Source: https://www.piercedavis.com/toxic-tort-liability-products-manufactured
Timestamp: 2019-04-23 00:17:09+00:00

Document:
In Re: Asbestos Products Liability Litigation (No. VI) (DeVries v. Air & Liquid Systems Corp., et al./McAfee v. Ingersoll Rand Co.), 873 F.3d 232 (3d Cir. 2017): In Plaintiffs’ consolidated appeal of U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania Judge Eduardo C. Robreno’s orders granting summary judgment in the DeVries and McAfee cases, both involving allegations of exposure to asbestos from Navy equipment, the Third Circuit Court of Appeals concluded that Defendants may be liable under a negligence theory for injuries caused by others’ products under certain circumstances. Although the Third Circuit ultimately affirmed the grant of summary judgment as to Plaintiffs’ strict liability claims, it held that it “need not fully the contours of the [bare metal] defense’s distinctions in strict liability” because Plaintiffs had waived that issue by focusing their opening brief only on negligence.
While the court recognized that there are trade-offs to each approach, it ultimately determined that the “fact-specific standard” was appropriate given its determination that the “foremost” principle historically underlying maritime law is “the protection of sailors.” In the Court’s view, adopting a bright-line rule would lead to “under-inclusion” and would necessarily result in “some deserving sailor-plaintiffs . . . not receiv[ing] their due.” Although the Court also enumerated three other maritime law principles implicated here—(1) traditions of simplicity and practicality, (2) protection of maritime commerce, and (3) uniformity of rules governing conduct and liability—it ultimately discounted those factors as being neutral and not weighing more heavily in favor of one side or the other.
Following the Third Circuit’s decision, several defendants filed a writ of certiorari to the United States Supreme Court. On May 14, 2018, the United States Supreme Court granted certiorari and the case has been listed on the 2018 October term list for argument. The petitioners seek to have the Supreme Court resolve the question of whether “products-liability defendants can be held liable under maritime law for injuries caused by products that they did not make, sell, or distribute.” The petitioners argue that there is a circuit split on the issue, and that this split undermines maritime law’s interest in uniformity. Finally, the petitioners argue that the Third Circuit erred in adopting a foreseeability test, and that they are entitled to summary judgment.
Stearns v. Metropolitan Life Ins. Co., — F.Supp.3d —, 2018 WL 1610539 at *12 (D. Mass., Mar. 30, 2018): Applying maritime law, allowing a steam turbine generator manufacturer defendant’s motion for summary judgment as to plaintiff’s claims of naval/shipyard exposure. The court cited the Sixth Circuit’s Lindstrom decision for the proposition that maritime law “does not extend liability for component parts not manufactured or distributed by defendants,” and held that, because there was no allegation that Defendant ever manufactured or distributed asbestos-containing components, it was entitled to summary judgment as to such claims.
Woo v. General Electric Co., No. 74458-5-I, slip op. (Wash. Ct. App. Apr. 3, 2017): In pertinent part, reversing a trial court’s order that granted summary judgment for the defendant steam turbine manufacturer, Division One of the Washington intermediate appellate court held that material issues of fact remain for trial as to whether the defendant had a duty to warn of the hazards associated with asbestos-containing products manufactured by others. Defendant’s summary judgment motion argued, inter alia, that because there was no evidence that it supplied or installed the allegedly injurious asbestos-containing products used in conjunction with its equipment and allegedly encountered by Decedent during his shipboard service in the 1940s and 1950s, it did not have a duty to warn about the hazards of those products under two Washington Supreme Court decisions—Simonetta v. Viad Corp. and Braaten v. Saberhagen Holdings. In contrast, Plaintiffs argued that the exception set forth in the Washington Supreme Court’s Macias v. Saberhagen Holdings decision imposed a duty to warn about the hazards of asbestos-containing products that had to be used with Defendant’s equipment. In setting forth the specific rationales in those three precedents, the Court explained that, although Simonetta and Braaten espoused the general rule that a manufacturer need not warn about the hazards of others’ products, Macias and Braaten both noted that there were exceptions to the general rule—i.e. where the manufacturer’s product required the use of asbestos or the manufacturer specifically designed its product to be used with asbestos. The Court went on to describe the various types of evidence put forth by Plaintiffs (including a 1989 Technical Information Letter) that it concluded gave rise to reasonable inference “that [Defendant] knew only asbestos-containing thermal insulation, gaskets, and packing were available in the 1940s and 1950s and were necessary for the proper functioning of the steam turbines.” The Court also found that there was evidence that Decedent worked on the Navy ship at issue when it was first commissioned, which gave rise to a reasonable inference of exposure to originally-supplied packing and gaskets in the steam turbine.
