CHARLESTON, S.C. (Legal Newsline) - With billions of dollars on the table, certain water wholesalers are wondering if they get anything from pending PFAS settlements.
Wholesalers led by the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California and the North Texas Municipal Water District are asking to intervene in the litigation. They say the lawyers who drafted a possible $12.5 billion settlement with 3M did not consider nearly two-thirds of the 3,270 active wholesalers in an EPA database as known class members.
"Yet the agreement's definitions would appear to encompass many such wholesalers," the motion to intervene says.
The wholesalers want clarification on whether they are entitled to settlement funds, or whether they are eligible to opt out or object.
"As drafted, the 3M Agreement in ambiguous and creates incongruous results for complex water systems that involve wholesalers and retailers," the motion says.
Representing them are Jeff Kray and Jessica Ferrell of Marten Law in Seattle. Their colleagues who are leading the litigation are looking for a billion-dollar payday from settlements with 3M and DuPont.
Those firms are Douglas and London, Napoli Shkolnik, Baron & Budd, Fegan Scott and Motley Rice.
They seek $94,800,000 from a $1.185 billion settlement with DuPont over PFAS, a group dubbed "forever chemicals" because they persist in groundwater and human tissue for years.
The federal government is attempting to set a maximum contaminant level for PFAS, even as groups call the move premature. Much of the research regarding their effect on the human body is disputed.
The firms plan to ask for 8% from the huge 3M settlement. If the settlement ends up being worth $12.5 billion, that fees figure would be $1 billion.
"Never before has litigation protected American drinking water on this scale," the motion for fees says, adding the firms have "labored tirelessly for years." The motion says attorneys spent more than 400,000 hours on these cases over four-and-a-half years on "herculean tasks."
"This colossal achievement was the result of a sustained and concerted effort directed against all Defendants whose liability is undeniably intertwined and interrelated."
The DuPont settlement pales in comparison to the up-to-$12.5 billion 3M has agreed to pay, but the motion does not formally address fees from that agreement. It just seeks 8% from the DuPont settlement.
"Class Counsel ask the Court to review the current 8% fee request in the DuPont settlement, and the 8% fee request forthcoming in the 3M settlement together," the motion says. "This is justified given that the hours and work were equally important to achieving both settlements."
The settlement came after the judge overseeing federal multidistrict litigation in South Carolina earlier this year ordered a halt to proceedings so 3M and plaintiff lawyers could iron out an agreement. In a situation similar to litigation over asbestos and opioids, 3M still faces lawsuits by individuals and others over PFAS, which it manufactured for years and is found in everything from nonstick pans to cosmetics.
Other defendants range from firefighting products manufacturer Kidde-Kenwal, which filed for bankruptcy in May over the cost of PFAS lawsuits; National Foam; Tyco Fire Products; BASF; Carrier Global; W.L. Gore Associates; and state and federal governments.