Design Defect in Asbestos Cases

Decisions in our library in which the court ruled on design defect: 279 cases, by state. Each line gives what the court held, in our words; the law differs from state to state and changes, so read the opinion and talk to a lawyer before relying on any of them.

Missouri

• Clayton Center Assoc. v. WR Grace & Co. (Eastern District, 2nd Division, 1993). A building owner may recover in strict liability and negligence for asbestos contamination of the building from a fireproofing product. A claim accrues when asbestos fibers are released and a substantial, unreasonable risk of harm can be ascertained, and the economic loss doctrine does not bar recovery for damage to property other than the product itself.
• Hagen v. Celotex Corp. (1991). A plaintiff must show through expert testimony that each defendant's product was a substantial factor in causing the harm. Evidence showing only asbestos exposure in general, or that a defendant's product may have contributed, does not make a submissible case against that defendant.

Nevada

• Potter v. Crane Co. (2022). In an asbestos claim a plaintiff must show that the particular defendant sufficiently exposed him to asbestos; without a product traceable to the defendant, negligence, strict liability and conspiracy claims fail, and a holding company is not liable for its subsidiary absent a successor-liability exception.

New Jersey

• Losurdo v. Viacomcbs Inc. (2025). Under maritime law and DeVries, a manufacturer's duty to warn turns on whether it directed incorporation of asbestos parts, knew the integrated product was dangerous, and had no reason to believe the sailors using it would know of the danger. Under Miles, punitive and loss-of-consortium damages are not available in a maritime wrongful death action.
• Fowler v. Akzo Nobel Chemicals, Inc. (2021). A manufacturer cannot delegate its duty to warn to an employer but may discharge it, if reasonable under the circumstances, by giving adequate warnings to the employer; the jury must be told this. In multi-defendant asbestos cases, medical causation instructions must include the frequency, regularity and proximity test, not just a general proximate cause charge.
• Estate OF Brust v. Acf Industries, LLC (2015). The Locomotive Inspection Act preempts state-law design and failure-to-warn claims about locomotive equipment even when the user is an urban rapid transit operator not subject to federal railroad regulation. A plaintiff must show asbestos exposure to the defendant's product that was frequent, regular and in close proximity to establish substantial-factor causation.
• Barile v. 3M Company, Inc. (2013). A builder of a custom boiler that is an improvement to real property is protected by the ten-year statute of repose, including for follow-up repairs and for strict liability claims based on standard asbestos insulation made by others. A landowner owes no duty to protect an independent contractor's workers from hazards inherent in the contracted work unless it controls the means and methods of that work.
• Becker v. Baron Bros. (1994). Asbestos-containing products sold without warnings are not defective as a matter of law across the board; where the product's dangerousness is genuinely disputed, the jury must decide that first. Beshada is limited to the state-of-the-art defense. If the product is found dangerous and a warning would not destroy its usefulness, the court may then find it defective as a matter of law, leaving proximate cause to the jury.

