LAS VEGAS (KLAS) – A jury in Southern Nevada has awarded $5.2 billion to 15 plaintiffs in the most recent lawsuit against now-bankrupt company Real Water after its product was linked to liver illnesses.
Daisy Wei was one of the plaintiffs represented in the case and described her symptoms to NewsNation’s KLAS.
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“I felt so helpless,” she said of her sickness. “So hopeless.”
“I couldn’t get out of bed,” she recalled. “I started turning all yellow, jaundice, throwing up.”
Wei said she fought her way through acute liver failure in 2020 and was dangerously close to a transplant, with at least nine hospital stays in a year.
“I was so scared to go to sleep,” Wei said. “Because I was thinking I wasn’t going to wake up.”
Wei told KLAS she and her doctors couldn’t find the reason behind her illness for months, but they eventually linked it to her longtime consumption of Real Water.
“You never expect something that is supposed to be keeping you alive to actually be poisoning you,” attorney Breanna Switzler said.
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The now-closed company came under fire in 2021, with severe sickness, liver transplants and one death linked to the to the Las Vegas-based firm’s product.
Wei and the 14 other plaintiffs in this most recent lawsuit were represented by Kemp Jones LLP, with the massive payout one of several reached in the past year.
“It’s a wake-up call to the industry,” Switzler said, “to ensure that you are making a safe product and you are testing a product you give to the public.”
Real Water was found the contain the toxic chemical hydrazine. (KLAS)
Switzler said litigation focused on hydrazine, a toxic chemical found in the water. It is also used in rocket fuel and is directly linked to liver failure, according to Kemp Jones.
Switzler told KLAS the water wasn’t tested properly, which allowed for the consumption of the substance.
“If adequate testing was done, who knows if we would have even been here today,” she said.
Wei said she is grateful to be alive, and while this settlement can’t change the past, she hopes it will help her move forward.
“It’s kind of like a little light at the end of the tunnel,” she said.
Wei told KLAS her health has improved, but she has permanent scarring on her liver and will have to undergo medical testing and treatments for the remainder of her life.
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In a previous lawsuit, an attorney for Real Water told jurors the company tested the water but did not know to test for hydrazine.
In June 2021, the FDA announced that Real Water had agreed to cease operations until they could comply with federal regulations. In August 2021, the company officially filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy.
A just had already awarded $3 billion in damages to eight other Las Vegas residents in June. A settlement with other consumers was reached for $228 million in October 2023.
