The Missouri Senate has approved legislation designed to reduce high dollar legal awards coming from the St. Louis court system.
The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports Republicans in Missouri have tried for years to change laws allowing plaintiffs to combine legal cases.
The state's current law has been used in St. Louis courts to allow dozens of plaintiffs from within the city and from out of state to file lawsuits together. In February, 22 women were awarded $4.7 billion after claiming Johnson & Johnson baby powder caused their ovarian cancer. Many of the plaintiffs were not from Missouri.
Under the proposed change, an incident must have occurred in the same county or the parties in the lawsuit must live in the same county.
The bill now goes to the House.
