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US Supreme Court Declines Bayer/Monsanto Bid to Challenge Glyphosate Cancer Rulings

The US Supreme Court on Tuesday declined to hear a bid from Bayer-owned Monsanto that aimed to challenge thousands of lawsuits claiming its weedkiller Roundup causes cancer – a potentially costly ruling, AFP reported Tuesday. The high court did not explain its decision, which left intact a $25 million ruling in favor of a California man who alleged he developed cancer after using the chemical for years. The decision marks a major blow to the German conglomerate’s legal fight against Roundup-related cases, and Bayer has set aside more than $15 billion to deal with a wave of US lawsuits linked to the weedkiller.

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Will Supreme Court Let Bayer-Monsanto Off the Hook for Cancer-Causing Glyphosate Herbicide Roundup?

In June of 2020 it was announced that Bayer-Monsanto had reached the "largest settlement in pharma history" by agreeing to pay $10 Billion to settle about 125,000 lawsuits by people who died or came down with cancer from glyphosate poisoning, the main ingredient in Roundup, the world's most heavily used herbicide (weed killer) that is found in most food today. But there is one lawsuit that Bayer has contested, where plaintiff Edwin Hardeman was awarded $80 million in damages due to having non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL), a known side effect to too much exposure with glyphosate. The trial court judge reduced his settlement award to $25 million, and Bayer appealed the decision, which was upheld by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. It is now before the U.S. Supreme Court, and U.S. Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar has recommended that the Supreme Court deny Bayer's appeal. The stakes are high, as the Supreme Court's ruling could affect all future lawsuits against Bayer-Monsanto, and possibly even past lawsuits. What will the Supreme Court do, and just what are the Wall Street Billionaires and Bankers who largely control the Supreme Court planning behind the scenes in all of this? To rule in favor of Bayer could save investors $billions, and allow the EPA to continue to authorize the use of the world's most deadly herbicide to continue to be sold and used to poison our food supply. If they allow the decision of the Ninth Circuit to stand, how will that affect what the EPA does next regarding approving Roundup for agricultural use? While many people and groups have been calling on a ban of glyphosate-based herbicides, the fact is that if it is banned outright immediately, a very significant percentage of agriculture will no longer be able to produce food, as certain crops, such as corn, are over 90% genetically modified and could not grow without the herbicide Roundup. It would take many years to transition to something else. Whatever the reasons are behind the scenes for what the Supreme Court does, the stakes are high, and the results could be disastrous no matter which way the High Court rules. The best case scenario would be to allow all these lawsuits from people killed or injured by glyphosate to receive their settlements, and to put pressure on the EPA to start phasing out the use of Roundup giving farmers enough time to make the transition, so as to not bring major disruptions to the already fragile food supplies. But in that scenario the people would win, and Wall Street would lose, and that is just not something I see happening much, if at all, in today's judicial system.

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Largest Settlement in Pharma History: Bayer-Monsanto Agrees to $10B Settlement With Victims Poisoned by Roundup Weedkiller

Bayer will dole out between $10.1 billion and $10.9 billion—the single largest settlement in pharma history—to put an end to thousands of lawsuits tied to its acquisition of Monsanto and glyphosate-based Roundup. The $10 billion settlement will be apportioned to four leading plaintiffs’ law firms, who will in turn distribute the money to nearly 100,000 clients who were stricken with cancer after prolonged use of the toxic weedkiller. The German company acquired the St. Louis-based agrochemical giant Monsanto in 2018 for $63 billion, and inherited liability in thousands of lawsuits filed by people who claim exposure to Roundup and its main ingredient glyphosate was the cause of their cancer.

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Missouri Farmer Awarded $265M for GMO Pesticide Drift in Suit Against BASF and Bayer

A jury awarded $265 million in punitive damages against Bayer and BASF to a southeastern Missouri peach farmer who argued that weedkiller dicamba that had drifted onto his orchards from other farms had severely damaged his trees. The punitive damages awarded to farmer Bill Bader came a day after the jury awarded him $15 million in actual damages, agreeing with his argument that dicamba had drifted over from other farms and severely damaged Bader Farms, which is one of the largest peach farms in Missouri. Bader's attorneys argued that his trees likely wouldn't survive the dicamba exposure. The owners of Bader Farms alleged the companies conspired to create an “ecological disaster” that would induce farmers to buy dicamba-tolerant seeds.

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Courts Making Bayer/Monsanto Pay Billions for Their Poison

We’ve been reporting for years on the negative health effects of glyphosate, the active ingredient in the Roundup herbicide. While world bodies like the World Health Organization say that glyphosate is a “probable carcinogen,” the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) maintains that glyphosate is safe. Let’s not forget, though, that cronyism mars the EPA decision: unsealed court documents showed that a top EPA official (Jess Rowland) promised Monsanto he would quash efforts by the Department of Health to conduct its own review of glyphosate. So much for the federal government protecting the interests of people rather than special interests. There are now 13,400 cases pending that allege Roundup causes cancer. We hope these legal developments accomplish what government regulators were unable (or unwilling) to do: get glyphosate off the market for good.

