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Mealey's Asbestos

  • May 09, 2025

    Talc MDL Judge Won’t Admit Proposed FDA Asbestos-Talc Testing Rule

    TRENTON, N.J. — The Food and Drug Administration’s proposed rule governing the measuring and identification of asbestos in talc does not constitute a change in policy or binding authority, the federal judge overseeing the talcum powder multidistrict litigation in New Jersey said in denying a motion to supplement the record or for judicial notice.

  • May 09, 2025

    Old Asbestos Trust Claim Bars Claim Of Surviving Son, Bankruptcy Judge Says

    CINCINNATI — The son of a man who died from mesothelioma after receiving a payment in 2001 from an asbestos trust in settlement of a nonmalignancy claim cannot have a malignancy claim for his father’s mesothelioma reviewed by the trust because the father’s settlement released the trust from future liability and the son sought review too late, an Ohio federal bankruptcy judge ruled.

  • May 08, 2025

    Canadian Court Grants Asbestos Corp. Protection As It Attempts Restructuring

    THETFORD MINES, Quebec — A Canadian court on May 7 granted an application to apply legal protections to Asbestos Corp. Ltd. as the company filed a Chapter 15 bankruptcy in U.S. court in the hopes of restructuring.

  • May 07, 2025

    Talc Manufacturer Not Subject To Jurisdiction In Indiana, Court Says

    INDIANAPOLIS — A Missouri talc manufacturer’s shipping of products to an Indiana warehouse at the direction of another company does not create personal jurisdiction in the state, an appeals court in Indiana said in reversing a ruling denying a motion to dismiss in a mesothelioma case.

  • May 07, 2025

    Asbestos Corp. Seeks Canadian Law Protections As It Attempts Restructuring

    THETFORD MINES, Quebec — Asbestos Corp. Ltd. and its parent company announced May 6 that they would ask a court for legal protection under Canadian law as they attempt to restructure.

  • May 07, 2025

    English Court Affirms Adverse Inference, Asbestos Causation Ruling

    LONDON — An automobile garage’s failure to preserve evidence did not require an adverse inference forcing the trial court to simply accept the claimant’s positions, an English appellate court said while affirming a conclusion that asbestos exposures at the garage did not play a material role in a woman’s mesothelioma.

  • May 06, 2025

    Defendant: New Discovery Shows Moline’s Talc-Only Study Was False

    NEW YORK — Recent revelations show the identities of participants in asbestos expert Jacqueline Moline’s study on causation were always relevant but were withheld in an effort to further a litigation scheme, and the court should deny a motion for sanctions and instead award costs and fees associated with attempts to obtain what is now clearly relevant and discoverable evidence, an asbestos-talc defendant told a federal judge in New York on May 5.

  • May 06, 2025

    Asbestos Plaintiffs Point To More Support For Killing Government Immunity Defense

    NEW ORLEANS — Yet another judge recently determined that asbestos workplace safety and warning claims are not subject to government immunity defenses, a family tells a federal judge in Louisiana in a supplemental brief admitted by the court.

  • May 06, 2025

    Georgia Enacts Measure Changing Discovery, Damages In Injury, Death Actions

    ATLANTA — Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp signed into law a wide-ranging bill substantially amending how the state’s courts handle civil practice, discovery and tort liability in the state; the measure stays discovery when a party moves for dismissal prior to filing an answer, limits the ability of injured parties to argue at trial about the amount of noneconomic damages in bodily injury and wrongful death cases and limits the recovery of attorney fees.

  • May 05, 2025

    Family Can’t Secure New Trial In Rhode Island Asbestos Case

    PROVIDENCE, R.I. — While the evidence could have supported a verdict in favor of a mesothelioma sufferer's family and there were some anomalies at trial, the plaintiffs largely failed to object, and the jury was not improperly influenced into finding for the a fiber supplier, a Rhode Island justice said in denying a new trial and judgment as a matter of law.

  • May 05, 2025

    Louisiana Judge Excludes Testimony About Asbestos Expert’s Altercation

    NEW ORLEANS — Weighing the potential prejudice against “very little probative effect,” a Louisiana judge said he would exclude deposition testimony about an asbestos expert’s altercation at a conference because there was very little connecting the fight to any aspect of the case.

  • May 01, 2025

    Government Contractor Status Can’t Sheild Shipyard From Asbestos Suit, Judge Says

    NEW ORLEANS — The family of a deceased man is entitled to summary judgment on a shipyard’s government contractor defenses because their allegations that it failed to properly warn about dangers in the workplace or take necessary safety precautions are unconnected to the shipyard’s performance under Navy contracts requiring the use of asbestos, a federal judge in Louisiana said.

  • May 01, 2025

    Plaintiff Says J&J Falsely Portrayed Ruling On Expert Altercation Admission

    PITTSBURGH — Contrary to Johnson & Johnson’s contention at a hearing, a judge did not recently admit evidence of an asbestos expert’s altercation during a trial, a plaintiff seeking a new trial told a Pennsylvania judge after a jury awarded her $22 million in punitive damages despite finding that the company’s products were not the cause of a man’s mesothelioma.

