Welcome to Critical Mass, Law.com's weekly briefing for class action and mass tort attorneys. I'm Max Mitchell in Philadelphia filling in your usual columnist Amanda Bronstad.

This week we're beginning to see the litigation fallout from the nationwide college admissions scandal; meanwhile plaintiffs secured another verdict against Monsanto over its RoundUp weedkiller, and three class action suits are pending before the U.S. Supreme Court, with employers hoping to build on last year's successful challenge to public sector union fees.

Send your feedback to [email protected], or look me up on Twitter @MMitchellTLI. You may also reach out to Amanda through email to [email protected], or on Twitter: @abronstadlaw.

In Admissions Scandal, Students Are Giving Class Actions the College Try

You may not be surprised that litigation has followed in the wake of the largestcollege admissions scandal in U.S. history, but you may be surprised to learn that one of those lawsuits is seeking “no less than $500,000,000,000.”

That's $500 billion. Yes, with a “B.”

Law.com's Ross Todd reports that at least two class action lawsuits have been filed in the wake of a nationwide scandal where celebrities, attorneys and others were allegedly engaged in an elaborate scheme that included bribing coaches and test proctors in the hopes of getting their children into top universities.

One lawsuit, filed in the U.S. Court for District Northern District of California by attorneys from The Medler Law Firm and Zimmerman Reed on behalf of two Stanford University undergraduates, contends that their degrees are “now not worth as much,” since “prospective employers” might question whether they were admitted on their own merits, or their parents bribed the school. That lawsuit names numerous colleges, including Stanford University, the University of Southern California, Yale University and Georgetown University. Another class action lawsuit, this one filed in San Francisco Superior Court, was brought against several media figures, including actresses Felicity Huffman and Lori Loughlin. The suit, brought by a former teacher and her son who was allegedly rejected from several schools despite a 4.2 high school grade point average, did not name the universities embroiled in the scandal.

That's the lawsuit seeking $500 billion in damages.

Boeing's Legal Troubles May Soar Over 737 Max

Boeing may face mounting legal troubles after several countries, including the United States, decided to ground the company's entire 737 Max 8 aircraft after a March 10 crash in Ethiopia killed 157 people. That's according to an in-depth lookAmanda Bronstad took into the potential legal ramifications of the crash.

Of particular note, the circumstances of the Ethiopian Air flight's crash bore resemblances to that of another 737 Max 8 aircraft owned by Lion Air that crashed Oct. 29, killing 189 people—although the cause of both crashes remains unknown. Boeing faces lawsuits from passengers, particularly since eight of them on the Ethiopian Air flight were Americans, but airlines also could bring legal actions over revenue losses incurred due to the grounding, according to lawyers who specialize in aviation.

“This will be a large financial loss,” said Pete Flowers, of Chicago's Meyers & Flowers, who has filed a lawsuit against Boeing on behalf of a Lion Air passenger's family and plans to sue over the Ethiopian Air crash in the coming days. “The claims against Boeing are going to be enormous overall. There's going to be a lot at stake here.”

'Substantial' Plaintiffs' Win in Roundup Bellwether

A Northern California jury on Tuesday determined that Monsanto's Roundup was a “substantial factor” in causing a man's cancer, Ross Todd reported. The case is the first bellwether to go to trial out of the multidistrict litigationclaiming Roundup causes non-Hodgkin lymphoma in humans, and the unanimous ruling allows the case to move to a second phase, where jurors are set to consider whether the company knew about the herbicide's carcinogenic properties and it potential damages. Attorneys Jennifer Moore of the Moore Law Group and Aimee Wagstaff of Andrus Wagstaff representing the plaintiff at trial, and attorneys from Wilkinson Walsh + Eskovitz represented Monsanto. The verdict is a significant blow to Monsanto parent company Bayer AG, which last year was hit with a $289 million verdict in San Francisco Superior Court in a Roundup case outside the MDL proceedings. Although the state court judge overseeing that case slashed the award by more than $200 million post-trial, the company had been hoping to set a different tone in the MDL cases with a defense verdict in phase one of the first case to go to trial.

Here's what else you need to know: Labor's Lost: Anti-union organizations have three petitions in class action cases pending before the U.S. Supreme Court that seek to build on the Janus v. AFSCMEdecision from last year, which overruled a four-decade-old precedent that said unions could impose “fair share” fees on nonmembers for the cost of collective bargaining. The petitions, filed by National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation and the Buckeye Institute—confront laws that require a union's exclusive representation of public sector employees, and seek refunds of about $32 million for fees paid to the union.

Washed Out: An appellate panel in New York state court said a tenant-driven class action brought against two buildings in Manhattan that were damaged by Hurricane Sandy must be dismissed because expert opinions supporting the plaintiffs' claims were conclusory and unsupported by data and industry standards.

Removal Efforts: The Pennsylvania Supreme Court shot down J&J's request to have a Philadelphia judge taken off a pelvic mesh case, since the judge allegedly failed to properly disclose that his mother filed a lawsuit against another J&J subsidiary. The company isn't done seeking to have the judge removed, and has another request pending that seeks to have the judge barred from handling any pelvic mesh cases in the future.

Chalk Up Another Win: A jury handed up a $29 million verdict last week against J&J in a case raising claims that baby powder used as a base for makeup or dry shampoo caused a woman's mesothelioma. The verdict is the latest in a series of awards juries have handed up over J&J's talcum powder products.