Nevada jury hands $5.2 billion verdict against Vegas company in bottled water liver damage lawsuit

LAS VEGAS — (AP) — A jury in Nevada has delivered a $5.2 billion award in the latest large-sum lawsuit against a former Las Vegas-based bottled water company that was found responsible for causing liver damage in customers before it was recalled from store shelves in 2021.

A 12-day trial ended with the verdict Wednesday in the negligence and product liability case against AffinityLifestyles.com Inc. and its Real Water brand, according to Clark County District Court records. The jury awarded about $230 million in compensatory damages and $5 billion in punitive damages to Hunter Brown and several other plaintiffs.

Attorney Will Kemp, representing plaintiffs, told the Las Vegas Review-Journal he expects Real Water's insurance company to fight paying damages because the company has filed for bankruptcy.

Affinitylifestyles.com was headed by Brent Jones, who served as a Republican Nevada state Assembly member from 2016 to 2018. Jones and attorneys for the company did not immediately respond Thursday to emails seeking comment.

Juries have previously delivered separate verdicts against the company, awarding plaintiffs almost $3.1 billion in June,$130 million in February and $228 million in October 2023. Juries have been told that tests found Real Water contained hydrazine, a chemical used in rocket fuel that may have been introduced during treatment before bottling.

Defense attorneys have cast the company as unintentionally negligent, not reckless, because it didn’t know hydrazine was in the water and didn’t know to test for it.

Kemp represents additional plaintiffs in several more civil lawsuits still pending against the company.

Real Water was sold in distinctive boxy blue bottles as premium treated “alkalized” drinking water with healthy detoxifying properties. It was distributed to stores throughout the Southwest including Nevada, Utah, Arizona, New Mexico and the Los Angeles area and also was delivered to homes in large bottles before being pulled off shelves in March 2021.

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