U.S. District Court, Eastern District of Texas: Asbestos Cases

Our case-law library holds 9 asbestos decisions from the U.S. District Court, Eastern District of Texas (1980–2001). Each links to our summary and the full opinion.

• Kind of court: Federal district court

Decisions

• Broyles v. US Gypsum Co. (2001). The federal district court granted the plaintiffs' motion for mandatory abstention, remanded the settlement-enforcement dispute to Texas state court, and denied the motions to sever Armstrong and Babcock & Wilcox, so plaintiffs prevailed over USG and Union Carbide.
• Boyett v. Keene Corp. (1993). After a jury verdict of $226,466.09 for Rosemary Boyett against Keene Corporation, the court refused to reduce it by the plaintiff's settlements with the shipowners and other manufacturers, and it denied States Marine Lines' (Isco's) claim for indemnification from Keene.
• Cimino v. Raymark Industries, Inc. (1990). After a class trial of 2,298 asbestos plaintiffs, the court approved its sampling-based damages plan, set rules for prejudgment interest, the Johns-Manville settlement and punitive multipliers against Pittsburgh-Corning, Fibreboard and Celotex, and held ACL liable to only one plaintiff.
• Cimino v. Raymark Industries, Inc. (1990). After a jury verdict for the plaintiff class, the court dismissed the compensatory claims against Carey Canada, kept the punitive damages finding against it, left the contributory negligence findings in place, and set the accrual date for prejudgment interest. It also held ACL liable for Fibreboard products from 1951 to 1961 but declined to assess punitive damages against it.
• Carter v. Johns-Manville Sales Corp. (1983). The court dismissed plaintiff's strict liability failure-to-warn claim against Johns-Manville because of the stipulated unforeseeability of the danger, but held the design defect claim survived, and stayed further proceedings under the defendant's Chapter 11 bankruptcy.
• Hardy v. Johns-Manville Sales Corp. (1981). The district court granted Forty-Eight Insulations' motions for discovery and leave to file cross-actions on a market share theory, denied the sixteen defendants' motion to reconsider the collateral estoppel order (amending it slightly), and certified the collateral estoppel question for interlocutory appeal.
• Flatt v. Johns-Manville Sales Corp. (1980). The court granted plaintiffs' partial summary judgment against Johns Manville and, in part, against Certain-Teed, holding that asbestos products are defective and unreasonably dangerous and barring relitigation of that issue, but denied it on whether Certain-Teed made or sold asbestos products.
• Migues v. Nicolet Industries, Inc. (1980). After a $3,000,000 jury verdict for the widow, the court applied the credit rule (crediting the $400,000 settlement against the verdict) instead of pro rata apportionment, rejecting Nicolet's request. It found the award excessive and ordered a remittitur to a $1.5 million verdict, or a new trial on damages if the plaintiff refused.
• Mooney v. Fibreboard Corp. (1980). The court granted plaintiff Mooney partial summary judgment, barring ten defendants from relitigating whether their asbestos insulation products were defective and unreasonably dangerous; it denied summary judgment against Nicolet on whether it made or sold asbestos products.