed at the same time and you don't have different rulings in hundreds of different courts. Each case is still an individual case because everybody's injuries and exposures are different, but this stage of the case is all being done at the same time. We can expect some of the first trials, what's called bellwether trials, to go at the end of 2022, that's that's the hope. And that will give us a good assessment of what's going to happen with this litigation.

Jonathan Rosenfeld:

So one of the things that is related to every single type of civil action is the statute of limitations, the time that you have to file a lawsuit. How does the statute of limitations come into play with respect to Zantac lawsuits? In other words, if someone's watching this and they think they may have a potential case, and they're asking you, how long do I have to file a case? How would you respond to that?

Marty Gould:

Well the first question I would ask is, in what State did you take Zantac? So one of the most important things is for a client, or potential client, to immediately call a lawyer and have them assess their case, because the statute of limitations that would apply would be the one, typically, where the exposure happened, so where the client was buying the Zantac, taking it. And that State's statute of limitations for personal injury cases, for product liability cases, would apply. So that's why it's very important for somebody who may have a case to immediately call a lawyer experienced in this type of case, and find out when your statute of limitations is.

Jonathan Rosenfeld:

In terms of civil cases, everything ultimately comes down to one thing, it's really about getting compensation, getting financial compensation for your particular injury, for your particular situation. In terms of the Zantac cases, a lot of times people are asking, is there a set payout for a Zantac lawsuit? What is the average settlement for a Zantac case? We know that these cases are still really much in their infancy as far as the litigation goes, but can you give us an idea as to the elements of damages in these cases, and how they may be valued?

Marty Gould:

So, like you mentioned, we're still in ?he earlier stages of the case, there's no cases that have settled yet. Every case is going to be different, the value of the case is going to be contingent on the individual diagnosis, the treatment, and the experience of that person. These are people who have cancer, many of them are undergoing chemotherapy, invasive surgeries. Some people have lost loved ones, these are catastrophic injuries. So in a personal injury case like this, you can pursue compensation for physical and emotional, pain and suffering, lost wages, lost earning capacity. If you lost a loved one, loss of society, loss of support, emotional distress. These are all things that you can legally seek compensation for, and everybody's case is going to be a little bit different based off their experiences, but these are very serious cases, and they're being treated as very serious cases.

Jonathan Rosenfeld:

So potentially, people could be looking at substantial damages just in terms of their past and future medical care alone, in some of these situations, correct?

Marty Gould:

Exactly. And you can get the past medical expenses, which can be significant in a cancer case, future medical care, monitoring of somebody's cancer in those cases where someone, hopefully, has survived and is in remission. And at the end of the day, we're alleging that lives were lost, families were ruined, these are very serious and catastrophic injuries, and that's the way these cases should be treated.

Jonathan Rosenfeld:

Now, one of the things that people also look at, and when I say people look at, a lot of times you can see what is trending on the internet, but one of things that comes up periodically is, has anyone won a Zantac lawsuit as of today, as of August 2021? I think you mentioned earlier that these cases are really early on in terms of their litigation, but if someone's looking and saying, hey, has anyone won a Zantac lawsuit, the short answer is, what?

Marty Gould:

The short answer, Jon, is no. Nobody has tried these cases yet. The discovery is still ongoing, there's a lot being done right now. The goal is to have trials go in 2022. The expectation is probably toward the end of the year, there's much that has to be done before that. And those will be the bellwether cases, those first cases going to trial, which will be critical and important in terms of assessing what's going to happen with this litigation.

Jonathan Rosenfeld:

In terms of who can file a Zantac lawsuit, who would qualify to file a lawsuit against the manufacturer of Zantac under the guidelines that we're using as of today? Is it the individual? Is it the family? Is it both? Can you give us an idea as to who may qualify to bring a case?

Marty Gould:

Sure. So in terms of who may bring the case, typically it would be the person who took the Zantac and has cancer. If it's a situation where, tragically, that person has already died, the family can bring the case on behalf of that loved one, so they would bring the case as the administrators of the estate of the family member who is now deceased. The criteria that we're looking at is, did the individual take Zantac on a daily or regular basis for at least six months, and after taking Zantac, were you diagnosed with any of the following cancers? And these are cancers that are most closely associated with links to NDMA and the gastrointestinal system which the drug was impacting. Those cancers are stomach and gastric cancer, intestinal cancer, bladder cancer, esophageal cancer, liver cancer, pancreatic cancer, and breast cancer. But every case is different, so that's why it's very important to speak to a lawyer who can tell you whether or not you meet that criteria.

Jonathan Rosenfeld:

If someone's watching this video and they're saying to themselves, "You know what? I may have one of those conditions. I did take Zantac for a long period of time, but I don't have that product with me anymore. I either stopped taking it, I threw out." How does someone prove that they took Zantac at some point in their lives?

