Monsanto Hit With $78M Verdict In Philly's 6th Roundup Trial

By P.J. D'Annunzio
copied from www.law360.com
Law360 (October 10, 2024, 4:03 PM EDT) -- Bayer AG unit Monsanto was hit with a $78 million
verdict on Thursday by a Philadelphia jury in the sixth trial in the city's Roundup weedkiller mass tort.
The jury handed up its verdict — $3 million in compensatory damages and $75 million in punitive
damages — in Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas Judge Craig Levin's courtroom after nearly a
month of trial and two and a half hours of deliberation, finding that the company's flagship herbicide
was defective and the cause of plaintiff William Melissen's cancer.

Melissen alleged he developed non-Hodgkin lymphoma/hairy cell leukemia from using Roundup from
1992 to 2020 in his home and for commercial purposes. Like the plaintiffs in the Roundup cases,
Melissen alleged that Roundup's key ingredient, glyphosate, caused his cancer.

Monsanto has argued that the science shows glyphosate is safe for human use.
During closing arguments prior to the verdict, Melissen's attorneys urged the jury to hold the
"multibillion-dollar mega corporation" Monsanto accountable not just for causing their client's cancer,
but also poisoning "the birds, the butterflies and the environment" in the 50 years that Roundup has
been on the market.

Jason Itkin, an attorney for Melissen, told the jurors they wielded a rare power in this case.
"For the rest of your lives, you may never have the opportunity and power to do so much good," Itkin
said. "There's a catch–the opportunity is only good if you use it. Whether it's five days or five years
from now, you don't want to read something on the news, see a product on the shelf, see someone
go to the hospital and say, 'did I do enough?'"

Monsanto knew that it was selling cancer-causing "poison" the whole time, Itkin said, and never
bothered to warn people to wear gloves or protective gear, let alone pull the weedkiller from the
market.

"It is okay for companies to make a profit, but you cannot put profit over the health of real people
with real families," Itkin said.

Monsanto has the power to influence politicians, scientists, and the media, Itkin said, telling the jury
that only they had the power to stop the corporation.

"You gotta have the courage to award a big enough verdict to deter Monsanto from continuing on its
course of selling poison to people," he said.

Both sides in the litigation accused each other of cherry-picking science to advance their cases, using
experts paid to support their positions, pointing to scientific studies and journal articles with
favorable conclusions, and taking evidence out of context.

Bart Williams, who gave closing arguments on behalf of Monsanto, reiterated the point to the jury
and told them that the plaintiffs' attorneys were trying to solicit an emotional response from them in
order to find against Monsanto.

True it was tragic that Melissen developed cancer, and people naturally have sympathy when
someone is suffering, but the jury had to look at the facts dispassionately, Williams said.
And the facts, he said, all pointed to Roundup being perfectly safe.

Williams urged the jury to utilize their "intellect, analysis, reason, discipline, and common sense" in
answering one question: does Roundup cause cancer? If the answer was no, then the plaintiff's case
falls apart, he said.

"Science is real," he said. "Science leads to the truth. Sometimes that can be unexciting, especially
when you have to sit here and listen to it as jurors, but this case is all about science.
The case is William Melissen et al. v. Monsanto et al., case no. 210602578, in the Philadelphia Court
of Common Pleas.