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Mealey's Asbestos Bankruptcy

  • February 21, 2025

    Asbestos Doctors Seek Reconsideration Of LLT’s Sole Claim Surviving Dismissal

    NEWPORT NEWS, Va. — Three asbestos experts asked a federal judge to reconsider his conclusion that a paper they published on asbestos-talc causation was about Johnson & Johnson’s baby powder product after the judge dismissed two of the three claims saying timeliness and evidence issues doomed two of the three claims and left only the claim alleging product disparagement.

  • February 20, 2025

    Talc Debtor Cyprus Mines Seeks To Extend Injunction Protecting Parent Company

    WILMINGTON, Del. — With a $505 million global settlement in place and an “overwhelming” majority of asbestos talc claimants voting to accept a plan of reorganization, talc supplier and Chapter 11 debtor Cyprus Mines Corp. says in a motion and brief in Delaware federal bankruptcy court that an injunction barring claims against its immediate parent should be extended for six months while it conducts discovery in preparation for the plan’s confirmation hearing.

  • February 19, 2025

    Judge Dismisses 2 Of 3 Claims In Suit Against Asbestos Experts

    NEWPORT NEWS, Va. — Timeliness and evidence issues doom two of the three claims a Johnson & Johnson subsidiary brings against a trio of asbestos experts who authored a report linking talc to mesothelioma, leaving only a product disparagement claim based on the conclusion that a published study targeted the company’s talcum powder without naming it and that the attention the study received likely caused lower sales and higher litigation costs, a federal judge in Virginia said in partially dismissing the action.

  • February 14, 2025

    Man Defends Denial Of Fees In Asbestos Case He Wants Dismissed

    NEW YORK — As asbestos disease plaintiff said Feb. 13 that a magistrate judge properly recommended denying attorney fees and costs to a defendant company that he hopes to dismiss with prejudice because the company lumped both together in its request and failed to support either.

  • February 14, 2025

    CertainTeed Debtor Says Denial Of Stay Relief Should Be Upheld By 4th Circuit

    RICHMOND, Va. —The Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals should affirm a bankruptcy court’s decision not to lift the automatic stay so asbestos claimants could proceed with their state court lawsuits against CertainTeed spinoff DBMP LLC because “the Bankruptcy Court did not abuse its discretion” in rejecting the claimants’ argument that DBMP’s Chapter 11 case was filed in bad faith, the debtor says in a response brief.

  • February 10, 2025

    Federal Judge OKs Stay For Asbestos Claimant Pending Appeal Of Similar Case

    CHARLOTTE, N.C. —A North Carolina federal judge has agreed to stay an appeal by an asbestos personal injury claimant of a bankruptcy court’s decision not to lift the automatic stay in the Chapter 11 case of Ingersoll-Rand and Trane spinoffs Aldrich Pump LLC and Murray Boiler LLC until a similar appeal is decided by the Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals.

  • February 06, 2025

    FCR, Others Object To Reorganization Plan Of J&J’s Latest Debtor

    HOUSTON — The legal representative for future asbestos personal injury claimants in the Chapter 11 case of the latest Johnson & Johnson (J&J) spinoff, Red River Talc LLC, filed one of several objections to confirmation of the latest version of the debtor’s plan of reorganization in Texas federal bankruptcy court, saying the plan “does not provide ‘reasonable assurance’ that present and future claimants will be treated substantially the same.”

  • February 03, 2025

    Dismissal With Prejudice Warrants Award Of Costs, Asbestos-Talc Defendant Says

    NEW YORK — Voluntary dismissal with prejudice is “tantamount” to a judgment on the merits and warrants an award of costs or an explanation why such costs are not appropriate, a talc defendant told a federal judge in New York in a limited objection to a magistrate judge’s recommendation that the asbestos case be dismissed.

