Appeals Court Affirms $9.2 Million Award in Bayer Rice MDL Case
The 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals handed down a major decision in the Bayer Genetically Modified Rice Multidistrict Litigation (MDL) with Stueve Siegel Hanson representing the lawyers advocating for the plaintiffs.
Leadership attorneys secured nearly a billion dollars for farmers and other participants in the rice industry after Bayer irresponsibly let an unapproved genetically modified rice trait contaminate the rice supply. After spending more than a hundred thousand hours taking depositions and fighting Bayer, the leadership attorneys won three bellwether trials that precipitated a global settlement. Some of the plaintiffs, such as Riceland who received $92 million in settlements with Bayer, utilized leadership attorneys work from the MDL in their individual cases but refused to pay any portion of that to the leadership. Those leadership attorneys turned to Stueve Siegel Hanson for help.
“To be hired by your peers — attorneys who know what it takes to litigate complex cases because they have been in the trenches — is a tremendous honor,” according to Patrick Stueve, who is a nationally recognized trial attorney. “The case presented unique and challenging dynamics and involved novel legal issues. We were very happy when we persuaded the trial court to find that Bayer should have put $9.2 million of its settlement with Riceland into the trust the Court had created to pay the leadership, and we are even more pleased that Eighth Circuit affirmed that ruling.”
The leadership attorneys asked for $9.2 million and that is what the Court granted.
“As a lawyer, it is incredibly satisfying when you are able to return to your clients one-hundred cents on the dollar – every penny they were seeking from the defendant,” stated Stueve.
In addition to Patrick Stueve, Stueve Siegel Hanson Attorneys Todd Hilton and Brad Wilders were involved in the representation of the leadership attorneys.
For subscribers, you can find background on the case and the court’s decision below.
Law360, click here
Reuters, click here
Originally published September 1, 2016