New York

• Pritt v. Air & Liquid Systems Corporation (2022). Under maritime law, a plaintiff must show exposure to the defendant's own product and that the product was a substantial factor in causing the disease. Minimal exposure, or exposure only to another maker's component, is not enough. Maritime law also allows loss of consortium and punitive damages in a non-Jones Act claim.
• Milan-Leal v. Brenntag N. AM. (2021). A defendant seeking summary judgment in an asbestos case must show its product could not have contributed to the injury, and it cannot meet that burden by pointing to gaps in the plaintiff's proof. Strict liability may be imposed on retailers, and indemnification claims are premature until the underlying claims are resolved.
• Olson v. Brenntag N. Am., Inc. (2020). A jury could rationally find that J&J's talcum powders exposed the plaintiff to asbestos, that this exposure caused her mesothelioma, and that J&J's conduct warranted punitive damages. The compensatory award was excessive, and a 12:1 punitive-to-compensatory ratio was unconstitutionally excessive, so the court capped it at 7:1.
• Epstein v. Port Authority of New York & New Jersey (In re New York City Asbestos Litigation) (2019). A premises owner is liable under Labor Law § 200 and common law negligence only if it controlled the means and methods of the work, and conflicting testimony and evidence of that control raises fact issues. An owner outside the manufacturing, selling or distribution chain cannot be held strictly liable for products.
• Decanio v. Kohler Co. (In re New York City Asbestos Litigation) (2019). A boiler maker seeking summary judgment in an asbestos case must unequivocally show its product could not have contributed to the injury. Removing parts from boilers already disassembled by other trade workers was not shown to be an unforeseeable use or misuse, so that question was for a jury.
• LaFLAIR v. Johnson & Johnson (2019). A removing defendant must show by clear and convincing evidence that there is no possibility the plaintiff can state a claim against the non-diverse defendant in state court, applying New York's lenient pleading standard. An affirmative defense such as the contract-specification defense that turns on unresolved facts does not meet that burden.
• Cavalieri v. A.O. Smith Water Prods. Co. (In re Eighth Judicial District Asbestos Litigation) (Erie, 2018). Hockler v William Powell Co. is limited to salvage workers; a plumber who disassembles boilers while replacing them as part of his regular work is not barred from claiming against the boiler manufacturer.
• Shulman v. Brenntag N. AM., Inc. (2018). A defendant seeking summary judgment in an asbestos case must unequivocally show its product could not have contributed to the plaintiff's illness, and speculative or conclusory expert affidavits fail that burden. Conflicting expert evidence on whether talc was contaminated with asbestos raises fact issues for trial.
• All Craft Fabricators, Inc. v. Atc Assoc., Inc. (2017). A manufacturer has no duty to warn of latent dangers that do not arise from the intended or reasonably foreseeable use of its product; cutting into asbestos-core fire doors and panels during refurbishment was not an intended use.
• Finerty v. Abex Corp. (2016). A parent corporation that is not itself a manufacturer, seller or distributor in the chain of distribution cannot be held strictly liable for its subsidiary's products unless the corporate veil can be pierced; being in a position to exert pressure on a subsidiary or controlling a trademark does not create strict liability.
• Feinberg v. Colgate-Palmolive Co. (Matter of New York City Asbestos Litig.) (2016). Under CPLR 214-c, whether early symptoms were too isolated or inconsequential to start the limitations period is a fact question for the jury where the evidence is conflicting. On summary judgment, the defendant bears the burden of showing its product could not have caused the injury; the plaintiff need not exclude other causes.
• Finerty v. Abex Corp. (1st Dept., 2015). A parent company is not liable on a veil-piercing theory, but fact issues exist whether it may be directly liable for its role in standardizing and distributing a subsidiary's asbestos-containing parts. Personal jurisdiction over a foreign subsidiary under CPLR 302(a)(3)(ii) requires that it reasonably expected the out-of-state exposure to have consequences in New York.
• Hockler v. William Powell Company (1st Dept., 2015). A manufacturer is not liable in strict products liability or negligence where the plaintiff's injury came from dismantling or salvaging the product for scrap, because that is neither an intended use nor a reasonably foreseeable one. Without a foreseeable use, there is also no duty to warn.
• Smith v. AO Smith Water Prods. (2015). The First Department's Hockler decision is limited to salvage work and does not bar strict liability claims by skilled tradesmen who disassemble products during routine maintenance or renovation; whether such disassembly was foreseeable is a question of fact.
• Wiacek v. 3M Co. (2014). A design defect claim against a product maker needs expert proof of a feasible safer design, so plaintiffs without an expert cannot defeat summary judgment. The adequacy of a warning is ordinarily a question of fact, and compliance with NIOSH standards does not by itself bar a state-law failure to warn claim.
• Briggs v. General Electric Co. (Nassau, 2007). A summary judgment movant must first make a prima facie showing eliminating material fact issues, and failing that, its motion is denied regardless of the opposing papers. An insulation contractor performing a service is not a manufacturer or seller, so strict liability and warranty claims fail.
• Ciletti v. Raymark Indus. (In re Asbestos Litigation) (1997). A defendant asserting the military contractor defense to a design defect claim must prove every Boyle element, including warnings to the government, and merely raising some elements is not enough. New York does not recognize a child's claim for loss of parental consortium, and filing a proof of claim with the Manville Trust is not a settlement that supports a set-off under General Obligations Law § 15-108.
• Tabolt v. Flintkote Co. (In re New York Asbestos Litigation) (1994). A jury may infer exposure to a defendant's asbestos product from circumstantial evidence that the product was sold at the worksite and produced dust. Irreconcilable answers on a special verdict form require a new trial rather than the court discarding one answer. Settlement credits under N.Y. G.O.L. § 15-108 follow the New York Court of Appeals' aggregate method.
• Barnett v. City of Yonkers (1990). Under New York law a school board is liable like a private landowner only if it had actual or constructive notice of the hazard, an owner out of possession without control is not liable, and an architect is liable only for professional negligence judged by the standards of the time his services ended.
• Matter of Steinhardt v. Johns-Manville Corp. (4th Dept., 1980). A personal injury claim accrues when the harmful substance is inhaled, not when the injury is discovered, so the limitations period ran from the injury and not from the later diagnosis. Strict products liability claims sounding in tort carry the same limitations period as negligence.

