ThePopTort

Paint Companies Try to Squeeze Rhode Island for Lead Paint Costs – Judge Says No Way

Though much was known about the dangers of lead in paint (which causes irreversible brain damage in children) as early as the 1930s, the United States did not ban lead paint until 1978.   Paint manufacturers, knowing of the danger, marketed themselves as kid-friendly and safe in America, while providing Europe with lead-free paint and protecting farm animals from the effects of lead poisoning. 

The paint companies, fully aware of the health effects, profited immensely from their deadly paint.  Moreover, most of these companies still exist in some form and continue to profit from their past misdeeds.   At the same time, many children live in pre-1978 housing and are therefore tragically at risk for lead poisoning.  State and local governments have borne substantial costs enforcing safety measures that protect children from being poisoned.

Things were worse than usual in Providence, Rhode Island. It was known as “the lead-paint capital of the country because so many children were poisoned.”

Enter former Rhode Island Attorney General Sheldon Whitehouse and later his successor, Patrick Lynch.  These pioneering AG’s sued Sherwin-Williams and two other companies, seeking to hold them responsible for some of the overwhelming health care and housing costs associated with lead-poisoned children.  They knew that, as with the tobacco cases, the state would be swamped with delay tactics if they attempted such large-scale litigation without help.  Such tactics had already squashed smaller private plaintiff lawsuits in cases involving lead paint poisoning.  So the AG’s office hired outside counsel to aid them in the massive lawsuit, the Motley Rice firm.  And they won!

In February 2006, a jury returned a multibillion-dollar verdict against the three companies - the first state lead paint verdict ever!  The verdict mandated that the companies fund the removal of lead paint from more than 300,000 Rhode Island homes.   When the case moved to the state Supreme Court on appeal, 16 states supported Rhode Island.

But much to the dismay of child safety advocates and the state, the Court reversed the verdict two years ago.  Since then, the paint companies have been trying to force the state and Motley Rice to pay their legal costs. And luckily, yesterday the judge's response was the right one: NO WAY!

He ruled that the case ‘“brought significant attention to the serious harms of lead poisoning in Rhode Island, leading to an increased awareness in both the public and state officials.’ As a result, he said, the rate of lead poisoning declined by 76 percent from 1995 to 2004, and the General Assembly passed a new law designed to further reduce the poisonings.” In other words, “the state’s claims were ‘neither frivolous, nor made in bad faith.’”  Moreover, “The judge said ordering the companies to be reimbursed could deter the state from bringing public health lawsuits in the future.” AP reports:

Attorney General Patrick Lynch called the judge's decision "courageous" and said the companies' request for reimbursement was about more than just costs.

"It was meant to intimidate and silence any attorney or jurisdiction that would dare to demand that they be accountable for the products they put into the marketplace," Lynch said in a written statement.

Sherwin-Williams attorney Charles Moellenberg said the company will appeal the judge's decision to the state Supreme Court.

Wonder how many homes the paint companies could have cleaned up by now with the time and money being spent on this effort.  Stay tuned.

Medical Errors Continue to Get the Celebrity Treatment

You may have been hearing Dennis Quaid’s name pop up this week following his speech before the National Press Club, where is discussed the near fatal experience of his newborn twins in a California hospital, and an upcoming documentary on medical errors.  He’s the second major movie star in a year to turn patient safety advocate following an all-too-common experience with medical malpractice. (See our December post about Actor James Woods, whose brother died in a Rhode Island hospital.) 

One lesson here? The problem of medical errors is so universal that even wealthy celebrities who can afford most comforts in life, can’t buy their way out of it.  Poor Julie Andrews, whose surgery in 1997 to remove non-cancerous nodules in her throat, ended her singing career.  (Her doctor settled in 2000.)  Or Dick Schaap, legendary sports writer and broadcaster, who went in for routine hip replacement surgery, contracted an infection at the hospital and died three months later. (The Schaap family sued and the jury found the doctors negligent.)  Or Dana Carvey, who sued his heart surgeon for operating on the wrong artery when he underwent a double bypass in 1998.  The doctor settled for an undisclosed amount, which Carvey donated to charity. 

In Quaid’s case, there was the additional culpability of a major drug company, whom Quaid and his wife actually sued first.  They ultimately settled with the hospital, as well.  It was during the course of his case that he learned about California’s cruelly unfair “cap” on compensation for other malpractice victims, testifying in Congress:  

I have also learned a lot about the legal system – and it was surprising, I have to tell you. Like many Americans, I believed that a big problem in our country was frivolous lawsuits. But now I know that the courts are often the only path to justice for families that are harmed by the pharmaceutical industry and medical errors. Yet the law is stacked against ordinary people.  For instance, in my home state of California, a 1975 law caps compensation to malpractice victims. The cap has never been raised for inflation. The practical effect is that people without the wealth to pay legal fees up front are unable to get their cases before a judge or jury.