  • May 01, 2025

    J&J Affiliate Says New Evidence Shows Fraud By Asbestos Talc Study Author

    TRENTON, N.J. — Johnson & Johnson (J&J) spinoff Pecos River Talc LLC says in a motion filed in New Jersey federal court seeking to revive its dismissed trade libel and fraud action against the author of a scientific study that it now has ample evidence to prove that the study’s conclusion that the mesothelioma of each of the 33 participants had to be caused by their talc use is false.

  • May 01, 2025

    J&J Entity Seeks Study Participants; Judge Won’t Reconsider Dismissal Ruling

    NEWPORT NEWS, Va. — A federal judge on April 30 denied a motion for reconsideration of his ruling that a Johnson & Johnson entity adequately alleged that experts’ study linking mesothelioma to consumer talc disparaged the company and its products.  In a separate development, Johnson & Johnson subsidiary Pecos River Talc LLC asked a federal judge to compel the three asbestos experts to produce the identities of 75 study participants who reportedly developed mesothelioma solely after exposure to consumer talc products, saying that the evidence is necessary to the prosecution of its injurious falsehood claim and that no privacy issue or law precludes identification.

  • April 30, 2025

    Judge Sets Asbestos Shotgun Shell Case For Trial As 2nd Suit Settles

    WILMINGTON, Del. — There will be no consolidated trial of two shotgun shell asbestos cases later this summer after the plaintiffs in one of the Delaware cases notified the court that the action settled.  The judge recently set the second case for trial in July.

  • April 30, 2025

    New York High Court Denies Appeal In Asbestos Subpoena, Instructions Case

    BUFFALO, N.Y. — The New York Court of Appeals denied motion for leave to appeal in an asbestos case, turning away a challenge to a trial judge’s ruling quashing a subpoena seeking corporate testimony about events 50 years prior and a separate opinion affirming rejection of a jury instruction on an employer’s potential role as an intervening cause of a man’s mesothelioma.

  • April 28, 2025

    Employer: Industrial Board Properly Accepted Mesothelioma Expert’s Opinion

    WILMINGTON, Del. — The industrial board properly chose one expert’s opinions about the level of impairment a man suffering from mesothelioma experienced over another's in determining the award in a workers' compensation case, an employer told the Delaware Supreme Court in a response brief.

  • April 24, 2025

    J&J Entity Wants Talc-Only Meso Study Participants Revealed

    NEWPORT NEWS, Va. — Johnson & Johnson subsidiary Pecos River Talc LLC asked a federal judge to compel three asbestos experts to produce the identities of 75 study participants who reportedly developed mesothelioma solely after exposure to consumer talc products, saying the evidence is necessary to the prosecution of its injurious falsehood claim and that no privacy issue or law precludes identification.

  • April 23, 2025

    Judge Adopts Report And Settlements, Dismisses Insurers In Asbestos Coverage Row

    BUFFALO, N.Y. — A New York federal judge adopted a magistrate judge’s combined report and recommendation to settle estates’ claims with insurers and dismiss the claims against them in four similar suits filed by the estates of people who died purportedly from asbestos exposure, seeking payment of judgments entered against an asbestos mine, finding no error in the magistrate judge’s report and recommendation.

  • April 23, 2025

    Parties Agree Asbestos Subpoena Appeal Moot, Lay Out Paths For Sanction Ruling

    RICHMOND, Va. — A medical provider and an asbestos defendant in briefing agreed that dismissal of an asbestos case mooted the appeal of a ruling quashing a subpoena but offered the Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeal different paths forward on the remaining issue of sanctions.

  • April 22, 2025

    Court Seeks Response To Nonparty’s Sanction Request In Dismissed Asbestos Case

    NEW YORK — Dismissal of an asbestos-talc action does not moot a request for attorney fees as a sanction for repeated subpoenas and litigation against a third party, a New York federal magistrate judge said in ordering asbestos-talc defendant American International Industries (AII) to respond to a hospital operator’s motion.

  • April 22, 2025

    Talc Tort Funding Targets Must Respond To Subpoena, Magistrate Judge Says

    JACKSON, Miss. — A federal magistrate judge in Alabama granted in a text-only order a motion for reconsideration of a stay of discovery in a dispute between asbestos-talc law firms and then issued a written order denying a motion for a protective order and said nonparty litigation funding sources must respond to subpoenas.

  • April 22, 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.

  • April 18, 2025

    Asbestos Tort Targets Ask Delaware Court To Enjoin Trust Document Destruction

    WILMINGTON, Del. — A CertainTeed LLC affiliate and various Johnson & Johnson entities asked a Delaware judge to enjoin the destruction of asbestos bankruptcy trust documents they say are relevant to current and future cases.  In the wake of the motion the Delaware Chancery Court on April 17 set a hearing on a motion to expedite consideration.