Marty Gould:

Step one is we always ask the potential client, do you have the Zantac box at your house? If you do, you want to preserve it, that's something that we're going to want to hold on to. That aside, there's many different ways where we can prove that you took Zantac. If there's any receipts from purchases, from like a Walgreens or CVS or any other drug store, medical records, sometimes there's going to be references to the fact that you were taking Zantac, or you might've been prescribed Zantac from your doctor, and that certainly will be in the record. Local pharmacy records, oftentimes people had rewards programs, rewards cards, where their name and their entire history of the drugs that they purchased at the store are documented.

Marty Gould:

And even in cases where you don't have any of that, this is something that could have been purchased over the counter, the testimony of the witness or family members, that's also evidence. We get an affidavit from you, or if you take a deposition and you say that you are purchasing Zantac, that's evidence in the case, or if you have a family member who can attest to that.

Jonathan Rosenfeld:

So bottom line is, don't let the lack of immediate physical evidence dissuade you from bringing a po

In this episode Jonathan Rosenfeld chats with Bryce Hensley an Attorney at Romanucci & Blandin, LLC Here, they discuss:

Roundup Lawsuit Update 2021

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Jonathan Rosenfeld:

Hello everybody. I am Jonathan Rosenfeld. And today I am joined by attorney Bryce Hensley, and we are going to talk about the Roundup litigation, the 2021 updates with respect to the Roundup Weed Killer litigation. Bryce, thanks for joining me today.

Bryce Hensley:

Thanks for having me, John.

Jonathan Rosenfeld:

Now, Bryce, one of the largest emerging trends in mass torts in the past several years involves Roundup Weed Killer, and specifically the correlation between non-Hodgkin's lymphoma and use of Roundup. Bryce, many people have contacted our office in relation to these cases and one of the ongoing things they ask is really what is the status of these cases? People have been watching the news, they see a lot of headlines, but can you sort of bring this up to date with the status of the Roundup cases in 2021.

Bryce Hensley:

Right now the status of the Roundup litigation is there have been cases pending for over five years in various courts across the country, those include California, St. Louis, here in Chicago and various other states. There've been three trials that have proceeded in California that resulted in such decisive victories for Roundup users against the manufacturers that those companies, which is Monsanto and Bayer, the company that purchased Monsanto, has set aside billions of dollars for Roundup users to settle their claims, which typically involve non-Hodgkin's lymphoma or various subsets of that type of cancer.

Jonathan Rosenfeld:

So at this point, one of the followups that we're seeing with a lot of these potential clients is they're reading these news headlines that Bayer has set aside billions of dollars to resolve these cases. And obviously if you have a potential case, one of the followup questions that a lot of people are asking is really what is the settlement amounts per person when it comes to the Roundup lawsuit. Everything is ultimately about dollars and cents here and if someone's looking at this and saying, hey, Bayer, put aside all this money, how does that translate into what I'm going to get?

Jonathan Rosenfeld:

What is my piece of the pie? How would you respond to that? And what type of monetary recovery are we looking at here possibly?

Bryce Hensley:

Well, if you have been diagnosed with a form of cancer and you've used Roundup in the past, my first recommendation would be to reach out to an attorney, an attorney experienced in handling these types of cases. Our office has handled over dozens of cases, and we've also settled a case involving Roundup exposure. Each case is different though. And so the settlement values are really going to depend on a number of things, which include your diagnosis, the amount of Roundup you used, the extent of the treatment you received, the type of the treatment you received, your age and a number of other factors that may increase or decrease the value of your potential settlement.

Jonathan Rosenfeld:

Bryce, one of the things that I want to also ask you as sort of a follow up here is you mentioned that these cases have been going on now for years. In terms of the time to file a lawsuit and the time to file a Roundup lawsuit, ultimately everything is governed by a statute of limitations, a time requirement that you have to file a lawsuit. How are you looking at the statute of limitations with respect to potential Roundup cases?

Bryce Hensley:

John, that's a great question. There is still time to bring Roundup lawsuits, but there's two important things that have to be taken into consideration as to why people should move forward and call an attorney immediately. The first you already referenced, which is the statute of limitations. Every state in the United States has what's called a statute of limitations. That's a time period that governs the amount of time where you can actually file a lawsuit and move forward. Now that varies from state to state, and it's important to reach out to an attorney who has knowledge of various state statute of limitations.

Bryce Hensley:

What also may come into play there is when you first found out about the potential connection between Roundup and your cancer diagnosis. And a second important reason why it's important to reach out to an attorney immediately is because while these companies have set aside billions of dollars, there are also tens of thousands of individuals who have filed claims or filed lawsuits or are currently pending around the country. So it's important to reach out immediately before that money gets dispersed to other people.