  • January 28, 2025

    Asbestos Claimant Seeks Pause Of Stay Relief Denial Appeal Pending Similar Case

    CHARLOTTE, N.C. —An asbestos personal injury claimant asks a North Carolina federal court to stay his appeal of a bankruptcy court’s decision not to lift the automatic stay in the Chapter 11 case of Ingersoll-Rand and Trane spinoffs Aldrich Pump LLC and Murray Boiler LLC until a similar appeal is decided by the Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals.

  • January 28, 2025

    Smith Law Says Beasley Allen Suit Over Talc Dust Up Doesn’t Upend Its Action

    JACKSON, Miss. — A law firm told a federal judge in Mississippi that its lawsuit against a second asbestos-talc firm was more akin to one for defamation and that neither res judicata nor the first-to-file rule required dismissal or transfer of the action.

  • January 27, 2025

    Pa. Top Court Permits Torts For Time-Barred Occupational Disease Claimants

    HARRISBURG, Pa. — The bargain between employees and employers in the occupational disease system cannot countenance completely extinguishing an asbestos claim that would be time-barred by the law, a divided Pennsylvania Supreme Court said in affirming lower courts while relying on the same logic it applied in the workers’ compensation system setting a decade ago.

  • January 27, 2025

    Magistrate Denies Insurer’s Bids To Compel Discovery In Asbestos Coverage Dispute

    BUFFALO, N.Y. — A federal magistrate judge in a single order denied an insurer’s motions to compel discovery in four similar suits against insurers filed by the estates of people who died purportedly from asbestos exposure, seeking payment of judgments entered against an asbestos mine, finding that though discovery of negotiations resulting in a funding agreement is related to the agreement’s impact, the disclosure of the agreement “is sufficient.”

  • January 24, 2025

    J&J, Man Awarded $15M By Connecticut Jury Debate Punitive Damages, Experts

    BRIDGEPORT, Conn. — In a quartet of briefs filed in a Connecticut court, Johnson & Johnson (J&J) entities and a mesothelioma sufferer who was awarded $15 million briefed the size of the award, what amount the court should award as punitive damages and whether the court properly admitted experts and instructed the jury.

  • January 24, 2025

    Wisconsin High Court Will Hear Asbestos Premises Liability, Punitive Damages Case

    MILWAUKEE — The Wisconsin Supreme Court agreed to wade into an asbestos case over a brewery owner’s liability under state law for injuries suffered by the employee of an independent contractor and whether the state’s cap on punitive damages applies to all compensatory damages or only those the plaintiff is likely to recover.

  • January 24, 2025

    Bankruptcy Judge Closes Chapter 11 Case Of 2nd J&J Spinoff

    TRENTON, N.J. — A New Jersey federal bankruptcy judge has closed the second Chapter 11 case of Johnson & Johnson (J&J) spinoff LLT Management LLC after the Official Committee of Talc Claimants reported that it would not petition the U.S. Supreme Court for review of the bankruptcy judge’s decision to dismiss the case due to the debtor’s lack of financial distress.

  • January 23, 2025

    New Jersey Judge Denies Motion Seeking Access To Asbestos Expert Longo’s Lab

    NEW BRUNSWICK, N.J. — In the wake of the company’s efforts to find common ground, a New Jersey judge denied a motion by various Johnson & Johnson entities to conduct a live “side-by-side” inspection of asbestos expert William Longo’s laboratory and work, turning away complaints that to fully contest his methodology, the defendants must be able to witness his work live.

  • January 21, 2025

    Talc Supplier’s Chapter 11 Case Should Have Been Tossed, Receiver, Committee Say

    PHILADELPHIA — The board of directors of defunct talc supplier Whittaker, Clark & Daniels Inc. (WCD) lacked the power to file a bankruptcy petition in New Jersey on the company’s behalf because a South Carolina judge’s order appointing a receiver stripped the board of the authority to file for bankruptcy, the receiver and talc claimants’ representatives tell the Third Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals in their appeal of a bankruptcy judge’s denial of their bid to dismiss the Chapter 11 case.

