The New York Law Journal (7/29, Pierson, 11K) reports that a three-judge panel of the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals has “affirmed a $105 million judgment for New York City against Exxon Mobil Corp. over the petroleum giant’s contamination of groundwater with the gasoline additive methyl tertiary butyl ether, or MTBE, used until the mid-2000s to reduce emissions.” On Friday, in In re: MTBE Products Liability Litigation, the judges “rejected Exxon’s arguments that the city’s claims were preempted by the federal Clean Air Act and that the trial was tainted by juror misconduct.” The Journal adds that New York City’s case against Exxon “is one of a slew of similar cases over MTBE contamination filed by cities, states and individuals around the country. Those cases were consolidated in the Southern District of New York in a multidistrict litigation. The city’s case was chosen as a so-called bellwether trial, to give parties in the multidistrict litigation an idea of the likely outcome of trials.”