A mass tort is a civil action involving numerous plaintiffs against one or a few corporate defendants. The tort may involve, for example, personal injuries suffered by numerous plaintiffs as a result of a defective product, or a mass disaster in which there were many injured persons, such as an airplane crash, or exposure of a large group of people to toxic chemicals or pharmaceuticals.
Patterson is a city in Stanislaus County, California, United States. The population was 11,606 at the 2000 census. It is part of the Modesto Metropolitan Statistical Area. Patterson is known as the "Apricot Capital of the World".