North Carolina

• Walls v. Ford Motor Company (2022). Under North Carolina law, an asbestos plaintiff can show causation with direct or circumstantial evidence of regular exposure to a defendant's product over an extended period, without expert testimony specific to that defendant. Punitive damages require clear and convincing evidence that corporate managers actually understood the specific risk.
• Smith v. 3M Company (2019). Under North Carolina law, a premises owner is liable only if it controlled the place and the work, and an asbestos plaintiff must show exposure to a specific product with frequency, regularity and proximity; vague testimony that insulation dust was inhaled does not suffice.
• Finch v. BASF Catalysts LLC (2018). A reasonable jury could infer from circumstantial evidence that a supplier sold asbestos-containing insulation to the plant. Premises liability requires control of the work area, design claims apply only to manufacturers, and punitive damages under North Carolina law require willful and wanton conduct beyond gross negligence.
• Smith v. American Honda Motor Co., Inc. (2016). Under North Carolina law, compliance with federal labeling standards does not conclusively show a warning was adequate, and proximate cause is ordinarily for the jury. Design defect under N.C. Gen. Stat. § 99B-6 does not require expert testimony on a feasible alternative design, and punitive damages require clear and convincing evidence of willful and wanton conduct by corporate officers, directors or managers.
• Harris v. Ajax Boiler, Inc. (2014). Under North Carolina products liability law, a boiler maker is not liable where the plaintiff cannot show the boiler left the factory with asbestos cement or that the asbestos mud he removed was the maker's. Nor is the maker liable for an asbestos cement the worker applied that was not part of the boiler when made, since liability rests with that product's manufacturer.

Ohio

• Blakely v. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. (9th Appellate District, 2019). An unrebutted statutory presumption under R.C. 2307.941 that a premises owner complied with state safe exposure levels does not by itself defeat a premises claim built on a theory that the owner knew those levels were unsafe. A negligence-based supplier claim under R.C. 2307.78(A)(1) is not barred by DiCenzo or a privity requirement, and the product question is whether the component had left the manufacturer's control, not whether it was still in a manufacturing process.
• Hart v. Honeywell International (2017). Under Ohio's Product Liability Act, a failure-to-warn plaintiff's own testimony that he did not read warnings and would not have heeded them rebuts the presumption of causation, and without contrary evidence the claim fails. Expert testimony is not required to prove a design defect in asbestos brake products, and the existence of asbestos-free brakes is evidence of a feasible alternative design.
• Estate OF Blandford v. AO Smith Corp. (8th Appellate District, 2016). Under R.C. 2307.78(B), a bankrupt manufacturer that is subject to personal jurisdiction in Ohio and is not shown to be insolvent does not trigger substituted strict liability for its supplier. A supplier can still face negligent failure to warn liability under R.C. 2307.78(A)(1) if fact issues remain on its knowledge of the hazard, exposure to its product, and substantial factor causation.
• Schwartz v. Honeywell Internatl., Inc. (8th Appellate District, 2016). Expert testimony on cumulative asbestos exposure and brake dust causing mesothelioma was admissible without quantified dose, and evidence of manner, proximity and frequency of exposure met Ohio's substantial factor test (R.C. 2307.96). Evidence that a feasible non-asbestos alternative existed supported the design defect claim, and enough evidence of flagrant disregard existed that punitive damages should not have been taken from the jury.
• DiCenzo v. A-Best Prods. Co. (2008). An Ohio court decision applies retroactively unless a party has contract or vested rights under the prior decision, but the court may apply it only prospectively after weighing the Chevron Oil factors: a new principle not foreshadowed, whether retroactivity promotes or retards the rule's purpose, and whether it causes inequity. Under that test, Temple v. Wean's strict liability for nonmanufacturing sellers applies prospectively only.
• DiCENZO v. A-Best Prods. Co., Inc. (8th Appellate District, 2007). A plaintiff need not quantify the share of workplace asbestos attributable to a defendant to show its product was a substantial factor, and testimony placing the product directly above the worker can create a fact issue. Temple v. Wean's strict liability rule applies retroactively to suppliers who sold asbestos products before 1977.
• Adkins v. GAF Corp. (1988). Raw asbestos fiber sold in unwarned burlap or paper bags was a defective product under Ohio strict liability, even though the buyer knew the hazards. Under recent Ohio and Sixth Circuit decisions, failure to warn alone, without the statutory presumption, does not prove the intent needed for an employer intentional tort.
• Layne v. GAF Corp. (1988). Ohio strict products liability under Restatement 402A, Comments j and k, supports a failure-to-warn claim and a state-of-the-art defense for asbestos products, and the learned intermediary rule has been affirmed only for prescription drugs, not for building owners.

