On August, 2, 2021m A Kansas federal judge gave final approval to a $12.5 million settlement resolving claims that Hill’s Pet Nutrition Inc. sold dog food with dangerous levels of vitamin D, while awarding $4 million in attorney fees to class counsel.
The MDL was consolidated in July 2019, after the U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation found that there were common factual issues among the suits and that consolidating would streamline the process by eliminating duplicated efforts in discovery, the possibility of inconsistent class certification rulings, and other pretrial issues.
The suits each claim that varieties of dog food sold by Hill’s Pet Nutrition contain dangerous levels of vitamin D, with some plaintiffs alleging the food led to their pets’ deaths. While dogs do require some vitamin D, too much can result in serious health issues, including vomiting, loss of appetite, weight loss, renal failure and death, according to the suits.
While Hill’s recalled some of its specialty pet food products in January 2019, the pet food company knew more of its products contained the dangerous vitamin D levels and should have instituted a recall much earlier, according to the suit.
The plaintiffs are represented by Gary E. Mason of Mason Lietz & Klinger LLP, Rachel Schwartz of Stueve Siegel Hanson LLP, LLP and Scott Kamber of KamberLaw LLC.
The case is In re: Hill’s Pet Nutrition Inc. Dog Food Products Liability Litigation, case number 2:19-md-02887, in the U.S. District Court for the District of Kansas.
