Source: Business Insurance

July 26, 2019 (Reuters) — A California judge on Thursday reduced a $2 billion jury verdict, slashing the award for a couple who blamed Bayer AG’s glyphosate-based weed killer, Roundup, for their cancer to $86.7 million. Superior Court Judge Winifred Smith of the California Superior Court in Oakland said the jury’s billion-dollar punitive damage awards were excessive and unconstitutional, but rejected Bayer’s request to strike the punitive award outright. Under Judge Smith’s final order, California couple Alva and Alberta Pilliod would receive roughly $17 million in compensatory damages and $69 million in punitive damages, down from $55 million and $2 billion, respectively. The plaintiffs still have to formally accept the reduced awards. Brent Wisner, a lawyer for the Pilliods, in a statement on Friday welcomed the decision.