Teflon Class Action Up in Flames

Hi folks, I'm back from court. I decided to draw back on my elaborately constructed straw man arguments and simply argue my case on the merits. Ok, I sprinkled in a little Carver Time for dramatic effect -- after all, I was in state court.

Court took it under advisement, so we'll see.

Anyways, a dedicated reader sent along this 12/5/08 opinion denying class cert in the Teflon cookware class action. You may recall these cases were filed with a lot of publicity back in 2005:

Two South Florida law firms are spearheading a nationwide effort against E.I. Dupont De Numours Co., alleging the chemical and manufacturing giant knew for more than 20 years that its Teflon product and chemical components had the potential to make people sick, but hid the fact from consumers.

Miami law firm Kluger, Peretz, Kaplan and Berlin, working with Fort Lauderdale's Oppenheim Pilelsky, said they are filing their class action against DuPont (NYSE: DD) in federal courts in states representing more than a third of the nation's population.

"The class of potential plaintiffs could well contain almost every American that has purchased a pot or pan coated with DuPont's non-stick coating, popularly known as Teflon," Kluger, Peretz principal Alan Kluger said.

The lawsuits call on DuPont to pay damages to every member of the class and to compensate each for purchasing replacement cookware.

The lawsuit charges Dupont had a duty to warn consumers of any potential health hazards of Teflon before people purchased cookware made with Teflon.

Then in April 2006 they were finally in front of Southern District of Iowa Judge Longstaff:

The original cases, filed in federal court as required by the Class Action Fairness Act, come from U.S. district courts in California, Florida, Massachsetts, Pennsylvania and Texas, among other states.

The lawyers met presiding U.S. District Judge Ronald E. Longstaff for the first time last week at the first status conference, said Alan J. Kluger, lead plaintiffs counsel and a commercial litigator at Miami's Kluger, Peretz, Kaplan & Berlin.

The plaintiffs attorneys, so far "an informal group of lawyers working together," have "met and spoken regularly over the last 10 months and dealt with the science issues and the document issues," Kluger said.

You can read the opinion for yourself, but it was precisely the large, amorphous potential class Alan spoke about above that troubled the court.