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A Third J&J Bankruptcy Attempt Won’t Resolve Victims’ Talc Claims

In my many years as an attorney seeking to protect consumers from defective products, I’ve never felt a responsibility as heavy as the one I bear for the thousands of women suffering from ovarian cancer and mesothelioma, conditions linked to Johnson & Johnson’s tainted talc products. The profound pain and suffering they and their families endure is immeasurable.

Dozens of peer-reviewed scientific studies have revealed the correlation between talc use and these devastating diseases, with evidence pointing to the disturbing presence of asbestos, a notorious carcinogen, within talc.

Rather than acknowledge the mounting scientific evidence and provide fair compensation to the victims, J&J resorted to evasion and legal trickery.

By adopting the disreputable and now notorious Texas Two-Step bankruptcy strategy, J&J did a major disservice to both victims and J&J shareholders.

If the company’s bankruptcy scheme had succeeded, it would’ve been a gross miscarriage of justice. Victims would be robbed of their rightful day in court and forced to accept grossly inadequate compensation.

This maneuver by J&J was a gamble on perceived vulnerabilities within our multi-district litigation system. The wheels of justice often turn slowly, and J&J’s bankruptcy strategy brought the process to a screeching halt.

J&J expected

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Johnson and Johnson bankruptcy claim is a ruse to limit liability, cancer victims say

Juliet Gray has felt many things since she was first diagnosed with peritoneal mesothelioma two years ago.

Pain, which flares up when she’s stressed or tired. Fear, with every new doctor’s visit as she dreads the return of her rare, terminal cancer. Heartache, when she thinks of her 9-year-old son and how quickly her time with him is running out.

Mostly, though, she’s mad. She’s furious with New Jersey-based pharmaceutical giant Johnson & Johnson, whose talc products she blames for her incurable cancer. And her fury recently curdled into betrayal after Johnson & Johnson filed for bankruptcy in a controversial strategy company attorneys say will expedite the nearly 40,000 lawsuits against them.

Critics say the company — worth over $400 billion — is far from bankrupt and instead just wants to keep their cases from being heard by juries. Maryland-based attorney Jonathan Ruckdeschel, who has filed several lawsuits against J&J, said such a strategy forces plaintiffs into a collectively negotiated, judicially enforced settlement and removes their Seventh Amendment right to a jury trial.

“What they’re trying to do is cram everybody into a one-size-fits-all mandatory settlement that nobody has the choice to opt in or out of, and if you

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