Three More Johnson's Baby Powder Asbestos Cancer Trials Underway

New trials are currently in progress or about to start that build on the evidence of previous cases

Saturday, September 22, 2018 - Several new trials are underway or are slated to begin shortly in Los Angeles, New Jersey, and South Carolina in the wake of a recent precedent-setting verdict against cosmetics and pharmaceutical giant Johnson & Johnson. In August 2018, jurors awarded $4.69 billion dollars to 22 plaintiffs suing Johnson & Johnson alleging Johnson's Baby Powder is contaminated with asbestos. Johnson & Johnson's co-defendant, talc supplier Imreys settled with the 22 women prior to the trial for an undisclosed amount of money thought to be over $5 million. Plaintiffs now claim that executives at Johnson & Johnson have known for years that their products such as Johnson's Baby Powder that contain talc were contaminated with cancer-causing asbestos but chose to withhold such information from the general public in order to protect their profits.

The trials, one of which is underway and two slated to begin shortly are the first since the enormous jury award. The case in New Jersey is particularly notable because New Jersey is where Johnson & Johnson's corporate headquarters is located and that in July 2018, a New Jersey jury awarded a New Jersey banker, $117 million for the lung cancer, a.k.a., mesothelioma he contracted from Johnson's Baby Powder asbestos. The plaintiff alleged that he used Johnson's powder products after each shower and had breathed talcum powder dust daily for most of his life. Three of the six previous jury awards were vacated purely on jurisdictional grounds. Such an appeal would seem unlikely in a New Jersey trial where Johnson & Johnson is amongst the state's largest employers.

In addition to the trial that is underway, and the two that are beginning, some 10,000 other plaintiffs with cancer have filed to sue Johnson & Johnson. The three previously mentioned overturned cases may also attempt to be retried based on finding new evidence of asbestos, a known carcinogen having contaminated Johnson & Johnson's talc supply. Researchers are now finding that the Imrey talc supply, mined in Vermont and Italy in close proximity to asbestos mines may have been contaminated with asbestos. Once contaminated, asbestos cannot be removed from talc.

In building on the evidence publicly revealed in previous trials, new evidence against Johnson & Johnson is being uncovered. According to the Northern California Record, Dr. William Longo, a materials scientist and electron microscope researcher specializing in asbestos identification for the MAS lab of Suwanee, Georgia, testified that he had found "asbestos fibers in baby powder." In Dr. Luongo's words, "We found what I would call the anthophyllite (a form of asbestos) series with fibers and bundles in a 14.8-1 ratio." Dr. Luongo also pointed to dozens of Johnson & Johnson internal memos that showed Johnson & Johnson scientist discussing asbestos in the talc supply, "There are 70 documents that use the words tremolite and amphibole. You have one that talks about fibers, then you have ones that say absolutely this is asbestos. From what I've seen, maybe a dozen." Baby powder ovarian cancer lawyers are providing free case reviews for talcum powder lawsuits.

Information provided by TalcumPowderCancerLawsuit.com, a website devoted to providing news about talcum powder ovarian cancer lawsuits, as well as medical research and findings.