A bankruptcy judge declined on Friday to shield 3M Co. from continued litigation involving its military earplugs, a setback for the conglomerate’s attempt to shift the mass injury claims to a friendlier forum, WSJ Pro Bankruptcy reported. Judge Jeffrey Graham of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Indianapolis said he wouldn’t extend to 3M the same protection against the pending earplug injury lawsuits that its subsidiary Aearo Technologies LLC received by filing for chapter 11 last month. The bankruptcy filing marked the latest of several recent attempts by corporate defendants to leverage the powers of chapter 11 to resolve legal troubles. But 3M didn’t succeed as other businesses have. Judge Graham’s ruling leaves roughly 230,000 personal injury claims pending against 3M, which didn’t seek chapter 11 protection itself, but has played a central role in the bankruptcy proceedings of Aearo, the earplugs’ manufacturer. Friday’s decision backed plaintiffs’ lawyers, who have alleged the defective earplugs left U.S. military veterans with lasting hearing damage and won $265 million in jury verdicts before Aearo filed bankruptcy. 3M, which has denied the combat earplugs are unsafe, said it would appeal Friday’s ruling and that continuing to litigate the earplug cases one-by-one over the coming years “benefits no one.”
