Mealey's Asbestos
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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
Split Panel: Silicosis Case Fails Due To Plaintiff’s Unreliable Experts
HOUSTON — A split Texas appeals court panel on Oct. 31 affirmed a lower court’s ruling in favor of Exxon Mobil Corp. in a silica injury lawsuit brought by a worker who sandblasted railcars and contended that he developed pulmonary fibrosis because the company created a situation in which he had to perform an “intrinsically unsafe and ultrahazardous activity.” The panel held that the worker’s experts were not reliable.
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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.
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November 01, 2024
Woman Says Hysterectomy Evidence Relevant In Mesothelioma Case
LOS ANGELES — Expert testimony establishes that mesothelioma spread to a woman’s ovaries necessitating a hysterectomy regardless of the initial diagnosis, the woman tells a Los Angeles judge in opposing a motion in limine to exclude evidence of the procedure.
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October 31, 2024
Boiler Company Says Discovery Triggered Asbestos Case Removal
SEATTLE — It would have been objectively unreasonable to remove a case alleging asbestos exposure at various locations and to non-Navy products, and it was only subsequent discovery that demonstrated that the case belongs in federal court, a company argues in a supplemental brief opposing remand from a federal court in Washington.
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October 31, 2024
California Jury Finds For Asbestos Defendant In Friction Products Case
LOS ANGELES — A California jury returned a defense verdict in a friction case against a company accused of assembling asbestos-containing brakes, finding that while the company sold such products, they performed as expected and their benefits outweighed the risks.
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October 30, 2024
Arbitration Bid Fought In Reinsurance Billing Row Involving MOU
LOS ANGELES — Urging a California federal court to reject an arbitration bid in a lawsuit over reinsurance billings arising from asbestos bodily injury claims, an insurer contends that the abstention doctrine doesn’t apply and that the arbitration clause is in a different agreement than the one at issue and doesn’t include the present billing dispute.
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October 29, 2024
Single Exposure Asbestosis Causation Opinion Can’t Stand, Alcoa Tells Texas Court
HOUSTON — An appeals court ignored precedent and science in creating a new causation standard for single exposure asbestosis cases, an employer tells the Texas Supreme Court in its Oct. 28 opening merits brief urging the court to reverse the judgment of the court of appeals and affirm the ruling from the trial court.
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October 29, 2024
Day-Late Filing In Asbestos Trust Suit Rejected By Delaware Top Court
WILMINGTON, Del. — An appeal filed a day late prevents jurisdiction over the case, a defect that cannot be remedied, the Delaware Supreme Court said in dismissing an appeal from a ruling finding that the statute of limitations on a man’s asbestos case began at the time of his autopsy and barred a case against a bankruptcy trust.
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October 29, 2024
Baby Powder Company Expands Recall Of Possible Asbestos-Tainted Products
MONTVALE, N.J. — After previously recalling 62 cases of Dynacare Baby Powder over fears that the powder could contain asbestos, Dynarex Corp. on Oct. 28 announced in a press release that it was expanding the recall to include more than 1,000 additional cases of powder products that could be contaminated with asbestos.
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October 28, 2024
New York Jury Awards $600,000 In Mechanic’s Mesothelioma Case
NEW YORK — A New York jury awarded $300,000 each for past and future pain and suffering experienced by a former automobile mechanic with mesothelioma but declined to award any punitive damages against defendant North American Honda Motor Co. Inc., sources told Mealey Publications.
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October 28, 2024
Asbestos Jury Will Hear From Construction Expert, But Not About Talc Pleurodesis
SAN FRANCISCO — Reference to a man’s talc pleurodesis procedures would likely only confuse a jury, a construction expert may testify about general industry practices and likely length of exposure but not whether a man could have purchased a defendant’s product at a local hardware store, and any attempt to trigger the jury’s reptilian brain at trial can be addressed at that time, a federal judge in California said in partially granting motions in limine.
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October 25, 2024
4th Circuit Affirms Sanctions, Attorney Fees In Asbestos Referral Fight
RICHMOND, Va. — A federal court properly sanctioned an asbestos law firm for state court lawsuits it filed in an attempt to block litigation between it and another law firm in a fee dispute, and the factors generally used to award prevailing parties attorney fees do not apply in cases where the fees are awarded as a sanction, a Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel said Oct. 24.
