For the past two months, America’s Lawyer™ Mike Papantonio has been leading the fight against the corporate giant DuPont, and on Wednesday the jury sided with the plaintiff for the hefty sum of $5.1 million with the possibility of additional punitive charges set to be determined this week.
While this may seem like a small penalty for the company that is worth far more, this individual case is just one of 3,500 waiting in the wings against DuPont. Unlike in a class-action lawsuit, individuals with unique cases go against the corporation one at a time, resulting in a large number of smaller payouts, though for the person seeking damages, this is no small victory.
Thousands of injured Americans are seeking justice from a ruthless company with no regard for American health and well-being. This victory will make it far easier for plaintiffs to seek and receive damages from the corporation, so this win is about far more than the actual payout.
The jury ruled that DuPont showed “conscious disregard” for the health and well-being of Ohio residents located near the facility which regularly dumped gallons of cancer-causing pollutants into the Ohio river.
The case against DuPont argued that officials were intimately aware of the ill-effects of dumping C-8 and exposing humans to the chemical, but they ignored those risks. As a result, many people like the plaintiff contracted cancers which caused immense physical, financial, and emotional stress for an extended period of time.
Papantonio and his team of lawyers successfully argued that the case showed gross negligence on the part of DuPont. For decades they were aware of the deadly effect of C-8 but failed to properly advise the public or handle the chemical responsibly.
For those unfamiliar with C-8, below is a quick summary. For a detailed discussion, click DuPont C8 Poisoning and Litigation
C-8 is a chemical which proved incredibly useful in creating Teflon pans. Excess of the chemicals were incorrectly disposed of and dumped into the Ohio river where it flowed downstream and eventually all over the globe.
C-8 is what scientists refer to as “biopersistent” which means that it doesn’t break down naturally as many things do. As a result, C-8 now exists in 98 percent of American bodies as well as in organisms all over the world – and it’s not going anywhere.
Papantonio said of the jury’s decision: “DuPont only understands one thing – and that’s losing money. They have a defective moral compass.”
DuPont watchdog group Keep Your Promises issued this statement on the verdict:
“Today’s verdict puts a spotlight on DuPont’s negligence and conscious disregard for the people of the mid-Ohio Valley. This verdict means that help is on the way for the thousands of residents waiting for their day in court, the dozens of communities in need of remediation, and the folks in the mid-Ohio Valley struggling to use the Medical Monitoring Program that has been mishandled by DuPont.
To the extent that this is a signal of verdicts to come, this verdict alone will make the cost of DuPont’s C-8 abuse skyrocket into billions of dollars, which so many residents and communities sorely need.”
This victory shows that the people steering the ship at DuPont during the decades when they were exposing millions to the biopersistent C-8 were far too unconcerned for the well-being of local residents. As long as they accomplished their goals with the lowest price tag, the rest could go by the wayside.
Their days of skating on the backs of the American people are over, and we can expect further justice to be brought to the chemical giant as there are still thousands of cases like the one DuPont just lost waiting in the wings.
Many times in America, the bad guys win and run away with the profit while regular folks are left to suffer, but today is a victory for all Americans as a corporate giant thought too big to be taken down was handled in the legal system to victorious result.
