## Facts

- Saint-Gobain Performance Plastics Corporation operated an industrial plant in Bennington, Vermont.
- The plant released perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) into the air, and testing later found very high PFOA levels in many private drinking-water wells.
- State and local officials identified an approximately 20-square-mile area as the PFOA contamination zone based on testing results.
- Several residents living in the contamination zone tested positive for elevated PFOA blood levels.
- The residents sued Saint-Gobain but did not claim they were currently sick and did not seek damages for present personal injury.
- Instead, plaintiffs sought court-supervised medical testing designed to monitor for certain cancers associated with PFOA exposure, aiming for earlier detection.
- Plaintiffs alleged that roughly 8,000 people were potentially exposed and moved to certify a class of individuals who lived in the contamination zone, drank contaminated water, and had elevated PFOA blood levels but no current symptoms.
- Saint-Gobain opposed class certification, arguing that proceeding as a class would not fairly protect absent class members who might later develop disease because claim preclusion could bar later personal-injury suits for damages.

## Issues

1. Whether a class seeking court-supervised medical monitoring for asymptomatic individuals with elevated PFOA blood levels could be certified under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 23.
2. Whether the possibility that class members might later become ill—and then face claim-preclusion defenses—defeated Rule 23’s adequacy (or otherwise made class treatment improper).

## Decision

- The court granted class certification for a class seeking medical-monitoring relief tied to PFOA exposure in the defined contamination zone.
- The court found that the proposed class satisfied Rule 23’s requirements, including that the case presented common questions suitable for classwide resolution.
- The court rejected Saint-Gobain’s argument that potential future claim-preclusion effects for later personal-injury suits made the class improper or inadequately represented.
- The court concluded that a medical-monitoring class limited to asymptomatic individuals seeking monitoring relief could proceed without treating speculative future personal-injury damages as a reason to deny certification.

## Legal Principles

- A class may be certified when Rule 23(a)’s requirements (including numerosity, commonality, typicality, and adequacy of representation) are met and the proposed form of relief fits within Rule 23(b).
- Common issues can predominate in environmental-exposure cases when the claims turn on shared proof about the source and extent of contamination, classwide exposure indicators (such as elevated blood levels), and the appropriateness of a uniform monitoring protocol.
- The risk that some class members may later develop disease does not automatically defeat adequacy or bar certification of a class seeking present medical-monitoring relief.
- Courts may address concerns about later-filed personal-injury actions through the way the class is defined and the limited relief sought, rather than denying certification based solely on predicted res judicata disputes.

## Conclusion

Sullivan held that a class of asymptomatic residents with elevated PFOA blood levels could be certified to seek court-supervised medical monitoring related to alleged PFOA contamination from Saint-Gobain’s Bennington facility, and that concerns about possible future personal-injury claims and claim-preclusion defenses did not require denial of class certification.


Sullivan v. Saint-Gobain Performance Plastics Corporation, 2019 WL 8272995 (2019)