Newsletter RSS

Mealey's Asbestos

  • May 08, 2024

    With Asbestos Trial Looming, Parties Argue Maritime Law Before 1st Circuit

    BOSTON — Parties to an asbestos case set for jury trial this month argued before the First Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on May 7, with the plaintiff saying that there is no bar to jurisdiction because the case has always been a maritime case.  But the defendant says the plaintiff always sought a jury trial, which is unavailable in maritime cases.

  • May 08, 2024

    Suits Against Asbestos Trust Don’t Challenge Plan Terms, May Proceed, Judge Says

    MISSOULA, Mont. — Lawsuits against the W.R. Grace & Co. asbestos trust follow procedures in the plan for such tort actions and are not collateral attacks on the plan procedures themselves, a federal judge in Montana said in a pair of orders rejecting a magistrate judge’s findings and recommendations and denying dismissal.

  • May 07, 2024

    Plaintiff/Defense Experts Testifying Since Jan. 1, 2002

    The following is a listing of plaintiff and defense experts who testified in trials covered by Mealey's Litigation Report: Asbestos since Jan. 1, 2002.

  • May 07, 2024

    Asbestos Plaintiff, Talc Defendant Square Off Over Expert Testing

    BRIDGEPORT, Conn. — A mesothelioma plaintiff and an asbestos-talc defendant have briefed a Connecticut judge on whether disclosure of expert William Longo’s testing of additional bottles of talc was untimely or whether the company was properly made aware of development.

  • May 07, 2024

    Woman Defends South Carolina Asbestos Verdict From Causation, Other Challenges

    SPARTANBURG, S.C. — A trial featured expert testimony about the levels of asbestos a man encountered and that the exposures were sufficient to cause his disease, and the court should reject a motion for judgment notwithstanding the verdict (JNOV) in an asbestos case, a woman tells a South Carolina court in opposing the motion.

  • May 06, 2024

    Receiver’s Asbestos Claims Process Survives Benzene Defendant’s Objection

    MONROE, N.C. — A receiver’s proposal of how to handle thousands of asbestos and benzene claims of the now defunct Radiator Specialty Co. Inc. survived challenges by a sometime co-defendant claiming that the arrangement might leave it holding the bag in Pennsylvania litigation and where joint and several liability applies when a judge in North Carolina turned away the objections and adopted the suggested process.

  • May 02, 2024

    In Disqualification Dispute, Talc MDL Parties Brief Exhibit’s Admission

    TRENTON, N.J. — In letter briefing, Johnson & Johnson urged the asbestos-talc multidistrict litigation court to admit with only modest redactions an exhibit submitted in briefing on its motion to exclude an attorney and his law firm from the litigation, saying the law firm misstates and improperly expands a ruling finding the company waived certain protections.

  • May 02, 2024

    Judge Denies Spoliation Sanctions, Stays Trial Pending Appeal

    MISSOULA, Mont. — A federal judge overseeing a case involving BNSF Railway Co.’s handling of asbestos at the Libby, Mont., vermiculite mine denied the railway’s renewed motion for sanctions related to the failure to preserve the plaintiff’s remains and partially granted its request for bifurcated trial after a jury awarded $8 million to two individuals in a similar suit.  On May 1, the judge stayed the May 6 trial pending an appeal of that verdict.

  • May 02, 2024

    Johnson & Johnson Has New $6.5B Plan To Resolve Asbestos Talc Claims

    NEW BRUNSWICK, N.J. — Johnson & Johnson (J&J) announced May 1 that it will pay nearly $6.5 billion to resolve all ovarian cancer claims through a prepackaged plan of reorganization for another subsidiary that will file for bankruptcy in Texas if the plan is accepted by asbestos talc claimants.

  • May 02, 2024

    Asbestos-Talc MDL Judge Affirms Ruling Allowing Refiling Of Daubert Challenges

    TRENTON, N.J. — A ruling allowing the refiling of Daubert challenges in the multidistrict litigation involving Johnson & Johnson talc doesn’t throw out a previous judge’s ruling but simply complies with the 2020 ruling’s recognition that the underlying science could change and acknowledges amendments to federal rules, a federal judge in New Jersey said in an unpublished memorandum denying reconsideration.

  • May 02, 2024

    Disease Group’s Petition Is 4th To Challenge EPA Asbestos Rule

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — An asbestos disease awareness group is among the groups to have challenged the Environmental Protection Agency’s recent rule largely banning chrysotile asbestos, adding its petition in the District of Columbia Circuit  U.S. Court of Appeals to three similar petitions filed in the Fifth, Sixth and 11th circuits.

  • May 01, 2024

    Judge Finds No Jurisdiction Over J&J Spinoff’s Talc Study Fraud Claims

    TRENTON, N.J. — New Jersey courts lack jurisdiction over Johnson & Johnson’s (J&J) former bankrupt affiliate LTL Management LLC’s fraud claims against three experts involving a study of mesothelioma patients allegedly exposed to asbestos in talc because even assuming that the article targeted the company without naming it, sending a computer file to a publisher and working as an expert in the state are too tenuous to establish jurisdiction, a federal judge in New Jersey said April 30 in dismissing the case.

