A California state court judge cut a $2 billion Roundup jury award to $86.7 million for a husband and wife who say they developed non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma from Monsanto’s Roundup herbicides.

Monsanto parent company, Bayer AG, said reducing the damages was a “step in the right direction,” but that the company still believes the verdict and damages are unwarranted. Bayer is currently facing thousands of Monsanto Roundup lawsuits.

Judge Winifred Smith refused to toss the verdict, as Bayer had originally requested.

Roundup Lawsuit

The case involved Alva and Alberta P., who said they used Roundup to control weeds on their California property for 35 years. Alva was diagnosed with diffuse large B-cell lymphoma in 2011. Alberta received her diagnosis of primary central nervous system lymphoma in 2015. Both cancers are of the non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma variety.

Roundup contains glyphosate, an active ingredient that the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) has deemed “probably carcinogenic to humans.”

The judge wrote “there is evidence that Monsanto had information that was not available to the scientific or medical community and that it sought to impede, discourage, or distort scientific inquiry and the resulting science.”However, she also said that a punitive award equal to more than four times the amount of the compensatory damages could be constitutionally challenged.

Alva’s $1 billion punitive award was reduced to $24.5 million, and Alberta’s $1 billion punitive award was cut to $44.8 million. The judge concluded that Alva had additional health issues that had nothing to do with Roundup exposure.

She also reduced their compensatory damages. Alva went from $18 million to $6.1 million, and Alberta’s compensatory damages were reduced from $37 million to $11.2 million. She explained she multiplied these new award levels by four to come up with the final punitive awards.

Despite the reductions, the plaintiffs’ lawyer called the ruling “a major victory,” and Bayer said it still plans to appeal.

Another Roundup Herbicides Award Reduced

Dewayne Johnson, a former school groundskeeper in Northern California, also saw his Monsanto lawsuit award reduced. His initial $289 million award from a jury was reduced to $78 million by San Francisco Superior Court Judge Suzanne Bolanos late last year. Johnson agreed to accept the $78 million rather than risk another trial.

Johnson was 42 years old when an unusual rash started to develop on his body. In August 2014, he was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. He blames Roundup herbicides for his disease because his job required him to mix and spray hundreds of gallons of Roundup over school grounds.

Most toxicology studies have been conducted on glyphosate alone, because it is the only active ingredient listed on Roundup. However, the U.S. National Toxicology Program is studying glyphosate formulations to see whether the end product exhibits increased toxic effects compared to glyphosate alone. The studies hope to find whether Roundup causes DNA damage or oxidative stress, both of which could be precursors to cancer.

Both cases are in the California court system. The Roundup Herbicide Lawsuit is Case No. RG17862702, in the Superior Court of the State of California, County of Alameda. The Roundup Groundskeeper Lawsuit is Case No. CGC16550128, in the Superior Court for the State of California, County of San Francisco.

If you or a loved one developed cancer after using Roundup as a farm worker or home gardener, you may have a legal claim. Legal migrant farm workers may also seek help. Learn more by filling out the form on this page for a FREE case evaluation.

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