Templet v. Huntington Ingalls, Incorporated (2018)

Our plain-English summary of Templet v. Huntington Ingalls, Incorporated (U.S. Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit, May 1, 2018).

Robert J. Templet Sr. worked for Huntington Ingalls from 1968 to 2002. He alleged that between 1968 and 1979 he handled asbestos and asbestos-containing products at various worksites and developed diffuse malignant pleural mesothelioma. He sued Huntington Ingalls, executive Albert Bossier Jr. and Lamorak Insurance Company in Louisiana state court, claiming they negligently failed to warn him of asbestos dangers and failed to implement safety procedures. The defendants removed the case to federal court under the federal officer removal statute, saying the company used asbestos to build vessels under government contract specifications. The district court remanded the case to state court, and the defendants appealed. The Fifth Circuit affirmed. Following its recent decision in Legendre, it held that claims about failing to warn or adopt safety procedures involve private conduct implicating no federal interest. The defendants had not shown they were unable to adopt the safety measures Templet said would have prevented his injuries, so they failed to show the required causal nexus for federal jurisdiction.

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. Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit
• Decided: May 1, 2018
• Docket: No. 17-30676
• Stage: Appeal from jurisdiction, venue or removal
• Unpublished opinion. Many courts limit citing unpublished opinions as precedent.
• State: Louisiana

Outcome. The Fifth Circuit affirmed the district court's order remanding Templet's asbestos suit to Louisiana state court, rejecting removal by Huntington Ingalls, Albert Bossier Jr. and Lamorak Insurance.

What the court held. Negligence claims for failure to warn, train or adopt asbestos safety procedures do not show the causal nexus needed for federal officer removal when the defendant does not show it was prevented from adopting those safety measures.

Issues decided: Failure to Warn, Government Contractor Defense and Removal, Venue, Removal and Transfer.

The people and their exposure

• Robert J. Templet, Sr.: pleural mesothelioma

Who	Work	Where	When	Products
Robert J. Templet, Sr.	employee of Huntington Ingalls (shipyards and maritime work)	Louisiana	1968-1979

The defendants

• Huntington Ingalls, Incorporated (employer)
• Albert Bossier, Jr. (employer)
• Lamorak Insurance Company (insurer)

Decisions this opinion cites

Earlier decisions in our library that the court cited:

• Legendre v. Huntington Ingalls, Incorporated (U.S. Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit, 2018). The Fifth Circuit affirmed the district court's order remanding the case to Louisiana state court, ruling that Huntington Ingalls (Avondale) failed to show the causal nexus needed for federal officer removal, so the Legendre brothers prevailed.
• Savoie v. Huntington Ingalls, Incorporated (U.S. Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit, 2016). The Fifth Circuit vacated the district court's order remanding the case to state court, holding the shipyard showed a causal nexus for the survival strict liability claims, and remanded for the district court to decide whether the shipyard has a colorable federal defense; the Savoie family lost on the remand ruling.
• Blouin v. Huntington Ingalls Inc. (U.S. District Court, Eastern District of Louisiana, 2017). The district court granted the Blouin family's motion to remand and sent the case back to Louisiana state court, rejecting Huntington Ingalls (Avondale)'s federal officer removal.

Later decisions citing this one

4 later decisions in our library cite this one:

• Melancon v. Lamorak Insurance Company (U.S. Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit, 2018). The Fifth Circuit affirmed the district court's order remanding the case to Louisiana state court, ruling against Huntington Ingalls and the other defendants and for the Melancons.
• Bourgeois v. Huntington Ingalls Inc. (U.S. District Court, Eastern District of Louisiana, 2020). The district court denied plaintiff Bourgeois's motion to remand, holding that Avondale (Huntington Ingalls) and Bossier timely and properly removed the case under the federal officer removal statute.
• Jackson v. Avondale Industries, Inc. (U.S. District Court, Eastern District of Louisiana, 2020). The district court granted Hopeman Brothers' motion for reconsideration, vacated its earlier order remanding the case to state court, and denied plaintiff Patricia Jackson's motion to strike Hopeman's exhibits, finding federal officer removal jurisdiction.
• Parfait v. Huntington Ingalls Incorporated (U.S. District Court, Eastern District of Louisiana, 2019). The court granted Charles Parfait's motion to remand to Orleans Parish state court because the Avondale defendants' federal officer removal was untimely, and denied his request for costs, fees and Rule 11 sanctions.

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.

ROBERT J. TEMPLET, SR. Plaintiff-Appellee,

v.

HUNTINGTON INGALLS, INCORPORATED; ALBERT BOSSIER, JR., as an Executive Officer of

Avondale Industries, Incorporated; LAMORAK INSURANCE COMPANY, Defendants-Appellants.

No. 17-30676.

Filed May 1, 2018.

United States Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit.

Brian Carl Bossier, for Defendant-Appellant.

Edwin A. Ellinghausen, III, for Defendant-Appellant.

Gary Allen Lee, for Defendant-Appellant.

