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A federal bankruptcy judge has set a deadline of March 15, 2022 for receipt of claim forms from people who say they were sexually assaulted by priests and employees of Roman Catholic Diocese of Norwich, Conn., the New London (Conn.) Day reported. Victims who fail to do so will likely lose their right to obtain compensation from the diocese and possibly its parishes. The diocese filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy in July as it faced more than 60 lawsuits filed by young men who charge they were sexually assaulted as boys by Christian Brothers and other staff at the diocese-run Mount Saint John Academy in Deep River from 1990 to 2002. Mount Saint John was a residential school for troubled boys whose board of directors was headed by retired Bishop of Norwich Daniel Reilly. Since then, additional people whose sexual assault allegations involved not only Mount Saint John but diocesan churches have filed claims in the bankruptcy case. The court has set a deadline of Jan. 31, 2022 for the diocese to file its plan, but that could be extended. The 51 parishes in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Norwich are now seeking to join the diocese in seeking bankruptcy protection from sexual abuse claims against priests and other employees and will have to contribute funds to the settlement. This would leave victims unable to sue the parishes in the future. The official notice of the deadline or "bar date" from the Bankruptcy Court for the District of Connecticut states in bold letters that anyone who was sexually abused, on or before July 15, 2021, the date the diocese filed bankruptcy, and believes the diocese may be responsible for the sexual abuse, must file a claim.

Johnson & Johnson will likely have to wait until next year before it can restart negotiations to resolve 38,000 lawsuits filed by people who claim one of its oldest products, baby powder, causes cancer and other diseases, Bloomberg News reported. A federal judge questioned whether spending money on formal settlement talks makes sense while victim advocates oppose mediation. “I can order it tomorrow, but I don’t have any great anticipation there will be” progress, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Michael B. Kaplan said yesterday during a court hearing in Trenton, N.J. “I’d rather have their hearts and souls in it.” Last month, J&J created a unit to hold its talc liabilities and then put that company, which has no operations, into bankruptcy. The goal is to negotiate with victims to create a trust with at least $2 billion to pay all current and future baby-powder claims. The bankrupt unit, LTL Management, wants to get mediation started immediately, Greg Gordon, the lawyer leading the chapter 11 case, said in court. Before LTL filed bankruptcy, the groups made “good progress” in settlement talks as part of a separate bankruptcy case filed in Delaware by the former J&J talc supplier, Imerys Talc America, Gordon said. Tens of thousands of women claim the talc in baby powder causes cancer, a charge J&J denies. For years, the company focused on fighting lawsuits one at a time in courts around the country until the consumer giant switched tactics and decided to try to resolve all current and future claims in bankruptcy.

A group representing people alleging that Johnson & Johnson’s talc-based products cause cancer said on Friday that the planned spinoff of the pharmaceutical giant’s consumer health division will create new problems for talc claimants, Reuters reported. The group, known as the talc claimants’ committee, filed a statement with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of New Jersey, where the chapter 11 case of J&J’s subsidiary that holds its talc liabilities was transferred this month. The subsidiary, LTL Management LLC, filed for bankruptcy protection in October with the goal of settling 38,000 talc cases. J&J maintains that its talc products are safe. In Friday’s statement, the committee said that J&J’s plan to split its consumer division from its pharmaceuticals business “would create further barriers between tort claimants and assets that should be available to satisfy claims.” It contends that if J&J becomes two separately traded entities, disputes will arise over which one will be on the hook for a funding agreement in the LTL bankruptcy. The committee also accused J&J of using the bankruptcy process as a litigation advantage. J&J said when it announced the split that the move had nothing to do with the talc litigation or the bankruptcy. A status conference is scheduled on Monday before U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Michael Kaplan in Trenton, New Jersey.

Bikram's Yoga College of India LP, which filed for bankruptcy in 2017 after facing legal judgments related to sexual harassment, discrimination and other allegations, has sold six additional cars that were once part of the hot yoga pioneer's collection, Dow Jones Newswires reported. The vehicles grossed $250,000, with a 2009 Rolls-Royce Phantom going for $155,000. Parties receiving the proceeds will include City National Bank and creditor Minakshi Jafa-Bodden. The cars also included a 2002 Bentley Arnage and a 2008 Mercedes Benz. Late last year, the bankruptcy auction of 22 of Bikram's cars received winning bids totaling $915,000.

A lawyer for sex abuse survivors in the Boy Scouts of America's bankruptcy said yesterday that two attorneys for the official committee representing survivors' interests in the case should be disqualified after the committee sent an "inflammatory" email about the BSA's proposed reorganization plan and sex abuse litigation settlement, Reuters reported. Ken Rothweiler of Eisenberg, Rothweiler, Winkler, Eisenberg & Jeck claimed during a virtual hearing before U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Laurie Selber Silverstein that James Stang and John Lucas of Pachulski Stang Ziehl & Jones, who represent the official committee, knew the email was inappropriate but allowed it to be sent to thousands of survivors anyway. Rothweiler told the judge during the hearing that the email, which encouraged the survivors to vote against the plan, has tainted the voting process. Sex abuse claimants have until Dec. 14 to submit votes on the plan, which would establish a trust to compensate men who say they were sexually abused as children by troop leaders. The trust currently has around $1.887 billion available for survivors. The plan is supported by one large survivor group that Rothweiler works with. However, the official committee opposes the deal, saying that the amount being offered to more than 80,000 abuse claimants is too low. The committee sent an email on Nov. 6 to around 20,000 survivors that included a letter from plaintiffs’ attorney Tim Kosnoff, who is not part of the committee. The Boy Scouts say the letter contained false and defamatory statements. Additionally, the letter directed readers to Kosnoff’s Twitter account, where he has attacked Rothweiler, among others involved in the bankruptcy.