Chesher v. 3M Company, 234 F.Supp.3d 693 (D. S.C. 2017): In a case involving a Navy machinist’s mate, denying valve manufacturer’s motion for summary judgment, the court found that Plaintiff’s failure-to-warn claims were not foreclosed by maritime law’s “bare metal defense.” In its decision, the court explicitly adopted the approach used by the court in Quirin v. Lorillard Tobacco Co, 17 F.Supp.3d 760 (N.D.Ill. 2014), and held that “in order to bring a failure-to-warn claim under Quirin, a plaintiff must show: (1) the defendant actually incorporated asbestos-containing components into its original product, and (2) (a) the defendant “specified” the use of asbestos-containing components, or (b) such components were “essential to the proper functioning” of the defendant’s product.” The court found that the defendant’s engineering drawings showed that the valve company incorporated asbestos gaskets and packing into their valves. Further, it found that the testimony of expert Captain Arnold Moore interpreting the valve manufacturer’s drawing found that the drawing specified asbestos-containing gaskets and packing.
Grant v. Foster Wheeler, LLC, 140 A.3d 1242 (Me. 2016): In pertinent part, affirming the orders that granted summary judgment for three equipment manufacturers, the Supreme Judicial Court of Maine held that Plaintiff’s evidence as to product nexus did not rise above speculation and was not sufficient to create a prima facie case for causation or liability, even under the less demanding causation standard utilized by the trial court. The Court also held in a brief footnote that, “[s]imilarly, any claim of a duty to warn on the part of any of the defendants would fail.” In reciting the evidence, the Court noted that it was “undisputed that products—pumps, boilers, turbines, etc.—manufactured by [the equipment defendants] were present on naval ships constructed or converted at Bath Iron Works during the period when [Decedent] worked [there].” Notably, the Court explained that its analysis involved “examin[ing] what evidence [Plaintiff] offered to demonstrate that these products [i.e. pumps, boilers, turbines, etc.] contained asbestos originating with the defendants . . . .” (Emphasis added). The Court found that, although “Bath Iron Works employees covered the products with asbestos, . . . that covering was not asbestos that originated with [the equipment manufacturers].” As a result, even though Plaintiff also alleged exposure from external insulation used with Defendants’ equipment, the Court stated that its “analysis [under Maine’s strict liability statute] is confined to the evidence regarding [Decedent’s] potential exposure only to the asbestos contained in the products’ original gaskets and packing.” (Emphasis added).
McIndoe v. Huntington Ingalls, Inc., 817 F.3d 1170 (9th Cir. 2016): affirming grant of summary judgment to shipbuilders in products liability and negligence claim. Citing Lindstrom v. A-C Prod. Liab. Tr., 424 F.3d 488 (6th Cir. 2005), the court noted that McIndoe’s heirs had the burden of showing that he was “actually exposed to asbestos-containing materials that were installed by the shipbuilders and that such exposure was a substantial contributing factor in causing his injuries.” The court noted that in this negligence case against the shipbuilders, Plaintiffs “must show exposure to asbestos from materials that were originally installed aboard the ships.” (emphasis original) While the court found that a jury could potentially determine that McIndoe was exposed to originally installed asbestos, the court found that Plaintiffs could only speculate as to the actual extent of his exposure to asbestos from originally installed insulation, and therefore, Plaintiffs could not prove that such original asbestos insulation was a substantial contributing factor in causing McIndoe’s mesothelioma.
McKenzie v. A.W. Chesterton Co., 277 Or. App. 728 (Or. Ct. App. 2016), review denied, 360 Or. 400 (2016): Reversing a trial court’s order granting summary judgment for the defendant pump manufacturer, the Oregon Court of Appeal disagreed with the defendant’s assertion that it did not owe a duty in strict liability or negligence to warn about potential hazards associated with asbestos-containing gaskets, packing, and insulation manufactured and sold by others. After stating that the “identification of the products at issue” was its “threshold inquiry,” the Court agreed with Plaintiff that it should view the “final products” for purpose of a product liability analysis as being “the pumps as delivered to the Navy,” not the “asbestos-containing gaskets, packing, and insulation that others had manufactured and sold to the Navy and that [Plaintiff] encountered.” The Court went on to hold that an equipment manufacturer may be strictly liable if a plaintiff encountered equipment that was in substantially the same condition as when originally sold (i.e. the asbestos-containing replacement parts made and sold by others were similar to those originally installed in the equipment), and the defendant “expected” that the replacement parts would contain asbestos. The Court also held that an equipment manufacturer may be liable in negligence if it was foreseeable to the defendant that the asbestos-containing replacement parts would be used in or on its equipment.
May v. Air & Liquid Systems Corp., 129 A.3d 984 (Md. 2015): In reversing an award of summary judgment to pump defendants, the Maryland high court found that a manufacturer has, under limited circumstances, a duty to warn of asbestos-containing replacement components parts it has not placed into the stream of commerce. Philip May was a Navy machinist’s mate, who alleged exposure to asbestos from gaskets and packing from pumps installed aboard Navy ships. Defendants moved for summary judgment on the “bare metal” defense.
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