Largest Class Action Group Settlements and Recovery Funds

John Eddie Williams, Jr. served as one of five private attorneys retained by the State of Texas to sue the major tobacco companies, producing a $15.3 billion settlement in January 1998, the largest single-case settlement in U.S. history at the time.

As court-appointed co-lead plaintiffs' counsel in AFFF MDL 2873, Paul J. Napoli of Napoli Shkolnik negotiated a settlement requiring 3M Company to pay up to $12.5 billion to public water systems contaminated by PFAS compounds in firefighting foam, the largest drinking-water settlement in American legal history.

As court-appointed co-lead counsel in AFFF MDL 2873, Paul J. Napoli of Napoli Shkolnik helped negotiate a $1.185 billion class settlement with DuPont, Chemours, and Corteva to compensate public water systems across the United States for PFAS contamination tied to firefighting foam.

Hunter Shkolnik of Napoli Shkolnik represented Nassau County in negotiations that produced a $1.1 billion settlement with McKesson, Cardinal Health, and AmerisourceBergen, the three largest prescription drug distributors in the United States.

Steven Marks and Ricardo Martinez-Cid of Podhurst Orseck served on the NFL Concussion Litigation Plaintiffs' Executive Committee, helping negotiate an uncapped settlement projected to exceed $1 billion for more than 20,000 retired players suffering traumatic brain injuries.

Monsanto and its chemical spinoff Solutia agreed in August 2003 to pay $700 million to resolve claims from more than 21,000 Anniston, Alabama residents who were exposed to polychlorinated biphenyls the company manufactured and dumped near their homes for nearly four decades.

A federal jury in San Francisco found Google liable for invasion of privacy and intrusion upon seclusion after the company kept collecting data from third-party apps for users who had switched off the Web & App Activity setting. On September 3, 2025, the jury awarded $425,651,947 in compensatory damages and declined to award punitive damages. The award is a single class-wide figure shared by two nationwide classes of about 98 million users, not one person's recovery. The judge refused to set the verdict aside in August 2026, and Google has appealed to the Ninth Circuit.

Aaron Podhurst served as lead class counsel in a $410 million settlement resolving claims that Bank of America systematically manipulated the order of debit card transactions to drive up overdraft fees charged to more than 13 million customers.

In multidistrict litigation before Judge Andrew J. Guilford, CaseyGerry served as class counsel in a $393.5 million settlement resolving allegations that Wells Fargo secretly loaded unnecessary collateral protection insurance onto auto loan accounts, pushing hundreds of thousands of borrowers into delinquency and causing roughly 27,000 wrongful vehicle repossessions.

BASF Corporation agreed to pay $316.5 million to resolve claims by public water systems across the United States over PFAS contamination tied to firefighting foam. The sum is a $312.5 million settlement fund plus $4 million for notice and administration. Judge Richard Gergel approved it on Nov. 22, 2024, in the federal multidistrict litigation over aqueous film-forming foam. It is a class recovery shared among many water systems, not one plaintiff's award.

Beasley Allen, representing Alabama on contingency, secured $220 million from opioid distributors Cardinal Health and Cencora after roughly 18 months of litigation, with every dollar directed to statewide opioid abatement programs.

Morgan & Morgan's John Yanchunis served as court-appointed co-lead counsel in the multidistrict litigation over Capital One's 2019 data breach, which exposed the personal information of roughly 98 million U.S. customers. The $190 million settlement won final approval in 2022 as one of the largest data breach recoveries in U.S. history.

A Philadelphia jury found that Walmart had denied nearly 188,000 Pennsylvania workers paid rest breaks and pay for off-the-clock hours, and the judgment entered on that verdict grew to roughly $188 million.

As court-appointed lead plaintiffs' counsel, Morgan & Morgan's John Yanchunis negotiated the $117.5 million settlement resolving claims from Yahoo's 2013-2016 data breaches, the largest theft of personal data in history, touching roughly 3 billion accounts worldwide. Judge Lucy Koh approved the fund in 2020 after rejecting an earlier version as inadequate.

Walkup shareholder Michael A. Kelly served on the plaintiffs' leadership team that secured a $117 million settlement from former PG&E officers and directors over wildfires that ranked among the deadliest in California history.

Colson Hicks Eidson served as co-counsel to a class of Jewish families and helped reach a roughly $100 million settlement with Service Corporation International after workers at two South Florida Menorah Gardens cemeteries buried people in the wrong graves and discarded scattered remains.

Gallagher & Kennedy's Kevin Neal and Kenneth Ralston served as Arizona's outside counsel and secured an $85 million settlement from Google over the deceptive collection of smartphone users' location data.

Peter Merrigan of Sweeney Merrigan Personal Injury Lawyers represented 125 Massachusetts cities and towns in claims against Johnson and Johnson and the three largest opioid distributors, recovering $84.1 million in aggregate from the national opioid settlements.

M. Anderson Berry of Arnold Law Firm was among plaintiffs' counsel in a $60 million class action settlement against Morgan Stanley Smith Barney arising from two separate failures to secure customer data on decommissioned IT equipment, affecting approximately 15 million current and former clients.

A St. Louis County jury awarded $55.4 million to more than 400 investors in InnerPoint Energy Corp. after Simon Law proved that company insiders, including descendants of Anheuser-Busch co-founder Eberhard Anheuser, concealed a rising Michigan energy asset while telling shareholders their investments were worthless.

Roughly 700,000 Texas auto insurance policyholders shared a $52 million class settlement after a federal lawsuit showed Farmers Group charged long-term customers higher premiums than new customers for coverage that was functionally identical.

Robert Boatman and co-counsel recovered more than $50 million for Ventura County ranching and farming families whose herds, fencing, rangeland, and groves burned in the 2017 Thomas Fire.

Gayle Blatt of CaseyGerry served as court-appointed co-lead counsel in a multidistrict proceeding against 23andMe, securing a $46.75 million settlement for approximately 6.9 million customers whose genetic ancestry profiles and personal data were stolen in a 2023 credential-stuffing attack.

Geoff McDonald and co-counsel represented roughly 7,600 universal life policyholders hit with steep cost-of-insurance increases by Banner Life and William Penn, securing a $22.5 million cash fund inside a settlement the court valued at more than $40 million.