Welcome to Critical Mass, Law.com's weekly briefing for class action and mass tort attorneys. Everyone seemed to have something to say about Monday's $572 million opioid verdict in Oklahoma. Investors whose Burford Capital shares dropped after the Muddy Waters report have filed a class action against the litigation funding firm. Who are the law firms involved in the latest CAFA petitionbefore the U.S. Supreme Court?

Feel free to reach out to me with thoughts or comments. You can email me at [email protected], or follow me on Twitter: @abronstadlaw.

Judge Thad Balkman speaks during Oklahoma's case blaming consumer products giant Johnson & Johnson and its subsidiaries for the state's opioid drug crisis, in Norman, Oklahoma, in July. (AP Photo/Sue Ogrocki, File)

 

Opinions Abound Over the $572M Opioid Verdict

An Oklahoma state court judge ordered Johnson & Johnson to pay more than $572 million in abatement costs to the state of Oklahoma after finding that Johnson & Johnson's "misleading marketing and promotion of opioids created a nuisance."

The judgment, which followed the first opioid trial in the nation, sent shockwaves through the legal community. Defense bar groups immediately criticized what they considered an overly broad interpretation of Oklahoma's public nuisance law, while plaintiffs' attorneys cheered a verdict as a bellwether for thousands of other opioid lawsuits.

One day after the verdict, Purdue Pharma, another manufacturer, reportedly was in talks to settle thousands of cases for between $10 billion to $12 billion. 

Here's some reactions:

Jere Beasley (Beasley Allen): "The verdict in Oklahoma should bring all of the corporate entities to the table and result in a global settlement covering all of the pending litigation."

Nora Engstrom (Stanford Law School): "The plaintiffs' somewhat novel public nuisance theory was just put to the test, and it passed that test with flying colors."

Jonathan Novak (Fears Nachawati): "The defendants should expect significantly larger verdicts when this same story is told to a jury of citizens whose lives have almost certainly been directly and personally affected by the opioid crisis."

Mark Eveland (Verus): "The plaintiffs aren't going to forget the evidence that came out in this trial. Even if there are other defendants in the courtroom in that trial, they're going to use the Johnson & Johnson facts in this case in that coming trial."

Jeff Simon (Simon Greenstone): "The central allegation against the manufacturers of branded opioid products—OxyContin, Duragesic—was that the manufacturers engaged in a promotional campaign that targeted physicians who saw patients complaining of pain and targeted consumers who had complaints of pain. And that that promotional effort was successful. It reshaped protocols for pain treatment in America by making opioid prescriptions much more ubiquitous, and that lead to the opioid epidemic we have, and he found that to be true. He didn't just find that to be true with Johnson & Johnson but as part of a concerted, coordinated effort among the broad array of opioid brand manufacturers."

 

Burford's Troubled Waters

Litigation funders are increasingly the target of lawsuits—and that includes securities class actions. The Rosen Law Firm filed a class action alleging that Burford Capital misrepresented, or failed to disclose, signs that it wasn't doing so well. The case cites annual financial reports and an Aug. 7 report released by investment research firm Muddy Waters that suggested that Burford had manipulated its financials. Burford's shares dropped 42% to $5.90 a share after the report.

Burford has pushed back against the report's findings. It's also retained Quinn Emanuel, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer and Morrison & Foerster to look intoa preliminary investigation that found illegal market manipulation might have impacted its shares at the time of the Muddy Waters report.

Who Got the Work?

Baron & Budd has stepped in to represent nearly 4,300 plaintiffs who are asking the U.S. Supreme Court to keep lawsuits filed over Lipitor in California state court. Pfizer, repped by Michael McGinley (Dechert), petitioned the high court on June 21 after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit refused to hear its request to overturn a district judge's order remanding the cases back to Los Angeles Superior Court. Six business groups including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the Washington Legal Foundation have backed Pfizer, which insists the U.S. Class Action Fairness Act permits removal to federal court when a state court judge, as opposed to the plaintiffs, proposes joint trials of more than 100 plaintiffs at a time. Baron & Budd shareholder Burton LeBlanc, along with Charles Orr, who handled the underlying case at The Mulligan Law Firm before joining Baron & Budd this year, said in their response on Monday that the state court judge never proposed to hold joint trials.

Here's what else is happening:

Smoked Out: On the same day that plaintiffs' firm Zuber Lawler & Del Ducaplanned to file a false advertising class action against Weedmaps, which lists cannabis companies online, the California-based company said it would no longer host advertisements made by unlicensed dispensaries. Zuber Lawler's Josh Masur said Weedmaps possibly made the policy change after hearing about the threatened lawsuit. "Our inference is that word was getting around to more than just the people we wanted to talk to," he told Law.com.

Amazon Again: A month after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuitfound Amazon liable for allegedly defective products sold by third parties, an en banc panel has agreed to take up the case. Amazon had petitioned for the en banc panel to overturn a July 3 ruling, which set up a potential circuit split. In the suit, plaintiff Heather Oberdorf claims she suffered an eye injury while walking her dog with a leash she purchased through Amazon.com. Because she was unable to locate the seller, The Furry Gang, she sued Amazon.com.

Hammer Time: Personal injury lawyer Jim Adler (Jim Adler & Associates) is suing 14 competitors over their advertisements, which pop up when mobile device users search on Google for his trademarked moniker, "The Texas Hammer." Law.com's story has an example of one of Adler's ads, and a list of who he's named in the four federal lawsuits.

Thanks again for reading Critical Mass! I will see you next week.