Samuel M. Rosamond, III, for Defendant-Appellant.

Thomas More Flanagan, for Plaintiff-Appellee.

Mickey P. Landry, for Plaintiff-Appellee.

Sean Patrick Brady, for Plaintiff-Appellee.

Frank Joseph Swarr, for Plaintiff-Appellee.

Anders F. Holmgren, for Plaintiff-Appellee.

Jeffrey A. O'Connell, for Plaintiff-Appellee.

Ryan P. Phillips, for Plaintiff-Appellee.

Roderick Scott Marshall, I, for Plaintiff-Appellee.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana, USDC No. 2:17-CV-5935. Before: JOLLY, SOUTHWICK, and WILLETT, Circuit Judges.

PER CURIAM.[*]

This case is one of several brought by former Huntington Ingalls employees in state court alleging that the company failed to warn them of the risks of asbestos exposure and failed to implement proper safety procedures for handling asbestos.[1] Recently, in Legendre v. Huntington Ingalls, Inc., 885 F.3d 398 (5th Cir. 2018), we confirmed that asbestos claims regarding negligent failure to warn, train, or implement safety procedures do not give rise to federal jurisdiction when unrebutted evidence shows that the government did nothing to direct the shipyard's safety practices. Because this case involves such claims, we AFFIRM the district court's order remanding the case to state court.

Robert J. Templet worked for Huntington Ingalls from 1968 to 2002. He alleges that between 1968 and 1979 he handled asbestos and asbestos-containing products at various worksites, causing him to contract diffuse malignant pleural mesothelioma. Templet sued Huntington Ingalls, Huntington Ingalls executive Albert Bossier, Jr., and Lamorak Insurance Company (collectively, "Huntington Ingalls") in Louisiana state court for negligently failing to warn him of the dangers of asbestos and failing to implement safety procedures for handling asbestos. Huntington Ingalls removed the case to the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana under the federal officer removal statute, 28 U.S.C. § 1442(a)(1) (2012), alleging that the company used asbestos to construct vessels under government-mandated contract specifications.

We review a district court's federal officer removal decision de novo "without a thumb on the remand side of the scale." Savoie v. Huntington Ingalls, Inc., 817 F.3d 457, 462 (5th Cir. 2016), cert. denied, 137 S. Ct. 339, 196 (2016). Under the federal officer removal statute, an action against any officer or agent of the United States "for or relating to any act under color of such office" may be removed to federal court. 28 U.S.C. § 1442(a)(1). To remove, a defendant must show: "(1) that it is a person within the meaning of the statute, (2) that it has a colorable federal defense, (3) that it acted pursuant to a federal 2017 WL 2628103 (E.D. La. Jun. 19, 2017); Francis v. Union Carbide Corp., No. 11-2695, 2011 WL 6180061 (E.D. La. Dec. 13, 2011). officer's directions, and (4) that a causal nexus exists between its actions under color of federal office and the plaintiff's claims." Zeringue v. Crane Co., 846 F.3d 785, 789 (5th Cir. 2017) (cleaned up).

We recently clarified the scope of this "causal nexus" in a line of cases culminating in Legendre. The plaintiffs in Legendre alleged that Huntington Ingalls failed to warn them of the risks of asbestos exposure and failed to implement proper safety procedures for handling asbestos. See 885 F.3d at 399. Harking back to earlier cases, we explained that strict liability claims that "rest[] on the mere use of asbestos" support removal because they are "causally linked to the [government's] requirement that its ships contain asbestos." Id. at 401 (quoting Savoie, 817 F.3d at 465-66). But negligently "failing to warn, train, and adopt safety procedures regarding asbestos" does not support removal because it is "private conduct that implicate[s] no federal interest." Id. at 402 (quoting Zeringue, 846 F.3d at 794). Because allowing removal when the defendants were free to adopt the safety measures at issue, "would have stretched the causal nexus requirement to the point of irrelevance," id. (quoting Zeringue, 846 F.3d at 794), we held that the district court properly remanded the case to state court.

Here, as in Legendre, Templet brings negligence claims concerning Huntington Ingalls's failure to warn and adopt safety procedures regarding asbestos—"private conduct that implicate[s] no federal interest." Id. And here, as in Legendre, Huntington Ingalls makes no showing that it could not have adopted the safety measures Templet alleges would have prevented his injuries. See id. Because of this, the district court correctly held that Huntington Ingalls failed to show the required "causal nexus" to support federal jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1442.

For these reasons we AFFIRM the district court's order remanding this case to state court.

[*] Pursuant to 5TH CIR. R. 47.5, the court has determined that this opinion should not be published and is not precedent except under the limited circumstances set forth in 5TH CIR. R. 47.5.4.

[1] See, e.g., Legendre v. Huntington Ingalls, Inc., 885 F.3d 398 (5th Cir. 2018); Bartel v. Alcoa S.S. Co., 805 F.3d 169 (5th Cir. 2015); Blouin v. Huntington Ingalls, Inc., No. 17-2636,

Sources

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