Jonathan Rosenfeld:

Who qualifies to bring around a case? A lot of times people may be watching these videos and they may be saying to themselves, hey, I may not have a diagnosis of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma or a different type of cancer, but my family member is. Who qualifies under the guise, the parameters of the Roundup litigation to file a lawsuit?

Bryce Hensley:

Anybody who had exposure to Roundup could qualify for a potential settlement. These could be landscapers. These could be farmers, or these could be individuals using Roundup around their homes. Now whether or not you qualify also depends on the type of cancer diagnosis that you have. Roundup settlements typically resolve when an individual has exposure to the product and was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma or one of its subsets. Now whether or not an individual qualifies is ultimately going to depend on their diagnosis and then the value of that claim is going to depend on a number of things, including the type of diagnosis, the age that an individual was diagnosed.

Bryce Hensley:

It's going to depend on their Roundup, use the type of Roundup use that they had, and it's going to depend on a number of other risk factors that ultimately are used to determine the value of the case.

Jonathan Rosenfeld:

So the bottom line is if you think you have a potential Roundup case, now is the time to really take action and really contact an attorney. If you've been sitting on the sidelines watching this play out, now is really the time to act. Bryce, I want to ask you, can you give us an idea of the volume of cases that have been filed, the volume of Roundup lawsuits that have been filed?

Bryce Hensley:

Right now, there are tens of thousands of lawsuits involving Roundup of exposure pending around the country. In fact, it's believed that the number may even exceed 100,000 cases. Our office is handling many of these cases all over the country in various states, and we're currently evaluating settlement opportunities in those cases. But because there's so many cases, it's important that you reach out to an attorney immediately. While all these companies have set aside billions of dollars to settle Roundup claims, there are thousands of people out there and that money can disappear pretty fast.

Jonathan Rosenfeld:

Now, if someone's watching this video and they're saying to themselves, well, I think I have a case. I've got a diagnosis of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. I may have lived in an agricultural area when I was younger. I may have used Roundup. But you know what, I mean, that was three houses ago. I don't have the product anymore. What would you tell those people about, how you would essentially show the evidence that you would use to show that they actually used and were exposed to Roundup if they don't have the product anymore?

Bryce Hensley:

Well, John, that's a great question. There are a lot of people out there who no longer have any proof of their Roundup use. They may have thrown out the Roundup. They may have tossed out the receipts. They may have never gotten the receipts in the first place. But in the Roundup litigation, what many individuals have done is they filled out what are called affidavits or sworn statements attesting their Roundup use, or they may have a family member fill out an affidavit or a sworn statement attesting to their Roundup use.

In this episode Jonathan Rosenfeld chats with Jim Hardy an Attorney at Taxman, Pollock, Murray, & Bekkerman, LLC. Here, they discuss:

What Should an Employee do if Hurt on the Job?

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Jonathan Rosenfeld:

Hi, I am Jonathan Rosenfeld. And today on the Personal Injury podcast, I am joined by Jim Hardy, a work comp attorney in Chicago. And we are going to be talking about workers' compensation settlements, and how to value a work comp case in Illinois. Jim, thanks for joining me today. I appreciate it.

Jim Hardy:

Sure, no problem. Thank you, Jonathan. I glad to be here.

Jonathan Rosenfeld:

So Jim, we spoke in an earlier podcast about the benefits that people are entitled to in Illinois, generally under work comp. The money while you're off work, the TTD, the medical benefits while you're injured. And the third prong to work comp cases in Illinois is generally this lump sum payment. When people are talking about, "Hey, I got X amount of dollars for my work comp case," this is what they're talking about. They're talking about that lump sum payment.

Jonathan Rosenfeld:

And so today I want to talk with you and try to educate people a little bit about how this lump sum is derived, because it's not a random amount. It's a very methodical calculation. And I want you to help us get some insight into how these cases are valued under Illinois law.

Jonathan Rosenfeld:

And I guess the first thing, can you take a step back and walk us through that settlement process. I guess first off, in order to begin with I guess, when is a case, a work comp case in Illinois right to settle?

Jim Hardy:

Okay. Thanks, Jonathan. So you're entitled to a settlement for a work injury, but you should not settle your case until the doctor has released you from medical treatment. And the docs call that MMI or maximum medical improvement. So some people want to try to settle their case as soon as they're released back to work in some capacity, but that's not the best time, or that's not the appropriate time to settle a case. Because even though you're back to work, the doctor may still recommend treatment, therapy, follow-up visit doctor visits.

