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Mealey's Asbestos

  • February 05, 2025

    Judge Partially Grants Motion To Reopen Discovery In Asbestos Case

    OAKLAND, Calif. — Providing time limits for expert depositions and saying that there does not appear to be any resulting prejudice, a judge granted a motion to reopen discovery in a California asbestos case.

  • February 05, 2025

    Asbestos-Containing Pipe Maker Seeks To Escape Spoliation Jury Instruction

    WILMINGTON, Del. — A plaintiff and an asbestos-containing pipe defendant briefed a motion for reconsideration of a summary judgment ruling in Delaware court, with the plaintiff saying the company born “under the spectre of asbestos” cannot rely on “institutional ignorance” to explain away document destruction while the company told the court that the evidence destruction was inadvertent but that an adverse jury instruction issued in response would destroy any chance at a fair trial.

  • February 04, 2025

    New York Justice Won’t Reconsider Summary Judgment After Recent Asbestos Precedent

    NEW YORK — An asbestos-talc company points to nothing in recent appellate court opinions that warrants reconsidering a ruling denying it summary judgment nor does it explain why it is only now producing experts in support, a New York justice said in denying a motion to renew a summary judgment motion.

  • February 04, 2025

    Judge Finds Diligence Lacking After Asbestos Plaintiff’s Late Document Filing

    SEATTLE — Clerical errors and technology problems do not explain away misfiled documents in an asbestos case and the fact that it took three weeks to realize the error suggests a lack of diligence, a federal judge in Washington said Feb. 3 in denying a motion from relief from expert deadlines.

  • 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 31, 2025

    Burned Building Owner May Not Conduct Presuit Depositions,10th Circuit Says

    DENVER — The owner of a building that was destroyed in a fire was properly denied a petition to depose employees of the U.S. Postal Service (USPS), which rented the building from him, before filing a complaint, a 10th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel ruled, finding that the petitioner did not satisfy the narrow criteria for presuit discovery under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 27.

  • January 31, 2025

    Vanderbilt Minerals Withdraws Appeal Of ‘Battle Of The Experts’ Talc Ruling

    NEW YORK — A New York appellate court granted a motion by asbestos-talc defendant Vanderbilt Minerals LLC to withdraw its appeal of a ruling in which a justice concluded that the “battle of the experts” in the case created issues about whether cleavage fragments found in a second company’s putty were naturally occurring in talc or were asbestos.

  • January 31, 2025

    Auto Dealership Asbestos Case Belongs In New York, Court Affirms

    NEW YORK — A New York appellate court found that state rules and due process support a justice’s conclusion that an asbestos case alleging exposure during visits to various automobile dealerships in Florida and New York can be litigated in the latter jurisdiction.

  • January 30, 2025

    Asbestos Plaintiff Facing New Trial Wants Consolidation With Wrongful Death Case

    LOS ANGELES — Plaintiffs in an ongoing personal injury asbestos action set for retrial after a “fatally inconsistent” verdict and a related wrongful death case told a California court that the two actions should be consolidated because they share the identical alleged exposures, causes of action and defenses.

  • January 29, 2025

    Court: Questions Exist Over Whether Workers’ Comp Bars Minnesota Asbestos Suit

    ST. PAUL, Minn. — Because sufficient questions remain about the connection between a man’s mesothelioma and his employment the state’s workers’ compensation exclusivity provision does not bar a man’s action, a Minnesota appeals court held in an unpublished opinion affirming a district court on different grounds.

  • January 28, 2025

    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.

  • 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

    J&J Wants 2nd Look At Ruling Nixing Insurance After $4.69B Talc Verdict

    NEW BRUNSWICK, N.J. — An insurer opposed Johnson & Johnson’s request for reconsideration after a judge in New Jersey concluded that subsequent victories in asbestos-talc cases do not alter the fact that a Missouri jury awarded $4.69 billion in a case against the company and found that it acted in a reprehensible manner, putting the verdict outside the terms of insurance policies because the state forbids insuring punitive damages and the policies cover only accidental injuries.

  • 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

    Woman Wants New Trial After Inconsistent Liability, Damages Asbestos Verdict

    PITTSBURGH — A jury heard lay witness testimony about topics only an expert can relay and expert testimony about other potential causes of a woman’s mesothelioma that were not previously disclosed, and a court should order a new trial after the jury found in favor of Johnson & Johnson defendants but awarded $22 million in punitive damages anyway, a woman tells a Pennsylvania judge.

  • 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

    Sephora, Asbestos Plaintiff Debate Need To Continue Talc Trial

    LOS ANGELES — A high-end cosmetics retailer told a California court that late disclosure of talc products to which a mesothelioma sufferer was exposed requires continuing a trial scheduled to start in February.  But in response, the plaintiffs said that the case always involved the products in question and that the defendant’s failure to investigate the allegations should not be grounds to continue the trial.

  • 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 23, 2025

    Asbestos Pipe Case Liability Questions Go Before California Court

    LOS ANGELES — Parties wrapped briefing on the appeal of a verdict for an asbestos pipe manufacturer on the question of whether a man’s use of a power saw constituted misuse, his level of knowledge and whether there were adequate warnings about the product’s dangers.

  • January 23, 2025

    Insurer Must Cover Asbestos Defendant’s Defense Costs, Judge Says

    NEW ORLEANS — An insurance policy obligates an insurer to cover costs associated with defending against an asbestos action regardless of whether the expenses came before or after notice of the action, a federal judge in Louisiana said in granting summary judgment in a cross-claim.

  • 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.