Mass Tort Deals: Backroom Bargaining in Multidistrict Litigation

Mass-tort lawsuits over products like pelvic and hernia mesh, Roundup, opioids, talcum powder, and hip implants consume a substantial part of the federal civil caseload. But multidistrict litigation, which federal courts use to package these individual tort suits into one proceeding, has not been extensively analyzed. In Mass Tort Deals, Elizabeth Chamblee Burch marshals a wide array of empirical data to suggest that a systematic lack of checks and balances in our courts may benefit everyone but the plaintiffs - the very people who are often unable to stand up for themselves. Rather than faithfully representing them, plaintiffs' lawyers may sell them out in backroom settlements that compensate lawyers handsomely, pay plaintiffs little, and deny them the justice they seek. From diagnosis to reforms, Burch's goal isn't to eliminate these suits; it's to save them. This book is a must read for concerned citizens, policymakers, lawyers, and judges alike.

Author: Elizabeth Chamblee Burch
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Published: 05/16/2019
Pages: 250
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 0.87lbs
Size: 9.00h x 6.00w x 0.61d
ISBN: 9781108404211

About the Author
Burch, Elizabeth Chamblee: - Elizabeth Chamblee Burch is the Fuller E. Callaway Chair of Law at the University of Georgia School of Law and has been a visiting professor at Harvard Law School. In 2015, she won the American Law Institute's Early Career Scholars Medal. She has published over thirty articles and essays in journals such as the New York University Law Review, Cornell Law Review, Virginia Law Review, and Vanderbilt Law Review. She co-authors a casebook on The Law of Class Actions and Other Aggregate Litigation (2013) and is a frequent commentator in various national news media, such as The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, USA Today and The L. A. Times.