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October 22, 2024
Shipyard, Asbestos Plaintiffs Wrap Briefing On Government Immunity
NEW ORLEANS — Contractors who used asbestos-containing products under government contract and complied with contractual obligations are protected by government immunity, a shipyard told a federal judge in Louisiana in opposing summary judgment. In reply, the plaintiffs say the claims at issue in the case involve the handling of asbestos at the shipyard and do not invoke government contractor duties.
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October 25, 2024
Asbestos Appellate Bond Must Include Prejudgment Interest, California Judge Says
LOS ANGELES — An appellate bond must cover prejudgment interest because excluding it from the calculations is “nonsensical” and cuts against the policy goals behind requiring such a bond, a California judge said in ruling on an asbestos plaintiff’s motion.
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October 25, 2024
Connecticut Judge Denies Mistrial; Jury Hits J&J With $15M Talc Verdict
BRIDGEPORT, Conn. — A Connecticut judge denied Johnson & Johnson and various related entities’ motion for mistrial, turning away claims that plaintiffs’ questioning of an expert about his causation opinion and the presence of J&J in other cases inappropriately exposed the jury to evidence about other asbestos-talc lawsuits the companies face.
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October 25, 2024
Car Makers Pull Motion To Compel After Agreeing On Mesothelioma Genetic Testing
TRENTON, N.J. — Auto makers withdrew their motion to compel genetic testing in a mesothelioma case, telling a New Jersey judge overseeing the litigation that they reached a stipulation under which the plaintiffs agreed to submit to the testing and protocols governing the evidence.
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October 24, 2024
New Mexico Supreme Court: AG Must Disclose Agency Documents In Talc Suit
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — The attorney general’s office’s broad powers imbue it with the prelitigation duty to review nonparty agency documents before determining whether to bring suit, and logic and notions of fair play require making those same types of documents available to Johnson & Johnson in its defense of talc-related marketing claims, the New Mexico Supreme Court said in what it called a narrow issue of first impression.
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October 22, 2024
R.I. Justice: Experts Retained In Take-Home Asbestos Exposure Case Can Testify
PROVIDENCE, R.I. — A Rhode Island Superior Court justice largely refused to exclude two experts from testifying for the estate of a woman who claims that she contracted mesothelioma as a result of laundering her husband’s work clothes after finding that the experts’ conclusions that are based on the “each and every exposure” theory” are admissible under state law.
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October 22, 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.
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October 22, 2024
Virginia Jury Awards $3.45 Million In Millwright Mesothelioma Case
NEWPORT NEWS, Va. — A Virginia jury awarded the widow of a former millwright who developed fatal mesothelioma after occupational asbestos exposure $3.5 million in her case against John Crane Inc., sources told Mealey Publications.
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October 21, 2024
Reinsurers Move To Compel Arbitration In Billings Dispute Involving MOU
LOS ANGELES — Arguing that a dispute over reinsurance billings arising from asbestos bodily injury claims falls within the scope of the “broad” arbitration agreement in the excess of loss reinsurance treaty at issue, reinsurers in an Oct. 18 motion ask a California federal court to compel arbitration and dismiss or stay the case.
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October 18, 2024
Woman: Federal Court Discovery Can’t Save Untimely Asbestos Case Removal
SEATTLE — Supplemental discovery requests filed after a case landed in federal court did not change the allegations in the case or render a defendant’s removal six months after the filing of the complaint timely, a woman tells a federal judge in Washington in responding to a request for supplemental briefing.
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October 17, 2024
New York Justice Denies Dismissal Of Estee Lauder Asbestos Cancer Case
NEW YORK — A New York state court justice denied a cosmetic company’s motion to dismiss a suit alleging that exposure to asbestos within its talc products led to a woman’s mesothelioma, finding that the statute of limitations began when doctors actually diagnosed the woman and that tolling instituted during the coronavirus pandemic applied.
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October 16, 2024
Connecticut Jury Hits J&J Entities With $15 Million Talc Verdict
BRIDGEPORT, Conn. — A jury in Connecticut on Oct. 15 awarded a man and his wife $15 million in their asbestos-talc suit against Johnson & Johnson (J&J) and various related entities and triggered a punitive damages phase that by state law will be decided by the judge in the future, sources told Mealey Publications.