Anderson v. Ford Motor Company (D. Utah, Sept. 9, 2014)

Our plain-English summary of Anderson v. Ford Motor Company (U.S. District Court, District of Utah, September 9, 2014).

Joseph Anderson, Jr. sued in Utah state court, alleging he had asbestos-caused mesothelioma. The case was removed to federal court and transferred to the asbestos multidistrict litigation in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. Mr. Anderson died of mesothelioma in 2008, and his wife, Arva Anderson, was substituted as plaintiff. The Pennsylvania court denied the defendants' summary judgment motions in whole or in part. It then sent the case back to Utah for trial and severed the punitive damages claims. Back in Utah, Crane Co. asked for leave to file a dispositive motion arguing it was not responsible for asbestos materials made by others and used with its pumps and valves after sale, known as the bare metal defense. York International adopted that request. The Utah court denied both motions. It said Crane was repeating an argument already rejected by the Pennsylvania court and by this court on reconsideration. The opinion does not describe Mr. Anderson's work or exposure.

We wrote this summary from the court's opinion with the help of AI. It is not the court's wording, and it is not legal advice. The full opinion is below.

The decision

• Court: U.S. District Court, District of Utah
• Decided: September 9, 2014
• Docket: Case No. 2:06-CV-741 TS
• Stage: Other
• State: Utah

Outcome. The court denied Crane Co.'s and York International's motions for leave to file a dispositive motion on the bare metal defense, leaving the plaintiff's claims to proceed to trial.

What the court held. A party may not obtain leave to file a dispositive motion that repeats an argument already rejected by the MDL court and by the transferee court on reconsideration; the court would not revisit that ruling or define Utah law on liability for other makers' asbestos products.

Issues decided: The Bare-Metal Defense, Trial Procedure and Discovery, Venue, Removal and Transfer.

The people and their exposure

• Joseph Alexander Anderson, Jr.: mesothelioma; died

The defendants

• Crane Co. (manufacturer)
• York International Corporation (manufacturer)
• Ford Motor Company (manufacturer)

Other decisions in this case

Other rulings from the same court in the same case, in our library:

• Anderson v. Asbestos Defendants (In re Asbestos Cases OF Hatch) (February 20, 2007). The district court denied the plaintiffs' motion for relief and continued to defer ruling on their motion to remand, leaving the case to the MDL court in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania after the conditional transfer order.
• Anderson v. Ford Motor Company (June 24, 2013). The court granted Crane Co.'s renewed motion, joined by York, Honeywell, Goulds Pumps, Flowserve and Sepco, and excluded the plaintiff's experts' "every exposure" specific causation testimony, a ruling for the defendants over Arva Anderson.
• Anderson v. Ford Motor Company (February 28, 2014). The district court denied Crane Co.'s motion, joined by other defendants, to exclude plaintiff Arva Anderson's expert Dr. Abraham's specific causation testimony, so the plaintiff prevailed on the motion.

The court's opinion

The text below is Google Scholar's copy of the court's opinion, a public record. Numbers in brackets, such as [*921], mark where each page of the printed reporter begins.

ARVA ANDERSON, Plaintiff,

v.

FORD MOTOR COMPANY, etal., Defendants.

Case No. 2:06-CV-741 TS.

September 9, 2014.

United States District Court, D. Utah.

MEMORANDUM DECISION AND ORDER DENYING DEFENDANTS' MOTIONS

FOR LEAVE TO FILE A DISPOSITIVE MOTION

TED STEWART, District Judge.

This matter is before the Court on Defendant Crane Co.'s Motion for Leave to File a Dispositive Motion and Defendant York International Corporation's ("York") Motion for Leave to File a Dispositive Motion. For the reasons discussed below, the Court will deny Defendants' Motions.

I. BACKGROUND

This matter was initially filed in state court by Joseph Alexander Anderson, Jr., and was removed to this Court on September 1, 2006. Plaintiff's complaint alleged that Mr. Anderson had been diagnosed with asbestos-caused Mesothelioma. Mr. Anderson died of Mesothelioma on June 7, 2008, and his wife and the executor of his estate, Arva Anderson, was substituted as Plaintiff. On October 20, 2006, the United States of America Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation ("MDL") issued Conditional Transfer Order 269,[1] which transferred Plaintiff's case to the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania (the "Pennsylvania Court").

