JACKSON, Miss. (Legal Newsline) – Private lawyers, some of whom contributed to her campaign, stand to gain financially from Mississippi Attorney General Lynn Fitch’s new lawsuit against 3M, DuPont and other companies over chemicals known as PFAS.
Fitch and three private firms filed their case Dec. 17 in a multidistrict litigation proceeding in South Carolina federal court. Those firms are headlined by Dallas’ Baron & Budd, a firm whose lawyers were among many in the trial bar to support the Republican Fitch’s 2019 campaign to replace Democrat Jim Hood. A lot of those firms handle securities class actions and see the Mississippi public employees pension system as a potential client.
Hood had used Baron & Budd for other litigation, leading to $4.3 million in fees for it in 2019 in a case against Fresenius Medical Care. Attorneys there, and the firm itself, then donated $3,258 to Fitch two months later. Russell Budd’s wife Dorothy also donated $1,000.
The contract calls for a tiered system of recovery, with the private lawyers set to receive 25% of recovery up to $10 million, then 20% of the next $5 million, 15% of the next $5 million, 10% of the next $5 million and 5% of recovery exceeding $25 million.
The other firms are Cossich Sumich of Louisiana and Herring, Long & Crews of Mississippi.
The Cossich firm gave $3,500 to Hood for a failed run at governor in 2019.
James Herring of the Herring firm has for years supported Fitch, a former state treasurer. Herring gave her $11,130 in 2019 for her AG campaign.
The State’s case will be thrown in with hundreds of others that allege PFAS, chemicals found in products like non-stick cookware and firefighting foam, have contaminated water systems and other sites.
The chemicals have no set toxicity level but accumulate in the body without being expelled. Medical monitoring from a settlement in West Virginia and Ohio claimed a link between exposure and six diseases, but that science is regarded as incomplete by many.
States have set their own maximum contaminant levels well below a federal advisory of 70 parts per trillion. Many of those states have, like Mississippi, hired private firms to pursue litigation on contingency fees.
Not much is happening in the MDL other than the judge handling it – a former personal injury lawyer – showing an unwillingness to entertain motions to dismiss.
“(T)hese guys on the plaintiff’s side are talented lawyers,” Judge Richard Gergel said at a hearing when one company made its argument that it shouldn’t be named as a defendant in these cases.
“I would be – you know, I would think that the chances that they’re going to leave it in a way that there’s no basis for liability would, you know – I’m just – I haven’t seen it. I’m just going to suggest that that’s a – that can be a tall order for a defendant at a motion to dismiss stage.”