Request Filed To Transfer Dozens of Roundup Lawsuits in New Jersey State Court to One Judge

Even after paying billions in Roundup settlements to individuals diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, the number of cases pending in New Jersey state court has quadrupled over the last year.

As a growing number of individuals continue to file lawsuits alleging Roundup caused non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, a group of plaintiffs with claims pending in New Jersey state court have renewed a request to consolidate and centralize the claims before one judge, to help coordinate pretrial proceedings in the long-running litigation.

Over the course of nearly a decade, more than 120,000 Roundup lawsuits have been filed throughout the United States, each raising similar allegations that users were not adequately warned that Roundup exposure could increase their risk of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and other forms of cancer.

The litigation emerged in 2015, after the World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) classified glyphosate in Roundup as a probable cancer-causing agent. 

Bayer and Monsanto have already paid over $10 billion in Roundup settlements, to resolve claims alleging that the manufacturers failed to provide adequate warnings for U.S. consumers. However, the number of claims continues to grow as former users are diagnosed with cancer, and many users have rejected the settlement offers.

Most of the U.S. Roundup litigation has been centered in the federal court system, as well as California and Missouri state courts. However, a number of complaints have also been brought in New Jersey state court.

On February 27, lawyers representing at least 36 plaintiffs with Roundup lawsuits pending in the state court system sent a request (PDF) to the acting administrative director for the New Jersey Courts, requesting that claims brought throughout the state be consolidated before Judge John C. Porto in the Superior Court of New Jersey in Atlantic County, as part of a multi-county litigation (MCL).

The plaintiffs argue that centralization will reduce duplicative discovery into common issues in the cases, avoid conflicting pretrial schedules from different judges, and serve the convenience of the common parties, witnesses and the judicial system.

A similar request was made in January 2024, which was rejected since there were only a handful of cases pending at the time. However, plaintiffs indicate that the number of New Jersey Roundup lawsuits has continued to grow since then, warranting reconsideration of their prior motion to transfer.

“When Plaintiffs originally made their request on January 22, 2024, there were only 10 Plaintiffs with cases filed in only four counties. After considering the prior application, the Supreme Court denied Plaintiffs’ request, specifying that ‘[t]he Court based its denial on the limited number of cases at present,’” the motion states. “The number of plaintiffs has since quadrupled and, as evidenced by the multiplication of such cases without centralization, Plaintiffs anticipate that the total number of cases subject to the Court’s petition order, if granted, will likely exceed one hundred.”

Plaintiffs indicate there are now at least 41 cases pending in the state, which are currently spread across eight different New Jersey courts.

If consolidated before one judge, the New Jersey cases would work like the federal MDL, but at the state-court level only. The appointed judge would preside over discovery into common issues that apply to all claims, and likely establish a “bellwether” process where a small group of representative claims are prepared for early trial dates, to help the parties gauge how juries are likely to respond to certain evidence and testimony that will be repeated throughout other claims.