Mealey's Asbestos Bankruptcy
-
January 20, 2023
South Carolina Top Court To Review Ruling Upping Asbestos Verdict To Nearly $2M
SPARTANBURG, S.C. — The South Carolina Supreme Court agreed to take a look at whether a trial court erred in increasing an asbestos award from $300,000 to almost $2 million and in calculating setoffs based on plaintiffs’ allocation of proceeds.
-
January 19, 2023
Justice Department Announces New Director For U.S. Trustee Program
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) announced Jan. 18 that the executive director of the National Consumer Bankruptcy Rights Center has been named as the new director of the DOJ’s U.S. Trustee Program (USTP).
-
January 18, 2023
Montana Seeks Comments On $18.5M Asbestos Settlement With W.R. Grace
WILMINGTON, Del. — W.R. Grace & Co. has moved a Delaware federal bankruptcy judge to approve settlement of a claim by the Montana Department of Environmental Quality (MDEQ) for natural resource damages stemming from “Operable Unit 3” (OU3) at the Libby Asbestos Superfund site.
-
January 17, 2023
Former Officers Of Debtor Nash Seek Defense Costs For Trustee’s Claims
BRIDGEPORT, Conn. — Three former officers and directors of debtor The Nash Engineering Co. are seeking relief from the automatic stay so one of the company’s insurers can advance them the costs needed to defend claims by the Chapter 7 trustee that they breached their fiduciary duties when negotiating settlements with asbestos insurers.
-
January 13, 2023
Georgia-Pacific Debtor Refutes Import Of 3M Ruling To Asbestos Injunction Appeal
RICHMOND, Va. — Asbestos claimants’ representatives in the Chapter 11 case of Georgia-Pacific bankrupt unit Bestwall LLC again fail in their reliance on a nonasbestos bankruptcy ruling in multidistrict litigation against 3M to support their position on appeal in their challenge to a bankruptcy injunction protecting Georgia-Pacific, Bestwall says in Jan. 12 response to a notice of supplemental authority in the Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals.
-
January 13, 2023
Hess Debtor’s Asbestos Committee Appeals Denial Of Motion To Dismiss Case
HOUSTON — The asbestos claimants’ committee for the Chapter 11 case of Hess Corp. affiliate HONX Inc. is seeking an interlocutory appeal in federal district court of a bankruptcy court’s denial of its request to dismiss HONX’s case for being filed in bad faith, according to a Jan. 12 court notice.
-
January 13, 2023
Montana Judge Affirms $30M Asbestos Punitive Award Against W.R. Grace Insurer
GREAT FALLS, Mont. — Saying that a workers’ compensation insurer was aware of the dangers of asbestos and knew or intentionally disregarded the fact that if it didn’t step in, workers at W.R. Grace’s Libby, Mont., vermiculite mine would be exposed with “truly catastrophic” consequences, a Montana judge found a jury’s $30 million punitive damages award appropriate and the conduct sufficient to exceed the state’s $10 million cap.
-
January 12, 2023
Hess, Debtor HONX Say Attempt To Drop Virgin Islands Asbestos Claims Violates Stay
HOUSTON — A law firm’s attempt to dismiss hundreds of asbestos personal injury claims against Hess Corp. affiliate and Chapter 11 debtor HONX Inc. pending before courts in the U.S. Virgin Islands is a violation of the bankruptcy stay and an “act of gamesmanship” so the firm can pursue its claims against Hess, the debtor and Hess say in opposition to the firm’s notice of intent to dismiss filed in Texas federal bankruptcy court.
-
January 11, 2023
J&J Wants Rehearing On California Court’s Expert Admission Ruling
SACRAMENTO, Calif. — A court erred in affirming admission at trial of expert causation testimony in an asbestos-talc case, and the error was anything but harmless, as there is a reasonable probability of a different outcome had the court excluded opinions on fibrous talc’s role in mesothelioma and exposure extrapolation from testing, two Johnson & Johnson entities argue in a petition for rehearing.
-
January 09, 2023
Mesothelioma Plaintiff: Totality Of Evidence Warrants Claim Against Employer
HARTFORD, Conn. — A former employer’s strategy of viewing individual facts in isolation to avoid facing the substantially certain injury that would result from its conduct falls apart when one looks at how it deceived employees and customers about asbestos, a plaintiff told a Connecticut appeals court.
-
January 03, 2023
Judge Admits Testimony Of Former Montana Senator In Asbestos-Screening Fight
MISSOULA, Mont. — Former Sen. Max Baucus was timely disclosed as an expert and, to ensure that there is no prejudice to a railway prosecuting a False Claims Act (FCA) suit, it may depose him, but disclosure of a hybrid-expert witness after the close for fact witnesses requires excluding a second expert, a federal judge in Montana said.
-
December 23, 2022
Jury Awards $40.8M In Asbestos Case Damages, Adds $11.3M In Punitives
LOS ANGELES — A California judge entered judgment on a $52.1 million verdict after a jury awarded a mesothelioma sufferer and her husband $11.3 million in punitive damages in a combined asbestos-talc and take-home exposure case.
