Plaintiffs’ attorneys are spending tens of millions of dollars for TV and digital advertisements to seek clients for mass tort cases, according to a recent front-page story in The Wall Street Journal (WSJ).
The WSJ reported the ads shown most frequently in 2023 included ones for soliciting individuals who might have been exposed to contaminated water at the Camp Lejeune Marine base in North Carolina; used Johnson & Johnson’s talc products; or were exposed to a firefighting foam which allegedly contained chemicals that cause cancer and other illnesses.
The surge in advertising to recruit plaintiffs for mass tort cases is being driven by third-party litigation funders, particularly private-equity firms, and hedge funds, who see the potential for lucrative returns in funding these large volumes of lawsuits, the WSJ found.
The WSJ story’s key data points are below:
- Nearly 800,000 television advertisements for mass tort cases ran in 2023, costing over $160 million.
- More than $106 million was spent by the 10 biggest digital legal advertisers in 2023, according to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
- $20 million to $100 million is the average dollar amount of the loans being provided to individual law firms from third-party litigation funders, with prospective returns for funders reaching 20% for riskier mass tort litigation cases.
- 24% increase in federal civil cases filed in 2023, driven by a rise in mass tort lawsuits.
“In almost all the mass tort cases, you can find big law firms that have taken it (third-party litigation funding), or if they haven’t, they’ve considered it,” Michael McDonald, a partner with Morning Investments, a financial advisory firm, told the WSJ.
To learn more about these issues, read Triple-I’s report on how third-party litigation funding impacts the pricing and affordability of insurance and visit Triple-I’s legal system abuse and social inflation knowledge hub.