While before the Pennsylvania Court, each of the Defendants filed a motion for summary judgment. The Pennsylvania Court denied each of these motions in whole or in part in separate opinions on April 27, 2011.[2] Defendant Crane Co. filed a motion for reconsideration before the Pennsylvania Court, and the Pennsylvania Court denied the motion on September 26, 2012.[3]

On that same day, the Pennsylvania Court issued a Suggestion of Remand, suggesting that the case be remanded to this Court because all discovery had been completed and the case was ready for trial.[4] On October 12, 2012, a Clerk's Order of Conditional Remand was signed, remanding the case back to this Court for trial and severing all claims for punitive or exemplary damages.[5]

On November 28, 2012, Defendant York filed a Motion for Reconsideration and on December 3, 2012, Defendant Crane Co. filed a Renewed Motion for Partial Reconsideration and Clarification.[6] The Court denied these motions on July 15, 2013.[7] Defendants now seek leave to file a dispositive motion.

II. DISCUSSION

Crane Co. seeks permission to file a dispositive motion on the legal issue of "whether Crane Co. is legally responsible for asbestos-containing materials that it neither made nor sold, but which were used with its pumps and valves post-sale."[8] The pending motion sets forth substantially the same argument that Crane Co. made to the Pennsylvania Court when it argued that it should not be held responsible for products "manufactured or supplied by other companies and used with Crane Co. valves post-sale,"[9] which is known as the "bare metal" defense. The Pennsylvania Court found that it "need not consider the `bare metal' defense since Plaintiff has presented evidence that Crane Co. manufactured some asbestos-

containing pumps. Moreover, Defendant has not cited to any Utah case recognizing the `bare metal' defense in the asbestos context."[10]

Crane Co. also made substantially the same argument before this Court when it sought "an order determining that it is not legally responsible or liable for asbestos-containing products it did not manufacture, supply, or otherwise introduce into the stream of commerce, but which were placed upon its metal valves and pumps by others post-sale."[11] At that time, Crane Co. did not ask the Court to reconsider the MDL Court's April 27, 2011 Order, but insisted that it was merely asking for clarification of a legal issue.[12] Crane Co., however, sought the same relief from this Court as it sought from the Pennsylvania Court and effectively requested the Court grant summary judgment.[13] At that time, the Court determined, to the extent that Crane Co. is asking the Court to reconsider the Pennsylvania Court's finding that there was a material issue of fact as to whether Crane Co. manufactured asbestos-containing pumps or valves, it is a second Motion to Reconsider. The Court will not engage in an attempt to define an area of Utah law that is not relevant to Crane Co.'s motion for summary judgment, and the question of Crane Co.'s liability for products it did not manufacture, supply, or otherwise introduce into the stream of commerce is only relevant if the Court does overturn the Pennsylvania Court's determination that there is a material issue of fact around the manufacture, supply, or introduction into the stream of commerce of asbestos-containing products. As the Pennsylvania Court has already fully considered Defendant's Motion to Reconsider, this Court need not do so again.[14]

In its Motion for Leave to File a Dispositive Motion Crane Co. again makes the same argument it made previously to the Pennsylvania Court and this Court. For the same reasons previously explained by the Court in its Memorandum Decision and Order Denying Defendants' Motions for Reconsideration and Clarification, Defendant Crane Co.'s Motion will be denied. Defendant York adopts as its own Crane Co.'s Motion for Leave to File a Dispositive Motion and incorporates by reference the same relief sought.[15] For the same reasons set forth above, York's Motion will also be denied.

III. CONCLUSION

It is therefore ORDERED that Defendant Crane Co.'s Motion for Leave to File a Dispositive Motion (Docket No. 400) is DENIED. It is further

ORDERED that Defendant York International Corporation's Motion for Leave to File a Dispositive Motion (Docket No. 437) is DENIED.

[1] See Docket No. 143.

[2] Anderson v. Ford Motor Co., No. 2:09-69122, 2011 WL 5505462 (E.D. Pa. Apr. 29, 2011) (unpublished) (order denying Crane Co.'s motion); Anderson v. Ford Motor Co., No. 2:09-69122, 2011 WL 5505437 (E.D. Pa. Apr. 29, 2011) (unpublished) (order denying York's motion).

[3] Docket No. 28-13.

[4] Docket No. 254.

[5] Id.

[6] Docket No. 267; Docket No. 268.

[7] Docket No. 328.

[8] Docket No. 400.

[9] Docket No. 268, at 3.

[10] Anderson v. Ford Motor Co., No. 2:09-69122, 2011 WL 5505462, at [*1] n.1.

[11] Docket No. 268, at 1.

[12] Id., at 1, 5.

[13] Docket No. 328, at 15.

[14] Id.

[15] Docket No. 437.

Sources

• The opinion on Google Scholar
• Utah asbestos laws
• Utah asbestos exposure sites