Hair Relaxer Lawsuit: A Comprehensive Overview

Hair relaxer lawyers have filed a Joint ESI Discovery Status Report outlining their progress on search methodologies for electronic document production.

Earlier in the month, a Georgia woman’s hair relaxer cancer lawsuit against L’Oréal, SoftSheen-Carson, and Strength of Nature, alleging the companies failed to warn consumers about the dangers of toxic chemicals in hair relaxers, has been allowed to proceed.

The Georgia Court of Appeals rejected L’Oréal’s argument that Georgia’s Statute of Repose and Federal preemption law should compel the Court to dismiss the case.

Initially, the Georgia trial court ruled that the lawsuit filed by the plaintiff Kiara Burroughs was not preempted by Federal law and was sufficiently pleaded to survive a motion to dismiss. In this hair relaxer litigation, Ms. Burroughs claims that she developed uterine fibroids as a result of using chemical hair relaxers.

The hair relaxer class action MDL experienced a decrease of nearly 300 pending cases over the past month. This reduction is due to plaintiffs deciding not to pursue cases involving non-cancer injuries. The total number of pending cases is now 8,170.

Hair relaxer attorneys and legal experts have no updates as yet on the possibility of a hair relaxer settlement in the current hair relaxer cases.

April marked another sluggish period for the hair relaxer class action MDL, with only 81 new cases added, up from 53 in March but significantly lower than the 3,000 new cases added in a single month less than a year ago. The total number of cases has now risen to 8,468.

May 30, 2024 – New Discovery Dispute

A recent discovery dispute has arisen between hair relaxer lawyers, centering on the interpretation of CMO #9. Plaintiffs’ attorneys are frustrated as defendants continue to issue new or amended Deficiency Letters in response to amended Plaintiff Fact Sheets (PFS), contrary to CMO 9’s explicit language.

According to CMO 9, once a plaintiff responds to a Deficiency Letter, the Designated Defendant cannot issue additional letters identifying new deficiencies unless the case is part of the bellwether selection pool. Defendants, however, are conflating any deficiency with whether a PFS is “substantially complete,” leading to multiple rounds of deficiency notices.

Plaintiffs argue this practice contradicts the negotiated terms of CMO 9 and aims to prevent many plaintiffs from being deemed “substantially complete” for bellwether selection, generating grounds for dismissal despite substantial compliance.

May 16, 2024 – Dismissal of Certain Cancer Cases Requested

Plaintiffs’ lawyers are seeking court permission to dismiss certain cancer-related cases without prejudice, allowing them to be refiled later. These cases involve plaintiffs who initially believed they had ovarian, uterine, or endometrial cancer but later found they did not. Many hair relaxer lawsuits were filed quickly due to the Revlon bankruptcy rules, requiring victims to file a lawsuit or lose their ability to sue Revlon.

Consequently, attorneys filed cases without all necessary medical records to confirm cancer diagnoses and now seek to dismiss them without prejudice to avoid being permanently barred from refiling if covered cancers develop in the future.

May 6, 2024 – Battle Over Special Master Appointment

The appointment of Maura Grossman as special master is a contentious issue. The court has ordered defendants to supplement their response to Professor Grossman’s declaration of no conflict.

The Joint Statement refers to “Defendants’ counsel” without naming the attorney involved in discussions with Professor Grossman regarding TAR-related issues in another lawsuit. The court requires the defendants to provide the attorney’s name, their law firm, and the defendants they represent in this litigation.

Ironically, plaintiffs’ success in hair relaxer lawsuits may hinge not on finding incriminating documents but on proving inaction despite evidence that hair relaxers cause cancer.

There are no updates from either side regarding a hair relaxer settlement in these hair relaxer cases.

The momentum of the hair relaxer lawsuit MDL appears to be slowing down, with only 53 new cases added in the past month. This continues a five-month trend of notable decreases in new case filings. Presently, the hair relaxer MDL has a total of 8,387 pending cases.

The plaintiffs originally requested that the court order discovery from various foreign affiliates of the defendants, including L’Oréal S.A. The court approved this request recognizing the close corporate relationship between the two entities, although the court did exclude certain document categories from the order.

L’Oréal requested the court to reconsider this decision, citing inaccuracies in the facts presented and the legal and logistical difficulties of enforcing a discovery order on a French entity. However, the court was not persuaded by L’Oréal’s arguments.

