FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 24, 2008
TEAM OF ENVIRONMENTAL LAWYERS NAMED AS FINALIST
FOR TRIAL LAWYER OF THE YEAR AWARD
WASHINGTON â A team of dogged environmental lawyers who won a $380 million class action lawsuit against chemical giant DuPont has been chosen as a finalist for the 2008 Trial Lawyer of the Year Award by Public Justice Foundation, the national organization of public interest lawyers and advocates, headquartered in Washington, D.C.
Mike Papantonio, Virginia M. Buchanan, Ned McWilliams and Brian H. Barr of Pensacola, Fla.; J. Farrest Taylor, Angela Mason, Joseph D. Lane and J. Keith Givens of Dothan, Ala.; and Robert F.
Kennedy, Jr. of New York, spent more than 30,000 hours on the case, representing 8,000 residents in a lawsuit that ultimately forced DuPont to clean up a zinc smelting plant disaster in Spelter, W. Va.
The Papantonio team filed the class action lawsuit in 2004, alleging negligence, public and private nuisance, trespass, strict liability and other claims against DuPont, whose zinc smelting plant had spewed arsenic, cadmium and lead through the soil and air for 100 years. The October 2007 jury trial lasted five weeks. The award included $130 million for 40 years of medical monitoring in the area; $55 million for decontaminating plantiffsâ property; and $196 million in punitive damages.
Papantonio, Buchanan, McWilliams, Barr, Taylor, Mason, Lane, Givens and Kennedy are among 22 lawyers in three cases named as finalists for their extraordinary legal work in the public interest. Twenty cases were nominated for this yearâs award, involving a range of issues, from fraudulent pricing practices by a major pharmaceutical and gender bias on Wall Street, to access for the disabled and the rights of Hurricane Katrina victims.
Detailed summaries of the Papantonio teamâs case, Perrine v. DuPont de Nemours and Company, and the other finalist cases are accessible on the Public Justice website at http://www.publicjustice.net/2008_Awards.htm.
The winner of the nationally prestigious award will be announced on July 15 at the Public Justice Foundation Annual Gala and Awards Dinner in Philadelphia.