Of course, the celebrity gossip cites, (and we include here the LA Times blog here), seem more interested in whether he’ll be playing John Edwards in a biopic.  Sometimes it’s exhausting to keep people’s attention focused on what really matters!  

UPDATE:The Rand Corporation just released a new report saying exactly what consumer groups and patient safety advocates have been saying - the best way to reduce malpractice deaths, injuries, claims and lawsuits is to reduce the amount of malpractice.  The authors say, "This result suggests that policy options that improve patient safety may offer a new avenue for reducing malpractice pressure on physicians, at the same time that they improve clinical outcomes."  

Tragedy Turns Actor James Woods Into Patient Safety Patron

James Woods recently settled his lawsuit with Kent Hospital in R.I. over the wrongful death of his brother, Michael.

But it’s not just the personal justice for the Woods family that’s notable here—it’s also the benefits that future patients will reap as a result of the litigation (one of the many benefits of the civil justice system that is often overlooked).

Hospital president Sandra Coletta admitted that “mistakes were made” in the way Michael Woods was treated, and the settlement includes a promise by the hospital to clean up its act—specifically, by investing $1.25 million over the next five years to create the Michael J. Woods Institute at Kent Hospital.

According to Coletta, “the institute will be run by a board that will include a Woods family member and be charged with developing new procedures and training for Kent Hospital staffers, starting with the emergency room where Michael Woods died of a heart attack in July 2006.”

Woods emphasized how resolution of the case would give him “if not closure, some piece of mind about the meaning of his brother’s death.”

“It makes it possible for me to go to my brother’s grave and ask if I’ve done the right thing,” said Woods.

Actor James Woods Sues a Rhode Island Hospital Over Brother’s Death

Celebrities are often thought to be more or less immune from the everyday challenges of common folk, but as Dennis Quaid, the late Ed McMahon, Dana Carvey, and others have shown, they can be victims of medical malpractice just like anyone else.

Now Academy Award-nominated actor, and Rhode Island native, James Woods is suing Kent Hospital in Rhode Island for the wrongful death of his 49-year-old brother, Michael, who died in 2006 after going into cardiac arrest on a hospital gurney in the hospital’s hallway.

Woods, who is bringing suit on behalf of his deceased brother’s estate and teenage son, said he is doing so to seek “justice.”  

As we noted in our previous post on negligence at Rhode Island hospitals, whatever happens, at least he has the opportunity to bring this action - unlike states like California where so-called "tort reform" prevents many cases from going forward, or greatly limits the accountability of hospitals.  Ask Dennis Quaid about that.

Hair-Band Justice Rocks

To quote the eighties hair-band Great White: “It’s All Over Now.”

The final defendants to settle lawsuits over a 2003 Rhode Island nightclub fire that broke out during one of the band’s retro-road trips have finally agreed to compensate survivors and victims’ relatives, according to the Associated Press.  The blaze, which was the fourth-largest nightclub fire in U.S. history, killed 100 people, injured more than 200, and left 75 children without one or both parents.

In a 2003 “reform” article entitled “Lawsuit Lotto Reaches the Burned Ruin of R.I. Nightclub,” author Deroy Murdock condemned the victims’ attorneys for “pan[ning] for gold among the ashes” by naming corporate sponsors Anheuser-Busch and Clear Channel Communications as defendants.  But the fact is if either corporate sponsor had managed to fulfill its state-mandated, statutory obligation to ensure that there were appropriate fire exits in the nightclub that evening, countless lives might have been saved.  (See Second Amended Complaint, Passa, et al., v. Derderian, et al., 2003 WL 25764435.)

Needless to say, in the end, both companies agreed to settle—and the civil justice system continues to rock(!).

RI Supremes let lead paint makers off the hook

Thanks to Amy at CJ&D for this great guest post:

Yesterday the Rhode Island Supreme Court overturned a $2.4 billion dollar jury verdict against three paint manufactures. The majority of this would have been used to clean-up and inspect old buildings contaminated with lead paint, which causes brain-damage in children. The New York Times writes:

The justices [wrote] that the paint companies did not have control over how their lead-based products were used. Instead, the court said, the burden of making properties safe from lead contamination should rest with landlords and property owners.

“Today’s ruling is a landmark victory for common sense and for responsible companies that did the right thing,” Charles H. Moellenberg Jr., a lawyer for Sherwin-Williams, said in a statement. “The responsibility of making sure children aren’t exposed to lead paint remains squarely on property owners.” (Click here for the full article)

Hmmmm.

So even though the companies knew as early as the 1920s that lead paint caused neurological damage to children and, knowing this, the companies lobbied Congress for years to keep lead paint on the market in America even while other countries banned it for public health reasons. And even though the companies marketed lead paint specifically to parents and children, with claims of happy play spaces made brighter by their paint, all the while making sure to protect FARM ANIMALS from the harmful effects of lead in paint. Given all of this, they should have no clean-up responsibility? Might as well make all those parents responsible for all of the toys being sold with excessive levels of lead too.