Mealey's Asbestos Bankruptcy
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December 03, 2024
Angelos, Asbestos Claimants Resolve Asbestos Malpractice Claims For $57M
BALTIMORE — A judge in Maryland granted final approval of a $57 million settlement resolving asbestos claimants’ legal malpractice claims stemming from Law Offices of Peter G. Angelos PC’s failure to file timely actions after learning about insurance proceeds available in a settlement.
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December 03, 2024
Union Carbide Prevails In Rare Rhode Island Asbestos Trial
PROVIDENCE, R.I. — A Rhode Island jury returned a defense verdict for Union Carbide Corp. in a case alleging that a woman died after asbestos exposure suffered when she laundered her former husband’s clothing; the trial is the first time an asbestos case in the state has gone to jury in nearly 40 years, sources told Mealey Publications.
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December 02, 2024
Connecticut Judge Adds $7.5 Million To Vanderbilt Asbestos-Talc Award
BRIDGEPORT, Conn. — A judge in Connecticut added $7.5 million in punitive damages to an asbestos verdict, turning away attempts to relitigate successor liability and saying the conduct in question and jury’s findings support the award. The amount represents half the compensatory damages granted by a jury earlier this year.
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November 27, 2024
Chapter 11 Asbestos Debtor’s Settlement Protections Too Broad, U.S. Trustee Says
RICHMOND, Va. — Two settlements among new Chapter 11 debtor Hopeman Brothers Inc. and its insurers to help fund a trust to pay asbestos personal injury claims cannot be approved because the agreements purport to protect nondebtor third parties in violation of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code and U.S. Supreme Court precedent, the U.S. trustee tells a Virginia federal bankruptcy court in his objection to the deals.
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November 27, 2024
J&J’s Latest Debtor Fends Off Claimants’ Bid For Venue Reconsideration
HOUSTON — A request by certain asbestos talc claimants’ counsel for reconsideration of an order denying their motion to transfer venue for the Chapter 11 case of the latest Johnson & Johnson (J&J) spinoff, Red River Talc LLC, was denied by a Texas federal bankruptcy judge.
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November 25, 2024
Missouri Jury Returns Defense Verdict For Employer In Asbestos Case
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — A Missouri jury found for a defendant in an asbestos case after the state’s appellate court allowed the suit to proceed against the woman’s employer after concluding that it didn’t comply with the state’s special mesothelioma insurance provision and the Missouri Supreme Court declined to step in.
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November 25, 2024
Oregon Judge Reduces $200M Asbestos-Talc Punitive Damages Award
PORTLAND, Ore. — After finding a $200 million punitive damages award constitutional in an asbestos case, an Oregon judge reduced that award to $120 million, citing evidence that Johnson & Johnson already ceased production of the talc-based baby powder at issue in the case and previously paid punitive damages for the conduct. J&J moved to stay enforcement of the judgment.
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November 22, 2024
COMMENTARY: 2024 Key Insurance Decisions, Trends & Developments & A Look Ahead To 2025
By Scott M. Seaman, Pedro E. Hernandez and Lisa M. Roccanova
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November 21, 2024
J&J Talc Debtor Wants Lawyer Sanctioned For Skipping Deposition
HOUSTON — The debtor created in Johnson & Johnson’s third attempt at a bankruptcy resolution to asbestos-talc claims urged a federal bankruptcy judge in Texas to sanction an attorney who failed to appear for a deposition, saying a pending motion to quash does not give the deponent permission to simply decide not to appear.
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November 20, 2024
Talc Claimants Appeal Automatic Stay Ruling In J&J’s 3rd Spinoff Bankruptcy
HOUSTON — A coalition of attorneys for thousands of asbestos talc plaintiffs appealed to a federal district court a decision by a Texas federal bankruptcy judge in an adversary action that the plaintiffs’ claims against the latest Johnson & Johnson (J&J) spinoff, Red River Talc LLC, and its affiliates are blocked for now by the automatic bankruptcy stay.
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November 19, 2024
Compelling Arbitration, Judge Says MOU Is ‘Closely Related’ To Reinsurance Contract
LOS ANGELES — Concluding that a 1984 memorandum of understanding (MOU) is “closely related to the reinsurance contract and not a completely separate agreement,” a California federal judge granted reinsurers’ motion to compel arbitration in a lawsuit over reinsurance billings arising from asbestos bodily injury claims.
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November 18, 2024
Delaware Judge Won’t Modify Receivership Over Asbestos Company
WILMINGTON, Del. — A Delaware judge declined to modify a receivership to permit the marshalling of a dissolved company’s assets and defense of asbestos claims in four cases spread out over three states after an insurance company argued that the modification would skip procedures already put in place and essentially grant the relief sought by the original petition.
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November 04, 2024
COMMENTARY: Lady Justice May Be Blind, But Her Courts Aren’t: Gender Bias And Barriers To Representation For Female Plaintiffs
By Sophie Zavaglia
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November 14, 2024
Revlon Talc Claimants’ Direct Appeal Request Debated In 2nd Circuit
NEW YORK — The Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals should reject a petition for a direct appeal of a New York federal bankruptcy judge’s decision barring asbestos talc plaintiffs from pursuing claims against former debtor Revlon Inc. under the discharge and injunction provisions of its confirmed Chapter 11 plan of reorganization and instead send the dispute to a district court to review the questions presented “in the first instance,” the reorganized debtor says in an opposition brief.