  • January 17, 2025

    Cosmetics Company Ben Nye Says No Error In Confirmation Of Reorganization Plan

    SAN FRANCISCO — An appeal by asbestos plaintiffs and law firms of confirmation of the Chapter 11 Subchapter V plan of reorganization for family-run cosmetics company Ben Nye Co. Inc. to the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals Bankruptcy Appellate Panel (BAP) should be rejected because they failed to show that the Bankruptcy Court’s factual findings were wrong, the debtor says in an appellee brief.

  • January 16, 2025

    Shipbuilder Creditor Appeals Asbestos Debtor’s Insurer Settlement Protections

    RICHMOND, Va. — Shipbuilder Huntington Ingalls Industries Inc., a frequent co-defendant of Chapter 11 debtor Hopeman Brothers Inc. in asbestos cases, has appealed a Virginia federal bankruptcy judge’s approval of an $18 million settlement between the debtor and insurers, saying in its statement of issues on appeal that a U.S. district court must decide whether the approval order’s inclusion of a “nonconsensual third party release and non-debtor discharge and corresponding injunction” amounts to reversable error.

  • January 16, 2025

    Magistrate Judge Won’t Condition Talc Suit Dismissal On Expert Discovery

    NEW YORK — A man is free to sue whomever he wants, and because dismissal with prejudice precludes any future litigation on the claims, the talc defendant will not suffer any prejudice and is not entitled to discovery into an expert on whom the plaintiff no longer relies, a federal magistrate judge in New York said Jan. 15 in recommending that the court grant the motion.

  • January 14, 2025

    Pennsylvania Judge Molds Verdict, Handing J&J Win In Asbestos-Talc Case

    PITTSBURGH — A Pennsylvania judge molded an inconsistent verdict in favor of Johnson & Johnson, wrapping a more-than-monthlong trial that included a break for the holiday season by handing the company and various of its entities a defense verdict in the asbestos-talc case.

  • January 10, 2025

    Facing Insurer’s Opposition, Talc Supplier Seeks Extensions Of Exclusive Periods

    TRENTON, N.J. — Raw materials supplier and Chapter 11 debtor Presperse Corp. asked a New Jersey federal bankruptcy court to give it more time to file an amended plan of reorganization after the company’s lone insurer objected to the plan’s disclosure statement and disputed insurance coverage for asbestos personal injury claims.

  • January 09, 2025

    Avon Affiliates Granted More Time To File Chapter 11 Liquidation Plan

    WILMINGTON, Del. — A Delaware federal bankruptcy judge has given the U.S. divisions of cosmetics giant Avon more time to file a Chapter 11 liquidation plan after the debtors said they have begun negotiations with unsecured creditors and the U.S. trustee on a consensual plan to resolve the consolidated cases.

  • January 09, 2025

    Punitives, Bankruptcy Docs At Issue As Pittsburgh Asbestos Case Briefing Wraps

    PITTSBURGH — In post-trial briefing, an employer hit with $1.5 million in punitive damages told a Pennsylvania judge that the statute of repose should have barred the case, that there was insufficient evidence that it acted in a way that warranted the award, that the jury was improperly instructed on the issue and that a court ruling improperly handled expert testimony and access to bankruptcy trust documents.  But the couple awarded the $3.8 million mesothelioma verdict said the statute of repose does not apply to workplace safety claims, that there was ample evidence that the company breached its duty to workers and that its request for the bankruptcy filings was untimely.

  • January 06, 2025

    Judge Won’t Recuse From Asbestos-Talc Law Firm Spat

    MONTGOMERY, Ala. — An Alabama federal judge on Jan. 3 declined to recuse himself from a law firm’s suit alleging breach of contract involving a partner’s handling of asbestos-talc claims involving Johnson & Johnson and its debtor affiliate, saying his former work for the firm did not bring his impartiality into question.