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Article: Supreme Court OKs Agent Orange suit. (Service).(Brief Article)
- Article from:
- VFW Magazine
- Article date:
- August 1, 2003
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2003 Veterans of Foreign Wars of the United States. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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A Supreme Court decision in June allows Vietnam veterans exposed to Agent Orange to sue companies that manufactured the herbicide. The court's 4-4 vote returned the case, Dow Chemical v. Stephenson, to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd District.
A 1985 out-of-court settlement created a $180 million fund financed by Agent Orange manufacturers to pay veterans for diseases caused by the herbicide. It denied payments to vets who became ill after 1994, and the settlement money ran out in 1997. Vietnam vet Daniel Stephenson sued in 1998 after developing cancer, saying he was not properly represented in the earlier case.
Stephenson's attorney, Gerson ...