NEW YORK– Napoli Shkolnik PLLC concluded 2021 with another successful year in securing victories for clients in many practice areas, including class action, mass tort, pharmaceutical litigation, environmental litigation, and civil rights, among others.
In 2021, the firm saw two landmark verdicts for victims of the opioid crisis. In November, Napoli Shkolnik clients Lake and Trumbull Counties secured a jury verdict against CVS, Walgreens, and Walmart in Ohio confirming the defendants fueled the opioid epidemic by flooding communities with opioids. The following month, a jury held Teva Pharmaceuticals USA, Inc., Cephalon, Inc., Actavis, LLC, Actavis Pharma, Inc., Watson Laboratories, Inc., and Anda, Inc. responsible for causing a public nuisance in the New York Opioid Jury Trial. The defendants were found to be minimizing the addictiveness of opioids with misleading marketing. Damages trials for both cases will be held later this year.
“We are proud of our track record in delivering justice for victims of injuries and wrongs, and are committed to maintaining our high rate of historic settlements across all of our practice areas,” said Marie Napoli, Founding Partner at Napoli Shkolnik.
Following Napoli Shkolnik’s landmark $625 million settlement for victims of the Flint water crisis, the claims period for those affected by the crisis is now open, finally bringing closure to thousands of families. The claims period opened on January 12 of this year and will run through May 12, 2022. The fight continues with the remaining defendants who have yet to claim responsible for their role in this disaster.
Napoli Shkolnik partner Chris Schnieders has been deeply involved in the litigation against Monsanto, the makers of the herbicide Roundup. He and his team have secured a substantial settlement, which will be distributed to thousands of the firm’s clients.
In June 2021, in light of the rising number of social and racial injustice incidents in New York and around the country, Napoli Shkolnik announced a new joint law office with long-time colleague, nationally renowned civil rights attorney Ben Crump. The Ben Crump Napoli Shkolnik firm seeks to bring justice to marginalized communities. In July, the team filed a lawsuit against Johnson & Johnson on behalf of members of the National Council of Negro Women claiming that J&J specifically marketed its talcum-based baby powder to Black women, despite knowing its link to ovarian cancers.
Napoli Shkolnik and Ben Crump also filed a complaint against Gopher Resource lead-smelting plant last year on behalf of a former Gopher worker and his family. The Tampa plant’s unsafe conditions exposed hundreds of workers to dangerous levels of lead, many of whom are now suffering devastating health effects.