Specifically, L’Oréal challenged some of the factual assertions about the relationship between L’Oréal USA and L’Oréal S.A. used by the court. The judge, however, determined that L’Oréal’s objections were largely factual interpretation rather than factual contradictions.

Additionally, L’Oréal raised concerns about complying with the discovery order without following the procedures outlined by the Hague Convention, arguing that this might conflict with the French blocking statute. Nonetheless, L’Oréal failed to convincingly demonstrate how the order would adversely affect French interests. In response to these concerns, the MDL judge allowed L’Oréal USA extra time to work with L’Oréal S.A. to manage these logistical issues.

Judge Sheila M. Finnegan has designated Honourable Paul Grimm as the Special Master for Electronic Discovery in the hair relaxer lawsuits case. This appointment came despite the defendants’ suggestion to award the role to Judge Sidney Schenkier.

Lawyers in the hair relaxer MDL are focusing on cases linking hair relaxers to uterine, endometrial, and ovarian cancers, with over 8,000 cases pending.

A detailed schedule leading to potential bellwether trials by late 2025 is set, emphasizing the importance of Plaintiff Fact Sheets for detailed case information and deadlines for discovery and expert reports.

A favorable verdict in a bellwether trial usually translates to a larger hair relaxer settlement.

The hair relaxer lawsuit MDL experienced significant growth over the past few months, with several thousand new cases added each month since the summer, but recently, this trend abruptly slowed, with only 17 new cases filed last month, bringing the total to 7,894 pending hair relaxer lawsuits.

During the hair relaxer lawsuit MDL status conference in Illinois, the court requested a new briefing schedule and addressed disagreements over the scheduling of Science Day, with key submissions due by early December.

The parties are working on a Case Management Order, and defendants reported on similar state court hair relaxer lawsuits without seeking specific court actions.

Additionally, document production timelines were set, including Revlon and Avalon’s obligations for specific document and ingredient list disclosures by mid-December, with ESI discovery issues referred to Magistrate Judge Finnegan.

The MDL for hair relaxer lawsuits has expanded to include 5,996 cases, with 3,752 new filings in the past month. In contrast, there were fewer than 200 cases pending as of June 2023.

The court has offered helpful responses to common queries about initiating a hair relaxer product lawsuit under case MDL 23-cv-00818.

One of the main companies whose chemical hair relaxer is being sued, Dabur International (which owns Namaste Laboratories), has recently switched its legal representation.

Previously defended by the law firm Kirkland & Ellis LLC (who also led the defense in the 3M earplug case), Dabur has now opted for a new set of attorneys from the law firm Baker & McKenzie LLP.

August 17, 2023: A Master Complaint has been introduced in the hair relaxer lawsuits multidistrict litigation (MDL), offering a standard document that all parties suing can refer to in their lawsuits. On the same day, 36 new cases were added to the hair relaxer MDL, bringing the total number of pending cases to 275. While this is a decrease from the previous month’s 87 new cases, such declines are typical for mid-summer.

August 4, 2023: Judge Rowland approved an official Short Form Complaint (SFC) for future lawsuits involving chemical hair relaxers and cancer. This standardized form will simplify the process, making it easier for new cases to be filed directly in the hair relaxer lawsuits MDL.

August 1, 2023: The number of cases of the hair relaxer MDL reached 236, a significant increase from the initial 21 cases. Last month alone saw 87 new cases added, and this surge in hair relaxer lawsuits is expected to continue.

Defendants proposed to bifurcate discovery, focusing first on general causation or whether hair relaxers actually cause cancer. This move is frowned upon as it could slow down case progress and is not standard practice in multidistrict litigation. The judge is unlikely to grant this request.

June 16, 2023: In the past month, 25 new hair relaxer lawsuits joined the MDL, increasing the total pending cases to 149. Created with just 21 cases, the MDL is anticipated to see a dramatic rise in new filings soon.

June 9, 2023: The defendants are pushing for a phased discovery process that starts with establishing a link between chemical hair relaxers and cancer. The plaintiffs strongly oppose this, arguing that it will unnecessarily delay the case proceedings.

June 1, 2023: A Boston University School of Public Health study linked chemical hair straighteners to fertility decline. The study, which focused especially on Black, Hispanic, and mixed-race individuals, adds to existing concerns about the health risks of such hair straightening products.