U.S. District Court, District of Oregon: Asbestos Cases

Our case-law library holds 8 asbestos decisions from the U.S. District Court, District of Oregon (1988–2024). Each links to our summary and the full opinion.

• Kind of court: Federal district court

Decisions

• Long v. 3M Company (2024). A magistrate judge recommended granting Richard Long's motion to remand his asbestos suit to Multnomah County Circuit Court, rejecting Foster Wheeler's federal officer removal and admiralty arguments.
• Chatfield v. Brenntag North America, Inc. (2023). The district court granted Plaintiff Chatfield's motion to remand to Multnomah County Circuit Court, ruling that in-forum defendant Chang was properly served and not fraudulently joined, so removal by the J&J and Brenntag defendants failed.
• Sheldon v. Cleaver-Brooks, Inc. (2021). The court denied plaintiff Pamela Sheldon's motion to remand to state court, ruling that adding Oregon defendant Murphy did not destroy complete diversity, so Cleaver-Brooks kept the case in federal court; it also granted Cleaver-Brooks leave to file a sur-reply.
• Levin v. Johnson & Johnson (2019). The magistrate judge recommended granting plaintiff Mary Sharon Levin's motion to remand her claims against Johnson & Johnson to Multnomah County Circuit Court on equitable grounds, rejecting J&J's bankruptcy-based removal.
• Levin v. Johnson & Johnson (2019). The court corrected a clerk's error by remanding the claims against all non-J&J defendants to Multnomah County Circuit Court and denied those defendants' motions to dismiss as moot; the claims against J&J stayed in federal court.
• Coury v. Air & Liquid Systems Corporation (2018). The district court denied the estate's second motion to remand and its motion for sanctions, keeping the case in federal court under the federal officer removal statute for General Electric and CBS.
• Laux v. Akebono Brake Industry Co., Ltd. (2015). The district court adopted the magistrate judge's recommendation, granted plaintiff Marilee Laux's motion to remand the case to state court, and denied the Japanese defendants' motion to dismiss as moot, so Akebono Brake Industry and the other defendants lost on removal.
• Schmoll v. ACandS, Inc. (1988). After a bifurcated bench determination on the papers, the court found Raytech Corporation to be a successor in liability to Raymark Industries for its asbestos products, so plaintiff Schmoll won and Raytech lost on that issue.