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Bayer-Monsanto Ordered to Pay $2 Billion to Glyphosate Cancer Victims

After less than two full days of deliberations, a California jury ordered Monsanto to pay just over $2 billion in punitive and compensatory damages to a married couple who both developed non-Hodgkin lymphoma they say was caused by their many years of using Roundup products. After listening to 17 days of trial testimony, jurors said Monsanto must pay $1 billion to Alberta Pilliod, who was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin lymphoma brain cancer in 2015, and another $1 billion to her husband Alva Pilliod, who was diagnosed in 2011 with non-Hodgkin lymphoma that spread from his bones to his pelvis and spine. The couple, who are both in their 70s, started using Roundup in the 1970s and continued using the herbicide until only a few years ago. The jury also awarded the couple a total of $55 million in damages for past and future medical bills and other losses. In ordering punitive damages, the jury had to find that Monsanto “engaged in conduct with malice, oppression or fraud committed by one or more officers, directors or managing agents of Monsanto” who were acting on behalf of the company. Pilliod v. Monsanto is the third Roundup cancer case to go to trial. And it is the third to conclude that Monsanto’s glyphosate-based herbicides can cause cancer and that Monsanto has long known about – and covered up – the risks.

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Monsanto Not Only Problem Facing Bayer: Investors Question Ethics in Selling Banned Pesticides in Brazil

Bayer CEO Werner Baumann recently lost a crucial confidence vote as investors questioned his handling of the $63 billion Monsanto deal and the wave of US lawsuits that followed. In what Bloomberg called "a stunning development for the German drugs and chemicals company", about 55 percent of shareholders voted against absolving Baumann and other managers of responsibility for their actions in the takeover last year. The vote threw Baumann's future into question and prompted an immediate supervisory board session. While much of the investor unrest undoubtedly focuses on financial liability, strong concerns are being raised about Bayer's ethics. At Bayer's annual general meeting, Christian Russau from the umbrella organization, the Critical Shareholders, made a speech in which he launched a scathing attack on the company for its "double standards". According to Russau, Bayer sells pesticides in Brazil that are banned in the EU. Russau said he feared that companies such as Bayer will continue to participate, perhaps more than ever, in the sale and distribution of highly toxic agrochemicals in Brazil. As a survival tactic in the face of Monsanto's multi-billion dollar acquisition, Bayer will go for growth at any price. Any poison which can be sold will be sold.

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Jury Slams Monsanto for Corporate Malfeasance in Roundup Cancer Trial, Awards $80 Million in Damages

Today, a second jury in less that 8 months found Bayer-Monsanto’s signature weedkiller Roundup responsible for causing cancer. The verdict in the case Hardeman v. Monsanto before a federal district court in San Francisco found exposure to glyphosate, the signature ingredient in Roundup, caused plaintiff Edward Hardeman’s non-Hodgkin lymphoma. Jurors awarded $80 million in damages to Hardeman. “Clearly, the testimony that informed the jury’s decision was Bayer-Monsanto hiding Roundup’s carcinogenic properties, manipulating the science and cozying-up with EPA so it would not have to warn consumers of its dangerous product,” said EWG President Ken Cook. “Bayer-Monsanto has known for decades the cancer-causing properties of Roundup and I applaud the jury for holding the company accountable for failing to warn consumers of the known danger. This verdict puts Bayer’s back firmly up against the wall as the cost of litigation mounts and its stock price gets pummeled once again,” said Cook.

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Judge Rejects Monsanto’s Bid to Overturn Glyphosate Conviction but Reduces Punitive Damages from $250 Million to $39 Million

Earlier this week (October 2018) San Francisco Superior Court Judge Suzanne Ramos Bolanos rejected Monsanto’s appeal to overturn the jury verdict which found that glyphosate in the herbicide RoundUp causes cancer. Judge Bolanos had earlier hinted that she might overturn the jury's verdict, and eliminate the $250 million in punitive damages. While denying Monsanto's attorneys their request for a new trial, Judge Bolanos did reduce the punitive damages from $250 million to $39 million, the same amount (39 million) that was awarded to the plaintiff, Dewayne Johnson, who is not expected to live much longer due to his cancer diagnosis. Judge Bolanos also stated that if Dewayne Johnson and his attorneys did not accept the reduction in punitive damages, that she would order a new trial. Johnson’s lawyers said in a statement that the “reduction in punitive damages was unwarranted” and that his legal team, Baum Hedlund and the Miller Firm, was “weighing the options.” Bayer, now the parent company for Monsanto, stated that they would file another appeal of the jury's verdict.

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German Company Bayer Approved to Buy Out Monsanto: “A Marriage Made in Hell”?

The recent Monsanto-Bayer merger has been approved by both American and European continent authorities, merging two of the world's top seed biotech companies and producers of genetically modified seeds. Bayer, a company based out of Germany, is a name most often associated with aspirin in the United States and around the world. But even before this merger, they already hold a huge market share of seed production. Bayer is somewhat constrained in developing their GMO products, as Germany bans the cultivation of GMO crops. Most of Bayer's GMO development is done in the USA, and by purchasing Monsanto, they will become, by far, the largest GMO company in the world. This has prompted some to refer to the Bayer-Monsanto merger as "A Marriage Made in Hell."

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