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November 14, 2024
Oregon Judge Finds $200M Punitive Damages Constitutional In Asbestos Case
PORTLAND, Ore. — An Oregon judge declined to reduce or vacate $200 million in punitive damages awarded in an asbestos-talc case against Johnson & Johnson, saying the jury’s $60 million in noneconomic damages supports finding that the award passes constitutional muster.
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November 13, 2024
More Than 150 People Sue Cape Entities Over Asbestos Scheme
COLUMBIA, S.C. — More than 150 individuals with various types of asbestos exposure filed a negligence and product liability suit in South Carolina against mining giant Cape PLC and its various subsidiaries on Nov. 12 for allegedly operating a scheme to sell asbestos in the United States with the knowledge that doing so would kill or injure tens of thousands of people while relying on a “byzantine web” of interrelated entities to escape liability for the conduct.
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November 13, 2024
Restrictions Granted In Asbestos Coverage Dispute Involving Liquidated Insurer
OMAHA, Neb. — In docket-only orders, a Nebraska federal magistrate judge granted motions to restrict access to certain documents by National Indemnity Co. (NICO) and Horace Mann Insurance Co., including briefs related to summary judgment motions, in NICO’s suit seeking to enforce obligations by multiple insurers, one of whom is now insolvent, for the liability NICO incurred related to claims for asbestos exposure.
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November 12, 2024
Kentucky Panel Reverses Workers’ Comp Ruling In Asbestos Coverage Dispute
FRANKFORT, Ky. — The Kentucky Court of Appeals reversed a decision by the Kentucky Workers’ Compensation Board and instructed the board to remand the dispute to an administrative law judge to determine which of two insurers should provide coverage to a workers’ compensation claimant who developed mesothelioma as a result of asbestos exposure while working at a Kentucky high school that contained asbestos.
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November 08, 2024
Disclosure Statements For Asbestos Talc Debtors Imerys, Cyprus Mines Approved
WILMINGTON, Del. — A Delaware federal bankruptcy judge approved the disclosure statements for the reorganization plans of affiliated Chapter 11 asbestos talc debtors Imerys Talc America Inc. and Cyprus Mines Corp., overruling objections to the statements by a claimants’ law firm and the U.S. trustee and setting a date for the plans’ confirmation hearing.
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November 08, 2024
La. Panel Vacates Order For Lack Of Admissibility Ruling In Asbestos Coverage Row
BATON ROUGE, La. — A Louisiana appellate panel vacated and remanded a lower court ruling that denied a motion for summary judgment filed by a company that purportedly used asbestos-containing products in an asbestos liability suit filed against it and multiple defendants, including a now-insolvent insurer, finding that the lower court incorrectly denied summary judgment to the company without ruling on the parties’ objections to the evidence.
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November 05, 2024
Validity Of Kaiser’s Bankruptcy Plan Debated On Remand From Supreme Court
RICHMOND, Va. — Now that the U.S. Supreme Court has determined that the primary insurer of Chapter 11 asbestos debtors Kaiser Gypsum Co. Inc. and Hanson Permanente Cement Inc. has standing to object to the debtors’ reorganization plan, the Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals should uphold the insurer’s merits arguments and reverse confirmation of the plan, the insurer says in its Nov. 4 supplemental reply brief on remand from the high court.
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November 05, 2024
Judge Stays J&J Effort To Remove Counsel From Talc MDL
TRENTON, N.J. — The effort to disqualify and remove the Beasley Allen law firm from the talc multidistrict litigation steering committee is on hold after a federal judge in New Jersey stayed the effort in the wake of a ruling by the judge overseeing a J&J entity’s bankruptcy saying the automatic stay should apply.
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November 04, 2024
Reorganizing In Face Of Asbestos Claims Is Valid Goal, Georgia-Pacific Spinoff Says
RICHMOND, Va. — The Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals should affirm a bankruptcy court’s denial of a “belated and meritless” motion to dismiss the Chapter 11 case of Georgia-Pacific spinoff Bestwall LLC by the Official Committee of Asbestos Claimants because Bestwall has “a valid reorganizational purpose” and “sufficient financial distress” to pursue relief in good faith under the U.S. Bankruptcy Code, the debtor says in a Nov. 1 response brief.
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November 01, 2024
California Panel Upends Auto Shop Owner’s $10.1M Asbestos Verdict
SAN FRANCISCO — A trial court overseeing an asbestos case that produced a $10.1 million verdict erred in issuing a directed verdict on the sophisticated user defense in the case of an automobile shop owner and by failing to list certain potentially liable parties on the verdict sheet, a California appeals court panel said in reversing and remanding for a new trial.
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November 01, 2024
Asbestos Bankruptcy Claimants Take Stay Relief Denial Ruling To 4th Circuit
CHARLOTTE, N.C. —A federal judge in North Carolina affirmed a bankruptcy court’s decision not to lift the automatic stay for two asbestos cases, agreeing that allowing the cases to proceed in state court could threaten the DBMP LLC bankruptcy process. The claimants filed a notice of appeal to the Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals in the wake of the ruling.