In Re "Agent Orange" Product Liability Litigation

How later courts describe this case

• noting that regulatory “risk assessments may lead to control of a toxic substance even though the probability of harm to any individual is small” while, in civil litigation “a far higher probability (greater than 50%)” is required
• noting that it does not make sense to require "that the manufacturers of all potential causal agents be joined” if "it is not within plaintiffs power” and that if the manufacturers claim other parties are joint tortfeasors, the manufacturers are entitled to implead the joint tortfeasors
• preparing to conduct a jury trial of ten plaintiffs with “typical injuries . . . characteristic of those of the class”
• noting Agent Orange litigation proceeds on diversity jurisdiction since federal question jurisdiction has been rejected
• discussing limited Veterans Administration benefits currently payable to spouses and children of veterans
• requiring each defendant to establish that "its product could not have caused the plaintiffs' injury or, alternatively, that it should only be responsible for a proportion of the damage " (emphasis added)
• “as one expert put it, ‘all of us have probably been exposed to dioxin at some time’ ”
• court must focus on absence of collusion in settlement negotiations, in addition to whether interests of all class members were adequately considered