Vinocur v. Wenger Furniture & Appliances Co.

On September 10, 2015, citizen enforcer Laurence Vinocur and settling party Wenger Furniture & Appliances Co. (“Wenger Furniture”) entered into an out-of-court settlement agreement.  Vinocur had alleged that Wenger Furniture sold chairs with vinyl/PVC upholstery containing the phthalate chemical di(2-ethylhexyl)phthalate (“DEHP”) in the State of California without providing the requisite health hazard warnings.

As part of the settlement, Wenger Furniture agreed not to sell any chairs with vinyl/PVC upholstery in California after September 8, 2015, unless the chairs contain less than 1,000 parts per million of DEHP in any accessible component when analyzed using state or federally approved testing methodologies.  Chairs that do not meet the above requirements shall be sold with Proposition 65 warnings provided.  Wenger Furniture has also agreed to contact its vendors and instruct them to provide chairs that comply with the above requirements expeditiously.

The Settlement Agreement requires settlement payments of $25,500, divided therein between civil penalties, 75% of which are paid to California’s Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment, and compensation to citizen enforcer Vinocur and his counsel for their successful enforcement of this matter in the public interest.