US senator blasts J&J's Texas two-step bankruptcy as the pharma giant twists in the public spotlight
J&J has choreographed a legal dance that has taken the pharma giant straight into the waiting arms of a US senator. And the lawmaker has got some moves of his own.
Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-IL) took to the Senate floor to excoriate J&J’s use of the Texas two-step move to escape a mountain of litigation surrounding claims that the pharma giant’s talc-based baby powder was laced with asbestos, triggering ovarian cancer or mesothelioma. It spun out those assets into a separate company last fall, then promptly filed for bankruptcy of the new company, looking to shield the giant corporation from a mob of angry litigants bristling with more than 38,000 lawsuits threatening billions in potential judgments.
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