California Groundskeeper Beats The Chemical Giant Monsanto!

A California school groundskeeper was awarded $289 million from Monsanto.

A California groundskeeper may not live to see his children grow up. However, his family will be taken care of for the foreseeable future. A federal judge awarded Dewayne Johnson nearly $300 million after the jury found chemical company Monsanto was liable in his terminal cancer.

The jury also found that Monsanto had "acted with malice or oppression" and ruled that it knew or should have known the weedkiller was dangerous. During the trial, the court heard that Johnson may have just months to live and his wife had been forced to work two jobs to help pay for his treatment for non-Hodgkin's lymphoma.

Johnson has stage four cancer from non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. He is in his mid-40s and may not live much longer. The federal court pushed his case ahead to make sure he would see the jury make a decision that could impact companies that push out products that cause side effects.

Monsanto, the company that owns Round Up weed killer. The herbicide is known for killing weeds and crabgrass. The chemicals are powerful. But within those chemicals was glyphosate, an active chemical that could cause allergens to infect open wounds. Longtime exposure could serious damage skin and could be cancerous.

Monsanto disputes the claims and vows to appeal this decision.

In a statement to the newspaper, Scott Partridge, Vice President of Monsanto, said "glyphosate does not cause cancer, and did not cause Mr. Johnson's cancer" adding, "We will appeal this decision and continue to vigorously defend this product, which has a 40-year history of safe use and continues to be a vital, effective, and safe tool for farmers and others."

Monsanto is facing about 2,000 other lawsuits from cancer patients, their families or their estates who claim their products also gave them cancer.

Johnson is an African American man who has two children.