Mealey's Asbestos
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May 02, 2023
Asbestos FELA Claimant: Agreement Tolled Statute Of Limitations
NEW ORLEANS — A railroad told the Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals that a tolling agreement unambiguously extended the statute of limitations by a year and no more. But in a reply brief, a Federal Employers’ Liability Act (FELA) claimant said the real question is whether an extension required written evidence and if it did, whether the railway waived it through its actions.
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May 02, 2023
Judge Orders Discovery Into Jurisdiction If Couple Makes Asbestos Product Link
LOS ANGELES — A couple never establishes a connection between a defendant’s asbestos-containing product that allegedly caused an injury and a product supplied to California, but should they do so, more discovery into the connection is warranted, a California judge said.
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May 02, 2023
Former Mill Owner Dismisses Contract Case Over Facility Asbestos Claim
SEATTLE — Former mill owner Weyerhaeuser NR Co. voluntarily dismissed claims that the facility’s buyer breached the purchase agreement by refusing to indemnify it from an asbestos-related lawsuit settlement.
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May 01, 2023
Allegations Don’t Remove Chances Of Recovery, Judge Says In Remanding
CLEVELAND — A woman’s general allegations against three defendants do not suggest that she could not recover from two of them or that they were fraudulently joined to defeat diversity, a federal judge said April 28 in granting remand over an asbestos-talc defendant’s arguments.
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April 28, 2023
U.K. Court Affirms Foreseeability Ruling In Asbestos Case
EDINBURGH, Scotland — A lower court did not err in concluding that an employer could not have reasonably foreseen the danger from low-level exposures to asbestos occurring over a period of no more than a few days, an appellate court in Scotland said in affirming a ruling for the employer.
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April 28, 2023
Ford Launches Causation, Settlement Offset Challenges To Asbestos Verdict
GREENSBORO, N.C. — In a pair of motions, Ford Motor Co. tells a federal judge in North Carolina that the more than $6.8 million in settlement monies more than offsets the $275,000 plus interest judgment and that the plaintiff’s expert improperly assumed that brake dust was hazardous and mixed science on chrysotile asbestos and brake dust in concluding that exposure to friction products was a substantial factor in a man’s mesothelioma.
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April 28, 2023
Plaintiff: Rulings Wrongly Cut Short Merit Determinations In Asbestos Case
LOS ANGELES — A judge improperly denied a motion to withdraw admissions made inadvertently due to electronic issues, resulting in summary judgment for two asbestos defendants when the case should have been decided on the merits, while carefully “parsing and weighing” the evidence to prevent a merits resolution for a third defendant as well, a widow tells the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals in an April 27 opening brief.
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April 28, 2023
Delaware Judge Denies Interlocutory Appeal Of Ohio Duty-To-Warn Ruling
WILMINGTON, Del. — A Delaware judge denied a grinding machine manufacturer interlocutory appeal of his holding that Ohio law would impose a duty to warn about the dangers of using the product with asbestos-containing brakes, saying a decision interpreting Ohio law wasn’t paramount and that the company had not shown how its interests were any greater than the typical appellant.
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April 28, 2023
Ex-Talc Supplier Whittaker, Clark & Daniels Files For Bankruptcy Protection
TRENTON, N.J. — Former leading talc supplier and frequent asbestos lawsuit defendant Whittaker, Clark & Daniels Inc. (WCD) has filed for Chapter 11 protection in New Jersey federal bankruptcy court, with a company official saying in an April 27 declaration that in recent years the company has been “engulfed” in litigation and is currently spending $1 million a month on defense costs.
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April 28, 2023
Tennessee Appeals Court Affirms Exclusion Of Experts In FELA Asbestos Case
JACKSON, Tenn. — A Tennessee judge properly excluded two experts who, while qualified to testify, lacked any scientific or fact-based basis for their conclusions that exposure to asbestos and diesel fumes led to a woman’s renal cancer, the state’s appeals court affirmed.
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April 27, 2023
Bankruptcy Judge Issues Injunction For Asbestos Claims Against J&J, Chapter 11 Unit
TRENTON, N.J. — A New Jersey federal bankruptcy judge enjoined most asbestos personal injury cases against Johnson & Johnson (J&J), its Chapter 11 debtor spinoff LTL Management LLC and others due to the debtor’s second bankruptcy filing, but only temporarily.
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April 25, 2023
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.
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April 25, 2023
Asbestos Defense Expert’s Alleged Misrepresentations Complicate Post-Trial Motions
NEW YORK — Whether a jury heard a judge’s sidebar comments about a defense expert after alleged misstatements about whether the asbestos defendant supplied asbestos-containing gaskets with its valves and whether those comments and other actions “are particularly egregious” and warrant sanctions came before a New York justice in post-trial motions after a $23 million verdict.
