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WHAT WE’RE WATCHING
FIREWORKS - The first bellwether trial in the multidistrict litigation targeting Monsanto Co. with claims that its herbicide Roundup causes cancer got off to a fiery start Monday, as Judge Vince Chhabria in San Francisco chided plaintiffs lawyer Aimee Wagstaff multiple times to keep her opening statement within the limits he’d already established, namely to causation. Ross Todd reports that the judge issued a show cause order asking Wagstaff to respond in writing last night as to why she should not be sanctioned “for willfully and repeatedly violating the limitations on the subject matter that could be discussed in her opening statement.” You’ll recall that Monsanto was hit last year with a $289 million verdict, later slashed by more than $200 million, in San Francisco Superior Court in a Roundup case outside the MDL proceedings.
