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September 08, 2026
NEW ORLEANS — While plaintiffs in a Navy-exposure asbestos suit attempt to narrow their allegations to a time period before 1972, the allegations in the petition are more broadly pleaded than that, a federal judge in Louisiana said in denying remand.
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September 08, 2026
OAKLAND, Calif. — A California judge ruled on a series of motions in limine in an asbestos-talc case, excluding evidence and arguments about talc pleurodesis designed to show talc’s safety, allowing evidence that erionite exposure in Mexico led the plaintiff to develop mesothelioma, and making various determinations on experts’ admissibility.
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September 08, 2026
NEW ORLEANS — A Louisiana jury hearing an asbestos-talc case against Johnson & Johnson awarded a pair $10 million for a woman’s malignant epithelioid mesothelioma, apportioning the company 9% of the liability, sources told Mealey’s Publications.
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September 08, 2026
The following is a listing of plaintiff and defense experts who testified in trials covered by Mealey's Litigation Report: Asbestos since Jan. 1, 2002.
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September 08, 2026
LOS ANGELES — Johnson & Johnson and an affiliate (J&J) withdrew a consolidated bellwether asbestos action in which a jury handed it a defense verdict, ending posttrial briefing in which the plaintiffs challenged the “jury’s inexplicable finding that J&J was not negligent.”
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September 08, 2026
SACRAMENTO, Calif. — A non-debtor affiliate of Barretts Minerals Inc. subject to suit for testing of talc told the California Supreme Court it is not subject to jurisdiction in California and is entitled to an explanation from the appellate court for why it denied a writ. But in an answer, the plaintiff says it is the testing that allowed the talc to find its way to the state.
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September 04, 2026
LOS ANGELES — Allegations that a New Jersey company operated a warehouse in California out of which it shipped allegedly asbestos-tainted talc for distribution to at least one cosmetics company whose product the plaintiff used suffice for personal jurisdiction, and the company has not adequately disputed the fairness of imposing jurisdiction, a California judge said in denying a motion to quash.
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September 04, 2026
BRIDGEPORT, Conn. — With trial less than a week away, a man who says his mother died of mesothelioma after exposure to asbestos in consumer talc products filed a notice withdrawing his claims against all remaining defendants.
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September 01, 2026
LOS ANGELES — A California appellate court on Aug. 31 denied a writ of mandate that Exxon Mobil Corp. filed challenging a trial judge’s conclusion that the company must submit definitive evidence of genetic causation before he would permit genetic testing, which the company warned in a writ of mandate would effectively prevent defendants in Los Angeles asbestos and other toxic tort cases from raising genetic causation defenses.
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September 01, 2026
SAN DIEGO — A California federal judge on Aug. 31 granted a motion to transfer a suit filed by two insurers seeking equitable contribution from a third insurer for costs related to underlying asbestos personal injury claims filed against an insured after determining that Ohio, where the third insurer filed a declaratory judgment suit, is the more convenient venue for the parties and witnesses.
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September 01, 2026
BRIDGEPORT, Conn. — Consolidated asbestos dockets ensure that exigent plaintiffs see their day in court and that local jurisdictions aren’t overwhelmed by the complex litigation, which ensures consistency in rulings across cases, a plaintiff told a Connecticut court in asking for reconsideration and a stay of the court’s decision unwinding a consolidated docket.
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August 28, 2026
EAST ST. LOUIS, Ill. — Parties to a federal Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) suit in Illinois involving asbestos attorneys and a pipe manufacturer debated the scope of an order denying a motion to stay discovery and whether a pending motion to dismiss warrants granting a renewed motion seeking a stay.
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August 28, 2026
LOS ANGELES — A man who filed a take-home asbestos exposure case against a public entity before fulfilling the statutory requirements for doing so under the Government Claims Act cannot cure the defect, a California judge said in dismissing the defendant with prejudice.
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August 27, 2026
WILMINGTON, Del. — The Delaware Supreme Court denied reargument, leaving in place a ruling holding that discovery rules didn’t permit third parties in asbestos litigation to intervene to block asbestos bankruptcy trusts’ document retention policies allowing the trusts to destroy older claims data that the third parties warned constituted an “unprecedented spoliation of evidence.”
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August 27, 2026
LOS ANGELES — Because a defendant served a summary adjudication motion 47 minutes past the 5 p.m. deadline, under the Los Angeles County asbestos case management order, it was a day late and untimely, a California judge said in denying the company’s motion.
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August 25, 2026
TRENTON, N.J. — A special adjudicator recommended that a New Jersey court grant a motion to compel a company to produce depositions related to asbestos litigation, finding that the case involves asbestos and talc and cannot be limited to just evidence involving talc.
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August 25, 2026
The following is a listing of plaintiff and defense experts who testified in trials covered by Mealey's Litigation Report: Asbestos since Jan. 1, 2002.
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August 25, 2026
COLUMBIA, S.C. — Entities challenging the appointment of a receiver over Cape PLC assets asked the South Carolina Supreme Court for a stay or recall of remittitur so that they could file a petition for a writ of certiorari with the U.S. Supreme Court.
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August 25, 2026
WILMINGTON, Del. — Repeat litigants seeking to preserve asbestos trust documents told the Delaware Supreme Court that its ruling allowing the destruction to go forward looked at the case too narrowly and threatened “unprecedented spoliation of evidence” and that the court should grant leave to amend to meet the new equitable bill-of-discovery test the court created.
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August 24, 2026
WILMINGTON, Del. — The Delaware Supreme Court is set to decide causation and whether to affirm a $9 million verdict for plaintiffs in an asbestos case involving shotgun shell wads after the parties recently wrapped briefing in the defendants’ appeal.
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August 21, 2026
NEWPORT NEWS, Va. — The evidence shows that asbestos-talc study authors took steps to ensure their study didn’t include individuals in a previous study or those with other, more traditional asbestos exposures, a federal judge in Virginia said in denying Pecos River Talc LLC’s summary judgment motion on its trade libel claim and granting summary judgment to the authors.
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August 20, 2026
LOS ANGELES — Johnson & Johnson (J&J) and an affiliate told the California judge who oversaw the second bellwether asbestos-talc ovarian cancer trial that the jury heard sufficient evidence about the companies’ testing and marketing efforts to support its findings on negligence and negligence per se claims and that a new trial is not warranted.
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August 19, 2026
MISSOULA, Mont. — BNSF Railway Co. asked a federal judge in Montana for summary judgment in a Libby, Mont., asbestos case or for certification of an interlocutory appeal of the liability questions in the case, while in opposing the motion, the plaintiff claims that courts already decided many of the issues surrounding the company’s conduct in the town and that the motion improperly attempts to relitigate those issues.
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August 18, 2026
EAST ST. LOUIS, Ill. — A federal judge in Illinois granted expedited third-party discovery from asbestos trusts in a Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) case in the wake of a Delaware Supreme Court ruling allowing the trusts to implement new document retention policies.
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August 18, 2026
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court has distributed for its Sept. 28 conference a petition for a writ of certiorari filed by the estates of two mesothelioma victims seeking review of the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals’ reversal of an $8 million combined judgment for the estates against the railroad company that hauled asbestos-tainted vermiculite from W.R. Grace & Co.’s mine in Libby, Mont.