The Associated Press reports that Bayer has agreed to pay $7.25 billion in a proposed class action settlement to resolve lawsuits alleging that the weedkiller Roundup causes cancer. German-based Bayer acquired Monsanto, the manufacturer of Roundup, in 2018.
This litigation illustrates the wildly unpredictable nature of punitive damages litigation. There have been thousands of lawsuits asserting that Roundup causes cancer. In some of those cases, the juries awarded billions of dollars in punitive damages based on Bayer/Monstant’s failure to warn about the risk of cancer (see here and here). But in other cases, the plaintiffs got absolutely nothing, because the juries found that Roundup does not cause cause cancer (see here and here).
The settlement reportedly won’t impact a pending Supreme Court case, Monsanto v. Durnell. There, a jury awarded $1.25 million to a plaintiff who claimed that Roundup caused his cancer. The Supreme Court took the case to decide whether federal law preempts state-law failure to warn claims where the EPA has concluded that no warning is required for the product in question. Argument is scheduled for April 27.
