Ned McWilliams

The Water Beneath Stuart

A trial set for June 5, 2023, put Stuart’s contaminated wells, firefighting foam, and decades of company records on the same calendar. Ned McWilliams helped prepare the proof. No jury assembled, but the resulting settlements now direct billions toward water treatment while personal-injury claims proceed through a stricter federal docket.

The Wells

Stuart draws drinking water from wells beneath Florida’s Atlantic coast. In 2016, state regulators informed the city that two synthetic chemicals—PFOA and PFOS—were present above then-applicable federal health-advisory levels in some of its well water. Testing ultimately detected one or both compounds in nearly every city well.

The city traced the contamination to aqueous film-forming foam used for decades in local firefighting exercises. Its lawsuit alleged that manufacturers placed PFAS-containing products into commerce despite knowing the chemicals would persist and spread. Stuart installed an ion-exchange system designed to reduce the compounds to undetectable levels, then sought to place the treatment expense on the manufacturers rather than its roughly 17,000 residents.

The federal court consolidated Stuart’s claim in the AFFF multidistrict litigation in Charleston, South Carolina. U.S. District Judge Richard M. Gergel selected Stuart as the first public-water bellwether. Ned McWilliams, a Levin Papantonio shareholder who serves on the litigation’s science and discovery committees, joined the trial team. The federal court now reports more than 10,000 associated cases and tens of thousands of plaintiffs in the MDL; Stuart supplied the first municipal well field prepared for a jury.

Twenty-Two Years

The preparation joined hydrogeology to corporate history. Water samples and treatment models addressed where the chemicals traveled and what removal would cost. Depositions and records dating to the 1960s addressed what manufacturers knew. McWilliams told reporters that 3M had been the sole domestic manufacturer of PFOS. He described evidence that the company knew its chemistry had entered the blood of the general population, considered notifying the Environmental Protection Agency, and withheld the information for twenty-two years.

A retired 3M toxicologist, John Butenhoff, gave video testimony that 3M was more likely than not the source of PFOS found around the world. Stuart also planned to use internal studies and regulatory records to establish notice. Judge Gergel ruled that evidence concerning 3M’s compliance with federal reporting duties and its 2006 settlement with the EPA could bear on knowledge of the alleged dangers, subject to an appropriate limiting instruction.

As trial approached, McWilliams stated the scale of the case directly: “Next to global warming, this is the biggest environmental catastrophe to ever happen.” The statement rested on a local record—dated documents, measured concentrations, named wells, and the resin vessels Stuart had already installed.

Monday Morning

Case Management Order 19G placed Stuart on the June 5, 2023, trial calendar. The order required witness lists, jury instructions, deposition designations, pretrial briefs, and core exhibit lists. By late May, the parties had moved from general discovery into the particulars of what jurors would see and hear.

Judge Gergel denied two contested 3M motions in limine on May 15. The rulings permitted Stuart to offer evidence concerning 3M’s reporting obligations and EPA settlement as relevant to notice, and to question expert witnesses about compensation that could show bias. Other motions became moot after Stuart disclaimed reliance on the disputed material. The order set the evidentiary boundary for a trial then three weeks away, leaving liability for later resolution.

On Friday, June 2, DuPont, Chemours, and Corteva announced an agreement with public water systems, displacing the Stuart trial scheduled for the following Monday. Later that month, 3M announced a separate nationwide public-water agreement. The Stuart case had been prepared to test source, knowledge, and cleanup costs; the announced agreements instead moved the claims into a settlement process.

Four Settlements

Judge Gergel finally approved four public-water settlements. The DuPont group agreed to pay up to $1.185 billion, and 3M agreed to pay between $10.5 billion and $12.5 billion. Tyco and Chemguard agreed to $750 million, while BASF agreed to $312.5 million plus $4 million for notice administration. The agreements resolve defined public-water claims while leaving liability and the MDL’s personal-injury cases outside their scope.

Allocation follows the engineering of a treatment plant. The procedures use each affected source’s flow rate and PFAS concentration as principal inputs, then apply specified adjustments. The result depends on claims data rather than a flat payment per utility. On July 22, 2026, administration remains active: the authorized settlement site lists July 31 for Phase Two public-water forms and August 1 for Phase Two special-needs forms under the DuPont and 3M programs.

The money has reached operating systems. In September 2025, the Orange County Water District and fourteen local providers reported an expected $131 million over eight years from the first phase of the 3M and DuPont settlements, with about $23 million received. The district said 49 groundwater wells had returned to service with treatment operating and 57 more systems were being planned, designed, or built. The national settlements are financing pumps, treatment media, construction, and the return of cleaner water to distribution networks.

Settlement at the Trial Date

McWilliams had reached another mass-tort settlement at the edge of trial. Federal Pradaxa claims were centralized in southern Illinois in 2012 after patients alleged that the anticoagulant caused severe or fatal bleeding and that Boehringer Ingelheim had not adequately warned of the risk. Judge David R. Herndon appointed McWilliams to the plaintiffs’ executive committee.

The first trial was scheduled for September 2014. In May, Boehringer agreed to a $650 million program covering approximately 4,000 federal and state claims. The company denied wrongdoing and continued to defend the medicine. The program assigned payments according to claim-specific factors, including the alleged injury. Readiness for one jury had created a common evidentiary record for thousands of individual files.

AFFF Bellwether Preparation

The AFFF personal-injury track has not followed the public-water settlements to closure. A first personal-injury bellwether had been set for October 20, 2025. On August 15, Judge Gergel vacated that date after learning of a large inventory of unfiled claims, many potentially unvetted. Case Management Order 35 created a filing window and required diagnosis records, fact sheets, and proof of exposure for claims involving kidney cancer, testicular cancer, ulcerative colitis, thyroid disease, liver cancer, or thyroid cancer.

In February 2026, Case Management Order 37 established a portal process for identifying noncompliant claims, giving plaintiffs an opportunity to cure, and permitting dismissal motions if deficiencies remained. The following month, Case Management Order 26N recorded that party discovery in the Group B bellwether pool was substantially complete. It directed proposals by July 20 for selecting an additional ulcerative-colitis plaintiff and setting expert discovery; already approved thyroid-disease and ulcerative-colitis plaintiffs were to advance when that phase began.

By July 22, 2026, the court had not set a replacement trial date. The MDL continued screening files before advancing claims to jurors, with McWilliams remaining on its science and discovery committees. In Stuart, ion-exchange treatment continued removing PFAS from raw water before distribution.