  • May 01, 2024

    9th Circuit Panel Affirms Dismissal With Prejudice Of UCL Asbestos-Talc Claims

    SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Plaintiffs in a class action “littered” a fifth amended complaint with descriptions of advertisements, but many appear unrelated to the asbestos-talc claims underpinning the California unfair competition law (UCL) allegations or lack the necessary evidence of reliance, the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals said in an unpublished memorandum affirming summary judgment for the defendants.

  • May 01, 2024

    Man’s Knowledge Of Railway Toxins Started FELA Clock, Ohio Court Says

    TOLEDO, Ohio — A laryngeal cancer sufferer’s admission that he knew that he worked around potentially hazardous chemicals during his time at a railway and the available information on the hazards of asbestos and other toxins created a duty to investigate the cause of his disease and started the statute of limitations, an Ohio appeals court said in finding a Federal Employers’ Liability Act (FELA) claim time-barred.

  • April 30, 2024

    Judge Allows Asbestos Experts, Says Cross-Examination Can Explore Flaws In Testimony

    NEW ORLEANS — A federal judge in Louisiana denied a pair of challenges and admitted seven experts in an asbestos case set to go to trial in early May, noting that disagreements over whether social contacts or environmental exposures were the cause of a man’s fatal contact with asbestos went to the reliability of the evidence rather than its admissibility and any defects in the testimony could be exposed on cross-examination.

  • April 26, 2024

    Illinois Court Affirms Asbestos FELA Verdict After Negligence, Witness Challenges

    CHICAGO — Comments during closing statements about regulatory violations and the negligence standard in a Federal Employers’ Liability Act (FELA) case involving asbestos exposure were only a small portion of the entire closing, and the trial court was best positioned to determine the proper remedy for a witness’s presence in the courtroom during trial testimony, an Illinois appellate court said in affirming a verdict.

  • April 25, 2024

    Magistrate Judge Won’t Exclude Moline’s Supplemental Report In Asbestos-Talc Spat

    NEW YORK — While disclosure of Jacqueline Moline’s 2023 study and her dose-calculation opinion were untimely, they were harmless because there is no evidence that her opinion changed, that the defendants were unaware of her opinions or that any prejudice the defendants would face cannot be remedied, a federal magistrate judge in New York said April 24 in denying a motion to exclude reliance on the supplemental material.

  • April 25, 2024

    Judge Denies Spoliation Sanction, Will Bifurcate Montana Asbestos Trial

    MISSOULA, Mont. — A federal judge overseeing a case involving BNSF Railway Co.’s handling of asbestos at the Libby, Mont., vermiculite mine denied the railway’s renewed motion for sanctions related to the failure to preserve the plaintiff’s remains and partially granted its request for bifurcated trial after a jury earlier this month awarded $8 million to two individuals in a similar suit.

  • April 24, 2024

    Montana Jury Awards $8M In Pair Of Lawsuits Against BNSF

    GREAT FALLS, Mont. — A federal jury in Montana found that BNSF Railway Co.’s handling of asbestos at the Libby, Mont., vermiculite mine fell outside its duties as a common carrier and awarded $4 million to each of two plaintiffs who died as a result of their resulting exposures to asbestos.

  • April 24, 2024

    Chicago Jury Returns $45 Million Asbestos Verdict Against J&J Entities

    CHICAGO — An Illinois jury held Johnson & Johnson entity Kenvue Inc. 70% liable for a woman’s mesothelioma after finding that it and a second subsidiary could be responsible as a continuation of their parent company and awarding $45 million to her six children.

  • April 23, 2024

    Florida Jury Returns Defense Verdict In Asbestos-Talc Trial

    SARASOTA, Fla. — A Florida jury returned a defense verdict for Johnson & Johnson (J&J) on April 18, rejecting claims that its consumer talc contained asbestos that caused a woman’s fatal ovarian cancer, sources told Mealey Publications.

  • April 23, 2024

    Deposition Evidence, Causation Before New York Court In Asbestos Case

    NEW YORK — A New York appellate court now faces issues involving admission of a deposition a defendant did not attend but for which it was able to later cross-examine the witness, and whether the jury’s $15 million award was supported by expert causation testimony and sufficient.

  • April 23, 2024

    Plaintiff/Defense Experts Testifying Since Jan. 1, 2002

    The following is a listing of plaintiff and defense experts who testified in trials covered by Mealey's Litigation Report: Asbestos since Jan. 1, 2002.

  • April 22, 2024

    Wide-Ranging Briefing Follows $10 Million California Asbestos Award

    SAN FRANCISCO — Whether the regulatory environment put the owner of an automotive shop on notice of the dangers of asbestos and whether a court’s exclusion of interrogatory responses about the man’s other potential exposures and his teacher’s comments about his education came before a California appeals court in briefing on a host of issues.

  • April 22, 2024

    J&J Stuck In Figure Skaters’ Asbestos-Talc Suit Alleging 20,000 Exposures

    NEW YORK — Johnson & Johnson entities merely poke holes in a mesothelioma case brought by a makeup artist and figure skater alleging exposure to asbestos in talc on more than 20,000 occasions and do not eliminate the possibility of causation, as they must to prevail, a New York justice said in denying the companies’ motion for summary judgment.