Jim Hardy:

And once you settle the work comp case, then you close out your medical rights. So the work comp insurance carrier, once it's settled, they don't have to pay for any more medical bills. So that's why it's essential to not pursue settlement and sign off anything until your doctor has said that you are done treating, no more follow up visits, you're good to go and they release you from treatment. So that's the appropriate time and not before that.

Jonathan Rosenfeld:

And so if you are injured on the job and your doctor's released you but you're not feeling 100%, it may be in your best interest to wait a little bit and see what happens and see what develops. See if you have any more problems.

Jim Hardy:

Sure. That's correct also. Just because the doctor has released you from treatment, that doesn't mean that you have to settle. It just means that it's an appropriate time to settle not until you're put at MMI by the doctor.

Jim Hardy:

But commonly I won't settle a case until a person feels comfortable, once their released from treatment, that they're confident that they don't need to follow up with the doctor any further. They're doing okay at work under the doctor's orders and they feel pretty good. Then it's safe to enter into a settlement because there wouldn't be any anticipated future medical anymore based on the old date of accident when they got hurt. So that's important.

Jonathan Rosenfeld:

Okay. And now I want to talk with you about how these settlements are derived. And ultimately these cases, they're about money, frankly. How much the case is valued is really dependent on the extent of your injury and how much money you were making at the time you were injured.

Jonathan Rosenfeld:

And those two things, those two factors, can you explain a little bit how those two elements get calculated and how they figure into an ultimately to a lump sum settlement and work comp?

Jim Hardy:

Sure. So the benefits in a work comp case under state law are based on what they call the average weekly wage. And the average weekly wage is calculated using the earnings that you made before the date of accident. All right. So you go back and it's just that, it's the average weekly wage or average weekly earnings. You can go back a year per the statute. If you worked prior to the date of accident less than a year, well, then the calculation just is different, but it's still the average weekly earnings prior to the date of accident.

Jim Hardy:

Then once you have that average weekly wage, then all the other benefits of more comp flow from that. So for the off work benefit, for the TTD, temporary total disability, that's the check that you get every week, every two weeks from work comp. That's calculated under state law at a specific figure, two of the average weekly wage, but then you get that two thirds tax-free. That's why that TTD check is supposed to bring you about what you may take home prior to the date of accident.

Jim Hardy:

And then the average weekly wage calculation is also used to calculate what they call the permanency rate. And the permanency rate is what you use to settle a case at the end of the day for that specific person.

Jim Hardy:

So in a work comp case, the average weekly wage is important, and there are different ways to calculate it as well. The insurance company would be more than happy to calculate that average weekly wage for you, because they're going to calculate it to their advantage, which means to keep it as low as possible. Because then everything else, all the benefits that flow from that will be lower. That's why it's important to get an attorney involved to make sure that the average weekly wage is calculated correctly.

Jim Hardy:

So how we do that as we secure a wage statement from the employer, or look at the pay stubs if the injured worker has all of them for that specific period, and do our own calculation, that there are certain ... There's a lot of case law over the years in court about fighting about how that average weekly wage is calculated, and the adjuster isn't going to calculate it in your favor, that's for sure. So very, very important to calculate that average weekly wage correctly.

Jonathan Rosenfeld:

So do you calculate the average weekly wage, you figure that out. And then there's a document, there's a schedule in Illinois as well as in other states, basically categorizing each part of the body. And it basically sets forth the amount of money or weeks in terms of compensation that you can recover based on the type of injury that you sustained.

Jonathan Rosenfeld:

Can you talk a little bit about that scheduled types of injury in Illinois? What that is and how that comes into play with a settlement?

Jim Hardy:

Sure. So the Work Comp Act lays out a series of body parts, and it goes from at the highest rate for the, they call it the person as a whole, which is the core of the body. Usually the spine or head injuries or shoulder comes from the person as a whole.

Jim Hardy:

And then from there, it goes to loss of use of an arm, and then a hand, and then actually the thumb. And then each of the fingers, it goes down to the little finger, pinky finger. And then it also breaks it down into legs, ankles, foot, and toes as well. So it's very specific and there are also different schedules for loss of hearing, for instance, loss of vision and so forth for eye juries.

Jim Hardy:

But so, and what the state law does is, people think that there's a set rate that you get for a work injury. It's only a set rate if you have 100% loss of use of that body part. So if you have a thumb amputated that would be all the way down to the base, then that would be 100% loss of use of the thumb. And you would get a benefit check for the 100% loss. There's no argument, it's medically determined that there's an amputation there. Bone loss all the way down, you lost your thumb.

Jim Hardy:

So anything short of an amputation though is lower than 100% of course, and that's what you get a settlement for. Say you injure your thumb and fracture it. It's not amputated, you fractured it or you have an injury where they have to go in and do surgery on the nerve and the thumb due to a deep laceration. Th...