A Los Angeles jury recently delivered a billion-dollar verdict in a case alleging that talc baby
powder caused an elderly woman’s mesothelioma and death. While the family’s loss is undeniably
tragic, this verdict is just the latest in a trend of trial lawyers weaponizing
“made-for-litigation”
science.Â
It’s the trial lawyer playbook at
work — forum shopping, pervasive trial lawyer advertising, and judicial
acceptance of junk science all feed a never-ending cycle. Â
California long has been one of the nation’s worst Judicial Hellholes(r), but Los Angeles County is cementing
itself as the worst of the worst, showing how difficult it will be to break
this litigious cycle. Â
Forum shoppingÂ
Plaintiffs’ firms prefer filing cases in Judicial Hellholes(r)
thanks to low evidentiary barriers and plaintiff leaning judges in those
courts. In California, instead of seeing the label as a call to action, the
situation is growing more dire. For the second consecutive year, Los Angeles
County ranked among the Top 3 jurisdictions for mesothelioma filings. That’s not by
coincidence; it’s by design.Â
 When courts repeatedly deliver outsized verdicts with
little scrutiny of the science behind them, plaintiffs’ lawyers take note — and
follow the money.Â
 Trial lawyer advertisingÂ
To bolster this litigation machine and drum up the client base,
California’s airwaves, billboards, and more are flooded with legal services
ads. Between Jan. 1, 2024, and June 30, 2025, lawyers spent nearly $464 million on 3.9 million legal ads across
California markets.Â
In 2024, Los Angeles was the top media market in the country for
these ads, with nearly $165 million spent. More than 725,000
ads ran, encouraging potential claimants to call hotlines, fill out forms, or
join mass tort actions — often before any credible evidence of harm has been
established.Â
Beyond recruiting clients, this constant stream of alarmist
messaging serves a two-fold purpose for the trial bar by biasing potential
jurors. By the time they enter the courtroom, many jurors have been subjected
to months of misleading ads peddling junk science claims.Â
Junk science in the courtroomÂ
Once the docket is full, plaintiffs’ lawyers turn to “experts”
whose testimony often strays far from the scientific mainstream. In the Moore
talc trial that produced this billion-dollar verdict, the plaintiff’s expert,
Dr. Steven Haber, testified that spontaneously occurring mesothelioma is “exceptionally rare” and that virtually every case stems
from asbestos exposure. Â
However, peer-reviewed research overwhelmingly contradicts this
assertion. The World
Health Organization has noted that in North America, only an estimated 20% of mesothelioma
cases in women are related to asbestos exposure. Â
While Dr. Haber is not a mesothelioma expert outside the
courtroom, one of the two articles he has authored on the topic also
undermine his own claims in court. Dr. Haber documented a case of an
83-year-old woman who developed mesothelioma without evidence of past asbestos
exposure. The woman in the Moore case was 87 at the
time of her diagnosis. Age is a known risk factor for mesothelioma, regardless
of exposure. Â
Allowing Dr. Haber to testify about the purportedly
“exceptionally rare” nature of naturally occurring mesothelioma skewed the
facts during this trial. The court failed in its gatekeeping duty and should
have ensured that only reliable, scientifically grounded evidence reached
jurors, rather than disproven theories. Â
A broader junk science problemÂ
Unchecked junk science evidence in the courts unfortunately
isn’t limited only to talc. California courts continue to embrace
scientifically questionable claims in other mass tort contexts — particularly glyphosate and benzene.Â
In the Roundup cases, California
juries issued enormous awards largely grounded in a 2015 report from the International Agency
for Research on Cancer, which labeled glyphosate “probably carcinogenic.” That
report directly conflicts with conclusions of both the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and Health Canada, which found no evidence linking glyphosate
to cancer in humans.Â
Later investigations revealed that an “invited specialist,”
Christopher Portier, advised IARC on its glyphosate assessment while being paid by anti-pesticide groups and plaintiffs’ law firms
suing Monsanto. Following his involvement, the IARC study was reportedly altered in at least 10 instances to downplay findings
showing no link to cancer. Yet, California courts continue to allow this flawed
report to serve as the basis for astronomical verdicts.Â
Similarly, plaintiffs recently seized on discredited science in
liability claims alleging benzene in acne products. Filed in California federal
court last year, these suits rely on claims from a private lab, Valisure, whose
findings have been in the crosshairs before. The lawsuits asserted that acne products
contain unhealthy amounts of benzene and that the manufacturers failed to warn
consumers of these dangers in the products’ labels. However, the products only
produced benzene when stored at extreme temperatures (up to 158°F) — well above
those found in a consumer’s home or storage space under typical and reasonable
conditions. Â
The lawsuits came almost immediately following Valisure
submitting a citizen’s petition to the FDA requesting a recall of benzoyl peroxide
products, showcasing such coordinated, made-for-litigation research.
  Â
The cost of Nuclear Verdicts(r)Â
Between 2013 and 2022, California had 199 nuclear verdicts(r) in personal injury and wrongful death
litigation — the most of any state — with courts awarding more than $9 billion
in damages in these cases with individual verdicts greater than $10 million
each. Even considering its size, the state places in the Top 10 on a per-capita
basis, and Los Angeles was home to more than one-third of the verdicts.Â
 These high-dollar awards ripple through the economy:
insurers raise rates, businesses leave the state, and consumers ultimately pay
the price. Los Angeles residents pay one of the most expensive “tort taxes” in
the nation — $3,658 per person annually due to excessive tort
costs.Â
Breaking the cycleÂ
Los Angeles County has become winning turf for running the trial
lawyer playbook — where litigation strategy, not legitimate science, too often
drives courtroom outcomes. To restore fairness and confidence in the civil
justice system, judges must reassert their gatekeeping function and uphold
standards for expert testimony that align with sound science. Otherwise,
businesses will be deterred from investing in a state where justice is
determined more by marketing than by merit.Â
Justice should be based on truth, not theatrics. Until Los
Angeles courts close their doors to junk science, the cycle of billion-dollar
verdicts will continue to pad the pockets of a select few while further eroding
the rule of law. Â