The lawyer who oversaw payments to victims of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks has agreed to mediate part of the fight between Johnson & Johnson and thousands of women who claim the company’s baby powder causes ovarian cancer, Bloomberg News reported. Kenneth R. Feinberg would share duties with another mediator as part of an effort to resolve nearly 14,000 lawsuits against J&J and its former supplier, Imerys Talc America. Imerys filed bankruptcy in Delaware in 2019 with plans to force J&J to help pay for a victim’s trust that would settle all current and future lawsuits. J&J claims it isn’t responsible for helping Imerys. During a virtual court hearing Monday, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Laurie Selber Silverstein said she will likely sign an order setting up the mediation once lawyers submit a final version. The talks are unlikely to resolve all of the baby powder lawsuits that J&J faces because the mediation only covers liabilities faced by Imerys and another talc mining company. J&J is involved because it has previously promised to indemnify Imerys against all talc lawsuits. To try to end all current and future baby powder claims, J&J put a unit into bankruptcy with plans to pay at least $2 billion into a victims trust. J&J faces about 38,000 lawsuits claiming the talc in its baby powder was tainted and causes ovarian cancer and other health problems, mostly in women.

Washington state's attorney general on Monday argued that three large drug distributors' excessive shipments of pain pills helped create the U.S. opioid epidemic, calling it the "worst man-made public health crisis in history," at the start of a trial seeking $95 billion from the companies, Reuters reported. Washington Attorney General Bob Ferguson made that argument as a trial got underway in the state's bid to recover more money from the distributors McKesson Corp, Cardinal Health Inc. and AmerisourceBergen Corp than it would receive in a $26 billion nationwide settlement. He said the companies fell short of their legal obligations to operate systems to prevent the diversion of opioids from legitimate uses. They shipped 3.8 billion opioid doses into the state from 2006 to 2018, another lawyer for the state said. "Indeed, we know they were aware of the harms flowing from their conduct because in private correspondence company executives mocked individuals suffering the painful affects of opioid dependence," Ferguson said in his opening statement. As just one example, the state's lawyers displayed a 2011 email in which an AmerisourceBergen executive parodied the theme song to the TV show "The Beverly Hillbillies" while describing how people drove to obtain drugs at Florida pill mills. Don Migliori, another lawyer for Washington, said a systemic failure by the companies stop suspicious orders of opioids going to pharmacies "proved to be the most influential factor in the development of the opioid addiction crisis in this state."

A lawyer for two Ohio counties urged a federal jury on Monday to hold three major pharmacy chains responsible for fueling an opioid epidemic in their communities as the first trial the companies have faced over the drug crisis neared its end, Reuters reported. Mark Lanier, a lawyer for Lake and Trumbull counties, told a federal jury in Cleveland that a verdict in the case against CVS Health Corp, Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc. and Walmart Inc. would have ramifications all across the country. The counties accused the companies of creating a public nuisance in the form of the epidemic by failing to prevent excessive amounts of addictive pain pills from flooding their communities or identify "red flags" of misuse. Lanier said the pharmacies sometimes filled prescriptions for a year's worth of pain pills at a time and that their screening policies for a time were "porous beyond all description." Communities were "devastated" by their flood of opioids they failed to stop, he said. The companies have denied wrongdoing and said the blame falls on others, including doctors and government regulators. Their lawyers are expected to deliver closing arguments later on Monday.

Businesses suing insurers for billions in losses from COVID-19 shutdowns are entering a new phase: jury trials, the Wall Street Journal reported. Over the past year, judges have ruled in favor of insurers in hundreds of cases, backing up the carriers’ rejections of “business interruption” insurance claims. Many of those rulings have involved policies with virus-specific exclusions, which can make the cases more open-and-shut for judges. But last month, a jury in federal court in Kansas City, Mo., heard a restaurateur duke it out with a unit of Cincinnati Financial Corp. in a case without the virus-specific exclusion. It was the first coverage dispute, out of more than 1,800 COVID-19 lawsuits filed so far, to reach jurors, according to a COVID-19 litigation-tracking effort at the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School. While Cincinnati Financial still won, the trial signals that policyholders may be entering a new phase, in which their cases survive early motions to dismiss and get a fuller hearing than they have generally gotten so far. The plaintiffs in this new wave are expected to feature some large companies and organizations, such as Major League Baseball, a far cry from the local restaurants and other small businesses that so far have dominated action. And these big clients in many instances are represented by law firms with deep experience in insurance-coverage disputes, potentially setting the stage for some dragged-out, high-stakes legal fights. Large companies often have tailored policies, which don’t always have the boilerplate virus-specific exclusion that is common in policies sold to smaller businesses, said Tom Baker, a Penn law-school professor who runs the litigation-tracking project.