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April 24, 2023
With Trial Pending, Judge Once Again Stays 24-Year-Old’s Asbestos-Talc Case
LOS ANGELES — A 24-year-old mesothelioma sufferer originally allowed to proceed on his asbestos-talc claims by the LTL Management LLC bankruptcy judge once again finds himself blocked from trial after the company filed a second bankruptcy petition.
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April 24, 2023
Jury Returns Verdict For Defense In Mechanic’s Crane Brake Asbestos Case
SEATTLE — A Washington state jury returned a defense verdict for a crane company, finding no liability for a deceased mechanic’s alleged exposure to asbestos-containing brakes.
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April 24, 2023
Judge: Witness’s Work Testimony Can’t Free Engine Maker From N.Y. Asbestos Case
NEW YORK — A man’s affidavit stating that he worked at unspecified jobs for undisclosed companies, including a short stint with the engine manufacturer defending an asbestos case, is not enough to secure summary judgment for the company, a New York justice said.
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April 21, 2023
Supplemental Expert Reports Admissible In Asbestos-Talc Dispute, Justice Says
NEW YORK — Asbestos-talc defendant Colgate-Palmolive Co. has not shown that materials William Longo tested are different than the ones the company originally produced in discovery or that it is incapable of obtaining the materials through other means, a New York justice said in denying a motion to exclude supplemental reports or to compel discovery.
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April 21, 2023
New York Appeals Court Permits Substitutions Of Plaintiffs In Asbestos Cases
NEW YORK — Two co-ancillary administrators appointed by an Ohio court over two estates may amend their New York complaints after the widows were appointed as administrators, a divided New York appeals court said April 20 in affirming in a pair of opinions.
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April 21, 2023
Justice Affirms, But Limits Colgate’s Talc Sample Production Obligations
NEW YORK — Colgate-Palmolive Co. does not have to produce 23 talcum powder samples in an asbestos case from the 49 years that a woman was exposed to the products but must produce six samples from those years, a New York justice said in partly affirming a special master’s ruling.
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April 21, 2023
New York Justice: Rebranding, Nonspecific Asbestos Testing Create Jury Questions
NEW YORK — Evidence that a company rebranded boilers before manufacturing its own creates issues for a jury that are not eliminated by testing on non-plaintiff-specific products, a New York justice said in denying summary judgment.
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April 19, 2023
Asbestos-Talc Defendant Denies Need For 2nd Deposition Of Representative
BRIDGEPORT, Conn. — Whittaker Clark & Daniels Inc. (WCD) says in an opposition to a motion to compel a second deposition that its corporate representative answered relevant questions during his deposition but was under no obligation to discuss company financials or other information subject to a protective order and that the plaintiff is attempting to circumvent the close of discovery by seeking additional evidence.
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April 18, 2023
Judge Finds Broad Exposure Release Invalid Under FELA
LITTLE ROCK, Ark. — A railroad’s attempt to cram as many potential diseases and toxins into a release as possible is exactly the type of general and broad release of future liability frowned up by the Federal Employers’ Liability Act and does not bar a man’s subsequent action alleging that he developed cancer from asbestos and other toxins, a federal judge in Arkansas said April 17.
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April 18, 2023
Woman, Union Carbide Dismiss Appeal Of $14M Florida Asbestos Verdict
MIAMI — A woman awarded $14 million for her son’s fatal mesothelioma and asbestos joint compound fiber supplier Union Carbide Corp. filed a stipulated notice dismissing the company’s appeal involving expert testimony and product identification, which came after the third verdict in the case and two previous appeals, according to the docket.
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April 18, 2023
South Carolina Court Affirms Asbestos Verdict, Expert Admissions, Sanction
ANDERSON, S.C. — Medical causation experts’ cumulative dose testimony “easily meets the legal standard for reliability,” a South Carolina appeals court said in affirming a $5,125,000 verdict while saying it worried that lifting sanctions against Fisher Controls International LLC would sanction the asbestos defendant’s evasive discovery maneuvers.
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April 18, 2023
Couple Tells S.C. High Court Evidence Supported Additur Of Asbestos Verdict
COLUMBIA, S.C. — Instead of joyfully spending her remaining years with her husband of 51 years, a wife will have to care for an increasingly sick husband who will eventually die a painful death from mesothelioma, evidence that supports a trial judge’s new trial nisi additur, the couple tells the South Carolina Supreme Court. But in reply, the appellants tell the court that the couple never really grapples with the important issues on appeal and that the jury already heard the very evidence the couple cites and its verdict should not be disturbed.