-
December 21, 2022
Indemnification Row Between Trust, Debtors Settles For $350,000
CHARLOTTE, N.C. — A defunct boiler manufacturer’s asbestos personal injury trust will pay a bankrupt spinoff of Ingersoll-Rand Co. and Trane U.S. Inc. $350,000 to settle the spinoff’s claim against the trust for more than $25 million in unreimbursed expenses relating to the resolution of asbestos personal injury claims, with the settlement winning approval in North Carolina federal bankruptcy court.
-
December 20, 2022
J&J Debtor Sues Expert, Claiming Her Asbestos-Talc Study Is Fraudulent
TRENTON, N.J. — Johnson & Johnson’s bankrupt affiliate LTL Management LLC has sued the occupational disease expert who conducted the landmark study on the connection between asbestos in talcum powder and mesothelioma, asserting that the study is a fraud because the expert knew that some participants were exposed to asbestos by sources other than talc.
-
December 20, 2022
Discovery Rule Cannot Save Asbestos Injury FELA Claim, Judge Says
NEW ORLEANS — A man knew either when he settled a prior Federal Employers’ Liability Act toxic tort action involving asbestos or at the very latest when he was diagnosed with colorectal cancer of his claim, and he never explains why it took him six years to file suit, a federal judge in Louisiana said in finding his action untimely.
-
December 20, 2022
J&J Faults Standing, Size And Scope Of Asbestos-Talc Fraud Class
TRENTON, N.J. — Johnson & Johnson told a federal judge in New Jersey that it had no duty to preserve evidence stemming from an industrial asbestos-talc case in which it was not named as a defendant and that the proposed class is overly broad and not ascertainable.
-
December 16, 2022
Mediation Ordered To Resolve Bankruptcies Of Ingersoll-Rand, Trane Units
CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Debtors Aldrich Pump LLC and Murray Boiler LLC, affiliates Ingersoll-Rand and Trane and representatives for asbestos personal injury claimants will negotiate for a global resolution to the Chapter 11 cases and creation of a post-bankruptcy asbestos trust, with a North Carolina federal bankruptcy judge approving a request to compel mediation.
-
December 16, 2022
Judge Largely Denies Summary Judgments In Asbestos Screening Fight
MISSOULA, Mont. — There is no evidence that an asbestos screening company falsely obtained a federal grant related to a Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) program intended for Libby, Mont., residents suffering from an asbestos-related disease, but questions remain about whether it falsely submitted information and the extent of the government’s knowledge, a federal judge held in granting summary judgment on the former issue and denying motions on all other issues.
-
December 16, 2022
New Mexico, Mississippi Granted Direct Appeal Of Injunction Barring J&J Suits
TRENTON, N.J. — A New Jersey federal bankruptcy judge has allowed New Mexico and Mississippi to appeal directly to the Third Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals an order enjoining their consumer protection lawsuits against Johnson & Johnson (J&J) over its sale of allegedly asbestos-laden talcum powder.
-
December 14, 2022
Law Firm Says It Will Drop Virgin Islands Asbestos Claims Against Hess Debtor HONX
HOUSTON — A law firm representing asbestos personal injury claimants filed a notice Dec. 13 in Texas federal bankruptcy court informing the parties in the Chapter 11 case of Hess Corp. affiliate HONX Inc. that it intends to dismiss hundreds of asbestos claims against HONX pending before courts in the U.S. Virgin Islands due to the bankruptcy case.
-
December 13, 2022
Judge In Asbestos Case Finds Stay Doesn’t Bar Remand, Hess Merger Collusive
ST. CROIX, V.I. — The failure of a settlement and resulting new litigation precipitated an oil company’s interest in merging its entities, a federal judge in the Virgin Islands said Dec. 12 in finding that a bankruptcy stay does not prevent a ruling on remand and that the merger was a collusive attempt at securing federal jurisdiction.
-
December 12, 2022
Bankruptcy Judge OKs Honeywell’s $1.32B Buyout Deal With NARCO Asbestos Trust
PITTSBURGH — A Pennsylvania federal bankruptcy judge approved a buyout settlement agreement under which Honeywell International Inc. will pay $1.32 billion to the asbestos trust of affiliate North American Refractories Co. (NARCO) to bring an end to its commitment to fund the trust, which was created in NARCO’s Chapter 11 case.
-
December 06, 2022
New York Court Dismisses Causation Appeal In Asbestos-Talc Case
NEW YORK — A New York appellate court granted a stipulated motion to withdraw an appeal challenging a justice’s conclusion in denying summary judgment to an asbestos-talc defendant company that the evidence created genuine issues of material fact on both specific and general causation and that potential exposure from using tobacco products does not eliminate the potential for other liability
-
December 05, 2022
Joint Mediation Extended In Imerys Talc, Cyprus Mines Asbestos Talc Bankruptcies
WILMINGTON, Del. — Mediation aimed at a global resolution to the Chapter 11 asbestos bankruptcy cases of talc mining company Cyprus Mines Corp. and affiliate talc supplier Imerys Talc America Inc. will continue through at least Dec. 31, according to a stipulation by the parties approved by a Delaware federal bankruptcy judge.
-
December 05, 2022
Judge: Asbestos Defendant Can’t Access Communications With Proposed Receiver
WILMINGTON, Del. — A Delaware chancery court judge denied a motion seeking to compel production of any communications between a petitioner and a proposed receiver for a dissolved subsidiary of DCo LLC, finding the request to be based on “circular speculation” about an alleged connection between the two and saying the request was likely a “fishing expedition.”