Asbestos Settlement

When the defendant in a criminal case is found guilty, s/he receives a sentence. A criminal case involves the State against a human being who has allegedly violated the law.

In the case of a civil suit, “guilt” is known as liability, and the defendant is not necessarily a human being – although it may be. More often however, the defendant is what is known in legal terms as an entity, which may be a group of people, an organization, a company or corporation, or the estate of a deceased person. The specific set of laws under which a person or legal entity is held liable for damages is known as torts, which is an old French word meaning “to twist.”  The individual or entity is not necessarily in violation of the law, but is responsible in some way for another’s injury, pain, distress, damage or loss of property or even reputation.

The person (or less often, the entity) who brings a lawsuit against such a defendant is known as the plaintiff. The plaintiff is seeking compensation for their injury or damages in the form of a monetary award. In addition, if the judge or jury considers that the defendant exhibited willful negligence or somehow acted in a purposeful manner, punitive damages may be awarded (1). Punitive damages consist of an amount of money that is awarded to the plaintiff above and beyond compensation for actual loss and/or damages.

Many times, such tort cases do not go to trial; instead, the parties may attempt to resolve the issue out of court, either before the trial begins or before the court issues a ruling. When the plaintiff and defendant reach an agreement on such a resolution, it is known as a settlement.

Asbestos cases

Because of their frequency and the often astronomical sums of money involved, asbestos cases have become a legal specialty all their own, in essence if not in legal fact.

Sadly, decades of unregulated laissez-faire corporate capitalism, reliance on private for-profit industries to provide health care and failure by the U.S. government to hold corporations accountable has resulted in nearly three-quarters of a million cases filed since the 1970’s – half a million of which have been filed since 1990. By 2006, some $70 billion had been spent on asbestos litigation; current trends indicate that such litigation may cost as much as $195 billion more in the coming years (2).

The first successful asbestos judgment in history was Borel v. Fiberboard Paper Products, filed in 1969. Despite an appeal by the defendant, the court upheld an award to plaintiff in the amount of nearly $80,000 (3).

Legal Innovations

Since the 1970s, awards to asbestos victims have increased dramatically, ranging from $636,000 to over $10 million in some cases. Part of this is due to changes in strategy, or innovations by the legal profession. In some situations, multiple asbestos cases are consolidated. This means that several individual claims are tried at one time before the same jury. Another strategy is bifurcation, in which a trial is divided into two separate phases; one which addresses liability, the other in which damages are determined. The third strategy is known as the bouquet trial; this is a procedure in which a small group of individual cases is selected from a large pool of impending actions. At such a trial, the judge determines the asbestos settlements for the larger group based on the outcomes of the smaller one (4).

Your Right to a Settlement

Many conservative and pro-corporate elements criticize these trends, condemning them as abuses of the court system as they accuse the legal profession of opportunism. There are ongoing efforts to reduce these settlements as corporate lobbyists in Washington D.C. exert tremendous pressure and spend millions of dollars in their efforts to change the law and even deny victims the right to sue. In fact, a recent bill that would have done just this very thing died in the Senate in February 2006 (5). In addition, many corporations have been using bankruptcy laws in order to shield themselves from liability. In such cases, attorneys will pursue claims against any company or corporate entity involved, such as the original manufacturer, the seller, or even a parent corporation that has acquired the original company involved (6).

Make no mistake. These corporations are liable. If they were natural persons (they are not, despite their claim of such status), an argument could be made that their decades-long cover-up of information on the toxic effects of asbestos constituted depraved indifference to human life. Corporate officers were well aware of the effects of asbestos on the health of their employees and others who worked with the substance, and deliberately chose to withhold that information in order to maintain profitability (7).  

If you are a victim of asbestos exposure and suffer from asbestosis or mesothelioma, you have not only the right, but the responsibility to recover your expenses and hold these corporations liable for their malfeasance. An asbestos settlement not only compensates you for your medical expenses, loss of health and income and pain and suffering; through punitive damages, it sends the message that such indifference to human life for the sake of profits is unacceptable in civil society and will not be tolerated.

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