Mealey's Asbestos
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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.
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October 16, 2024
Summary Judgment Granted For Guaranty Association In Asbestos Coverage Dispute
NEW ORLEANS — A Louisiana federal judge granted summary judgment to the Louisiana Insurance Guaranty Association (LIGA), the purported statutory obligor for insurance policies issued by a now-insolvent insurer of the defendants sued by a now-deceased man alleging that workplace exposure to asbestos caused his mesothelioma, finding that the wrongful death claims filed by the man’s wife and two daughters are barred by the insurance liquidator’s deadline to file claims.
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October 16, 2024
Louisiana Court Says Res Judicata Not Applicable In Household Asbestos Case
NEW ORLEANS — Res judicata cannot be applied to a woman’s lawsuit claiming that she experienced significant asbestos-related exposure from her husband’s work shirts because the woman’s cause of action against her husband’s employer did not exist when a judgment was entered for her husband and against his employer in a separate lawsuit, a Louisiana appeals court said in granting a writ application and vacating a lower court’s ruling.
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October 15, 2024
Talc Retailer Facing Mesothelioma Case Wants Hysterectomy Evidence Excluded
LOS ANGELES — Any jury considering a mesothelioma case should not hear about a woman’s hysterectomy performed after doctors originally mistook her disease for ovarian cancer, as that information will serve only to inflame and confuse the jury, Walmart Inc. argues in a motion in limine seeking to exclude the evidence.
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October 15, 2024
Panel: Medical Monitoring Claim In Asbestos Suit Creates Potential For Coverage
PITTSBURGH — A trial court erred in finding that a former employee’s diagnosis of mesothelioma did not constitute an injury that arose during his employment, however, an insurer still owes a duty to defend and indemnify its insured for an underlying asbestos bodily injury suit because the former employee’s wife alleges a claim for medical monitoring that is potentially covered under the policy, a Pennsylvania Superior Court panel said in affirming the lower court’s ruling.
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October 15, 2024
Magistrate Judge Finds Access Paramount, Won’t Seal Asbestos Settlement Documents
NEW YORK — A federal magistrate judge in New York largely declined to redact names and amounts from documents related to court approval of a $600,000 settlement of asbestos claims against various talc defendants, saying the approval requires consideration of whether the agreement is fair and reasonable and should be available for public consumption and that nothing warrants redacting attorney fee information.
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October 15, 2024
Amici Urge Imposing Duty For Kentucky Take-Home Asbestos Cases
LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Two amici curiae urged the Kentucky Supreme Court to allow liability for take-home asbestos exposures, with one saying that the state long recognized universal duty and the second saying that placing corporate profits in “bubble wrap” by immunizing them from suit serves “no public good.”
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October 15, 2024
Judge Admits Marine Engineering Expert In Asbestos Sovereign Immunity Case
NEW ORLEANS — After denying reconsideration and precluding a man from relying on a settled party’s experts, a federal judge in Louisiana turned away challenges to a marine engineering expert, saying the expert’s knowledge about Navy shipbuilding practices and asbestos is likely to be helpful to a jury on the issue of derivative sovereign immunity.
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October 15, 2024
South Carolina Court Passes On Asbestos Causation, Sanction Questions
COLUMBIA, S.C. — The South Carolina Supreme Court left in place a discovery sanction and $3.12 million asbestos verdict, denying a certiorari petition asking it to weigh in on a wide range of issues from causation and intervening cause to the availability of punitive damages and whether a court properly penalized the defendant for its handling of lung tissue sample.
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October 15, 2024
9th Circuit Panel Reverses Government Contractor Win For Asbestos Plaintiffs
SAN FRANCISCO — A judge erred in granting summary judgment to a family on a government contractor defense in a maritime asbestos case under Boyle v. United Techs., when Yearsley v. W.A. Ross Const. Co. was both cited by the defendant and permits the defense, a panel of the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals said in an unpublished opinion reversing.
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October 11, 2024
Judge: ‘Unique Circumstances’ Free Asbestos Case From Texas Causation Requirement
WILMINGTON, Del. — The “unique circumstances” of an asbestos pipe case free a woman from Texas law requiring plaintiffs to calculate the aggregate dose of exposure and demonstrate that the dose doubled the risk of mesothelioma, a judge in Delaware said in denying reconsideration of a ruling denying summary judgment.
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October 11, 2024
Massachusetts Appeals Court Hears Arguments In Asbestos Firms’ Unfair Practices Spat
BOSTON — The Massachusetts Appeals Court heard oral argument Oct. 10 in a case pitting two asbestos plaintiffs’ law firms against each other in a battle over the scope of damages for unfair practices under Massachusetts law and the ownership of client-related databases lawyers took from their former firm during the formation of their new firm.
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October 10, 2024
Judge Wants Insights Into Discovery Request In Asbestos Case Remand Fight
SEATTLE — Discovery requests issued after briefing on a motion for remand call into question whether asbestos claims involve allegations of exposure stemming from military vessels at a shipyard, and the parties should meet and confer to resolve the issue or file supplemental briefs on the issue, a federal judge in Washington said.
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October 10, 2024
Man On Dismissal: Moline Study A Portion Of Talc Case, Doesn’t Call For Discovery
NEW YORK — Courts strongly favor granting voluntary dismissals with prejudice as precedent cited by both parties shows, and dismissal would leave no basis or need for ongoing discovery, an asbestos plaintiff tells a federal judge in New York in an Oct. 9 reply brief rebutting claims that his motion to dismiss his case was a bad faith effort to avoid discovery.