Held v. Mueller Sports Medicine, Inc.

The parties involved in the case Held v. Mueller Sports Medicine, Inc. executed a Consent Judgment on November 6, 2015.  In this matter, citizen enforcer Anthony E. Held, Ph.D., P.E. alleged that Mueller Sports Medicine, Inc. (“Mueller”) sold vinyl/PVC gloves containing the phthalate chemical diisononyl phthalate (“DINP”) in the State of California without providing the requisite health hazard warnings.  

As part of the agreement, Mueller agreed not to sell any vinyl/PVC gloves in California after October 1, 2015, unless the gloves contain no more than 1,000 parts per million of DINP when analyzed using state or federally approved testing methodologies.

The Consent Judgment required settlement payments of $30,000, divided therein between civil penalties, 75% of which are paid to California’s Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment, and compensation to whistleblower Held and his counsel for their successful enforcement of this matter in the public interest.