Oklahoma

• Case v. Fibreboard Corp. (1987). Oklahoma does not recognize market share liability or other collective liability theories (alternative liability, concert of action, enterprise liability) in asbestos injury litigation when the plaintiff cannot identify the specific manufacturers whose products caused the injury; creating a compensation scheme is for the legislature.

Oregon

• Mason v. Mt. St. Joseph, Inc. (2009). A 'product liability civil action' under ORS 30.900 lies only against a manufacturer, distributor or seller of the defective product that caused the harm. A party that only directed or reused asbestos products occasionally and noncommercially is not such a defendant, so the asbestos-specific limitations period in ORS 30.907 does not apply.

Other federal courts

• McINDOE v. Huntington Ingalls Incorporated (2016). Custom-built naval warships not distributed commercially are not "products" for strict products liability under maritime law, and a negligence claim requires proof of substantial exposure to the defendant's asbestos for a substantial period, which an "every exposure" expert opinion cannot replace.
• Savoie v. Huntington Ingalls, Incorporated (2016). Under the federal officer removal statute, negligence claims about safety measures the government did not control show no causal nexus, but pre-1996 Louisiana strict liability claims based on the mere use of asbestos required by government contract specifications do show one, and removal of the whole case is proper if a single claim qualifies.
• Ruppel v. CBS Corporation (2012). A private contractor may remove under the federal officer removal statute if it was a person acting under a federal officer, the suit relates to acts under color of office, and it has a colorable federal defense; the government contractor defense can be colorable for both use-of-asbestos and failure-to-warn claims without proof that the government prohibited warnings.
• Kurns v. AW Chesterton Inc. (2010). The Locomotive Inspection Act preempts the field of locomotive parts and appurtenances, so state-law design defect and failure-to-warn claims against makers of locomotive parts over asbestos exposure are preempted. The Federal Railroad Safety Act did not narrow that preemption.
• Lindstrom v. AC Product Liability Trust (2005). Under maritime products liability law, a plaintiff must show for each defendant that he was exposed to that defendant's product and that it was a substantial factor in causing the injury. A generic expert opinion that every asbestos exposure contributed does not meet this requirement. A manufacturer is not responsible for asbestos in other companies' packing or gaskets attached to its equipment.
• Rohrbaugh v. Celotex Corp. (1995). Under the law of the case doctrine, an appellate court's earlier holdings, explicit or by necessary implication, govern later stages of the same case. The earlier ruling that the plaintiff was not a foreseeable user and that the manufacturer had no reason to know of the hazard defeated both the products liability and negligence claims.
• Johnstone v. American Oil Co. (1993). Under Louisiana's risk-utility test for a product that is unreasonably dangerous per se, a court may not grant JNOV by disregarding admitted utility evidence as irrelevant. The product's danger and utility are weighed as to society as a whole, and the evidence here left a jury question.