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Kazan, McClain, Lyons, Greenwood & Harley, PLC
171 Twelfth Street Third Floor
Oakland, CA 94607
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Asbestos Litigation
About Us | Asbestos Litigation | Lawsuit FAQs
ASBESTOS LITIGATION
The first asbestos products lawsuit was filed on December 10, 1966. The Plaintiff diagnosed with asbestosis in July of that year. The defendants were eleven manufacturers of asbestos-containing insulation products, including Johns-Manville, Fibreboard and Owens Corning Fiberglas.
The case proceeded to trial on May 12, 1969 and a week later the verdict was returned in favor of defendants. However, a second case brought in the name of a co-worker succeeded and was upheld on appeal.
In 1974, Steven Kazan filed a precedent-setting lawsuit on behalf of Reba Rudkin, who developed asbestosis after working for 29 years at the Johns-Manville manufacturing plant in Pittsburg, California. Kazan sued Johns-Manville in a civil lawsuit, even though Mr. Rudkin worked for Johns-Manville and the company would normally be protected from such a lawsuit because workers' compensation is the exclusive remedy for an employee suing an employer. But we argued that Manville and its executives should not be shielded from fraud and conspiracy charges.
In January 1978, evidence of fraud and conspiracy started to emerge. During this period, numerous incriminating Johns-Manville documents were discovered, including the personal records of the president of Raybestos Manhattan, who corresponded frequently with Vandiver Brown, General Counsel of Johns-Manville. The letters disclosed that as early as the 1930s these companies conspired to suppress knowledge about the hazards of asbestos.
In November 1981, Steven Kazan tried the case of Bob Speake, a co-worker of Reba Rudkin. By this time a major victory had been won against against Johns-Manville, when the California Supreme Court ruled that workers could sue their employers when circumstances like those in Rudkin applied. This enabled Mr. Speake and other Pittsburg plant workers to proceed with their cases in civil court against their employer. In February 1982, Kazan obtained a verdict of $150,000 for Mr. Speake.
The case marked a threshold in asbestos litigation, giving rise to a number of punitive damage verdicts against Johns-Manville. The Firm set many other Johns-Manville factory worker cases for trial, but in August 1982, Johns-Manville filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection to avoid paying compensation to the growing number of victims of diseases caused by exposure to its asbestos products.
Unfortunately, several other asbestos companies followed Johns-Manville's lead into the bankruptcy courts. Within a few years, the entire asbestos textile industry was in bankruptcy, as were several major asbestos insulation manufacturers.
At the same time, the patterns of asbestos disease were changing. Initially, most cases of asbestos disease were seen among workers at asbestos mines and factories. This was reflected in the litigation against the major asbestos manufacturers, in particular, on behalf of workers at their plants.
Then a second wave appeared, of workers who were injured by exposure at sites where the asbestos-containing products were installed. Asbestos litigation diversified as these injured workers filed suit based on their exposure at shipyards refineries, railroads and power plants. The third wave was workers injured by asbestos exposure in the construction industry. They were exposed to different products - such as fireproofing sprays, drywall products, textures, and other asbestos-containing construction materials.
By the mid-1980s, The Firm had decided to file cases only on behalf of workers with serious asbestos-caused disabilities, particularly workers diagnosed with mesothelioma.
Through the years, The Firm has remained at the forefront of asbestos litigation. In 1996 Firm principal Dianna Lyons took on the Appellate Court ruling in the Sullivan case. In this case a trial court awarded damages to a plaintiff, but he died while his case was on appeal. The Appellate Court had ruled that because he died before the appeal was concluded, he therefore lost the damages awarded him for his pain and suffering. Realizing the gross injustice this appellate court ruling would inflict on asbestos victims in California the Firm volunteered to handle the issue before the California Supreme Court resulting in the Supreme Court reversing the lower court ruling.
For individual victims of asbestos disease, workers' compensation awards are often a lifeline. In this arena The Firm has been a leader in formulating law about occupational diseases in California.
One of the major workers' compensation rulings achieved by former Firm principal Victoria Edises was on behalf of Harvey and Lucille Steele. Mr. Steele was diagnosed with a relatively mild asbestos disease in 1976, but eleven years later he came down with mesothelioma. The Firm filed a new workers' compensation application on his behalf. This new application was contested, but Victoria Edises prevailed when the court ruled that the same asbestos exposure can give rise to separate and different asbestos-related injuries and disabilities.
This ruling is especially important for asbestos victims because people with one disease are at a much higher risk of later developing other asbestos diseases. The Steele decision acknowledged that even though Harvey Steele had already filed a workers' compensation claim for one asbestos disease, he was nevertheless entitled to file another workers' compensation claim for the separate injury and disability he suffered when he became ill from mesothelioma.
Another ruling of great benefit to workers' compensation applicants was in the Force case. In 1984, former principal Victoria Edises obtained workers' compensation benefits for Mr. Force, a former shipyard worker. George Force and his wife, Lucille, also filed a third party lawsuit against various asbestos manufacturers and distributors, and obtained substantial recoveries.
After Mr. Force passed away, his wife brought a longshore compensation claim. The insurance carrier attempted to obtain credit against its liability for benefits to Mrs. Force, from the monies that Mrs. Force and other members of the Force family received in their successful third party case. Ms. Edises obtained a ruling that limited the credit to that part of the third party settlement apportioned to Mrs. Force. The amounts apportioned to the Force children were excluded. Additionally, the Court found that the employer had the burden of proving apportionment of any third party settlement between multiple parties.
Because of this ruling, insurance carriers can only receive credit for monies paid to the actual applicants and cannot receive credit for monies paid to other parties. For instance, if a jury awards damages to an injured asbestos worker and to his wife and three children, then under Force, the workers' compensation carrier can get credit only for the monies apportioned to the worker himself, and not for the monies apportioned to his family. The effect of this ruling is to enhance the overall recoveries of workers with asbestos-related diseases, and their families, from their workers' compensation claims and third party lawsuits.