Your Legal Options After an Asbestos Diagnosis

When someone is diagnosed with mesothelioma, lung cancer, or asbestosis, everything changes. The shock. The questions. The urgency. And almost always, the sense that this never should have happened in the first place.

Since 2014, our firm has stood with thousands of families across the country, helping them make sense of what comes next. We understand how deeply asbestos-related diseases affect not just the body, but every part of your life, including your finances, your future, and especially your family.

We never charge upfront fees, and our consultations are always free. We only get paid if we recover money for you. Over the past decade, we've recovered more than $400 million for workers, veterans, spouses, and children harmed by an industry that knew asbestos was deadly and hid the truth for decades.

Three Paths to Compensation

Most people diagnosed with an asbestos-related illness qualify for more than one form of compensation. Depending on how and when you were exposed, you may have claims against manufacturers, property owners, bankruptcy trusts, and government benefit programs, potentially all at the same time.

Our job is to find every available source of compensation and help you pursue whichever options make sense for your family. That typically means some combination of three paths:

Asbestos Lawsuits hold companies accountable in court for the harm caused by their products or their failure to protect workers.

Asbestos Trust Claims recover money from bankruptcy trusts established by manufacturers who can no longer be sued directly.

Benefits provide medical coverage and income support through the VA, Social Security, or workers' compensation.

These paths aren't mutually exclusive, and most families pursue several at once.

Asbestos Lawsuits

Lawsuits hold companies directly accountable for the harm caused by asbestos exposure. They can result in substantial compensation that other paths don't provide, including damages for medical expenses, lost income, pain and suffering, and wrongful death.

The legal framework for these cases exists because of Clarence Borel, a Texas insulator who became the first person to successfully sue the asbestos industry. His 1973 victory established that manufacturers could be held liable for failing to warn workers about the dangers of their products. Every asbestos lawsuit filed since follows the path he opened.

The main types of asbestos lawsuits are below. Our asbestos lawsuits overview explains who can file, the deadlines, and how the different claims work together.

• Product liability lawsuits target manufacturers who made asbestos products and failed to warn users.
• Premises liability lawsuits target property owners who knew about asbestos hazards and failed to protect workers.
• Wrongful death lawsuits allow surviving families to seek compensation when a loved one dies from an asbestos-related disease.

Railroad workers and seamen have additional options. The Federal Employers' Liability Act allows railroad employees to sue their employers directly. Learn about FELA claims. The Jones Act gives seamen similar rights against their employers, and maritime law adds claims against the owners of unseaworthy vessels. Learn about maritime claims.

Asbestos Trust Claims

Many of the companies responsible for asbestos exposure went bankrupt and, through their Chapter 11 reorganizations, set up trusts to compensate current and future victims of mesothelioma, lung cancer, and other asbestos diseases. A bankruptcy court approved each plan. More than 60 trusts hold tens of billions of dollars set aside specifically for people with asbestos-related diseases. If you were exposed to their products, you may be able to file claims against multiple trusts.

Trust claims don't require going to court. There's no trial, no testimony, and no years-long litigation. You submit documentation of your diagnosis and exposure history, and if the claim meets the trust's criteria, you receive a payout—often within months. For mesothelioma, the total recovery from several trusts can be substantial, and can sometimes exceed $1 million.

Trust claims can be filed alongside lawsuits. The manufacturers you can still sue are different from the ones that established trusts, so pursuing both paths maximizes your total recovery.

Learn more about asbestos trust claims.

Benefits

If your illness prevents you from working, you may qualify for benefits that provide medical coverage and income support while you focus on treatment and care. And unlike lawsuits, they don't require proving anyone was at fault.

VA Disability is available to veterans whose asbestos exposure occurred during military service. Navy veterans are especially affected, though any veteran with a service-connected asbestos disease may qualify. Benefits include monthly tax-free payments, healthcare through the VA system, and survivor benefits for spouses and dependents.

Social Security Disability is available to workers who paid into the system and can no longer work due to their illness. Mesothelioma qualifies for fast-tracked approval under the SSA's Compassionate Allowances program, meaning claims can often be processed in weeks rather than months. Payments don't begin until after a five-month waiting period, and our firm can sometimes advance treatment and living costs in the meantime. Learn more about financial help during treatment.

Workers' Compensation provides no-fault medical and wage benefits for work-related disease. In most states it's your only remedy against your own employer, and recovery is more limited than what a lawsuit can achieve. But it doesn't block claims against manufacturers, property owners, or trusts.

None of these programs keeps you from pursuing lawsuits or trust claims. You can receive VA, Social Security, or workers' compensation benefits and still file for every other form of compensation available to you.

Learn more about disability benefits.

Go Deeper

If you want the full picture before you call, these in-depth guides explain each path in detail:

• The complete guide to asbestos trust claims: how trusts work, what they pay, and how claims are filed.
• The complete guide to mesothelioma lawsuits: what you have to prove, how damages work, and what affects your final recovery.
• Mesothelioma settlement values: what each asbestos trust pays, and the range of values it uses.
• Filing deadlines by state: the deadlines and rules that apply where you live or were exposed.

Claims Work Together

Most families pursue several paths for compensation, not just one. A worker diagnosed with mesothelioma might file a premises liability lawsuit against the property owner where he was exposed, trust claims against the bankrupt manufacturers of the products he worked with, and a Social Security disability claim for monthly income support. A veteran might combine VA disability benefits with trust claims and product liability lawsuits against the companies that supplied asbestos to the military. And a spouse or child who developed mesothelioma from fibers a worker carried home on his clothes may have their own product and trust claims, and in some states claims against the property owner, even though they never set foot in the plant.

These claims target different parties and draw from different sources, and they don't compete with each other. They stack to provide relief to families affected by asbestos and the diseases it can cause. Coordinating multiple claims properly is how families maximize their total recovery and ensure that every responsible party is held accountable. We've recovered more than $400 million for asbestos victims and their families by building comprehensive strategies that pursue every available claim simultaneously.

Learn more about why families choose us.

On our Clarence Borel page, we walk through exactly what would happen if someone with his exposure history contacted us today. It shows how workers' compensation, premises liability, product liability, and trust claims all fit together in a single coordinated strategy to compensate families affected by diseases like mesothelioma. Learn more about Clarence Borel.