Chavez v. Occidental Chem. Corp.

Paul A. Engelmayer, United States District Judge

In 1993, a group of individuals from countries including Costa Rica, Ecuador, and Panama filed a putative class action in Texas state court against a number of *522chemical manufacturers including, among others, the defendant here, Occidental Chemical Corp. ("Occidental"). The plaintiffs had all lived or worked on banana plantations. They alleged that they had suffered adverse health consequences as a result of exposure to a chemical pesticide called dibromochloropropane ("DBCP"). In 2010, some 17 years later, after a long train of procedural…