CVN screenshot of plaintiff attorney Will Kemp delivering his closing argument
Las Vegas, NV - A Nevada state court jury returned a massive $3 billion+ verdict on Friday in favor of eight Las Vegas residents who allege a purported health drink contaminated with a dangerous chemical gave them severe liver disease, and the full trial was recorded gavel-to-gavel by Courtroom View Network.
The Clark County jury delivered Friday’s verdict following a trial that kicked off on May 31 with allegations that Affinity Lifestyles - the now-defunct company that sold the beverage touting the supposed health benefits of high alkaline levels - contaminated the drink during the manufacturing process with hydrazine, a toxic chemical used in jet fuel.
The plaintiffs, five children and three adults, alleged that the drink put them into acute liver failure with some having to eventually undergo risky and expensive liver transplants. The defense conceded liability for the plaintiffs' injuries prior to the trial, leaving the jury tasked solely with determining the appropriate amount of damages. The defense maintained that supposed industry-standard tests for a product like Real Water simply weren’t designed to detect hydrazine and asked jurors not to award any punitive damages.
The jury rejected that argument, awarding the plaintiffs $89.75 million in compensatory damages and $3 billion in punitive damages.
Friday’s verdict follows another plaintiff victory in Real Water litigation. In February at another trial recorded by CVN jurors awarded $30 million in compensatory and $100 million in punitive damages in a similar trial. Another trial last October ended with a $28.5 million compensatory and $200 million punitive verdict. Another trial is scheduled for this coming October.
Attorneys for the parties did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The full trial, including all expert witness testimony and digital images of the exhibits and demonstratives used in the courtroom, is available for unlimited on-demand viewing with a subscription to CVN’s online trial video library. Along with this trial, subscribers also get access to hundreds of other civil trials in a wide range of practice areas featuring top plaintiff and defense attorneys from throughout the United States.
The plaintiffs were represented by Campbell & Williams and by Kemp Jones LLP, the same firm that represented plaintiffs in the two previous trials. Kemp Jones also represents the plaintiff in a major ongoing product liability trial in Las Vegas involving Nissan airbags currently being webcast and recorded by CVN.
The defense was represented by Wood Smith Henning Berman LLP.
Judge Joe Hardy presided over the trial.
The case is captioned Christopher Wren v. AffinityLifestyles.com, Inc., d/b/a Real Water, case number A-21-831169-B in Nevada’s Eighth Judicial District Court in Clark County.
E-mail David Siegel at dsiegel@cvn.com