THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, November 2, 1996 TAG: 9611020303
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A5 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: THE NEW YORK TIMES
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: 52 lines
The Supreme Court agreed for the first time Friday to confront the litigation crisis caused by huge numbers of lawsuits over exposure to asbestos.
The court accepted two cases that will help define how the federal courts treat the legal claims of people who have been exposed to toxic substances but have not yet become ill.
One of the cases is a closely watched class-action lawsuit against 20 major asbestos producers, brought on behalf of millions of people who were exposed on the job to the companies' products over the course of decades.
Last May, the federal appeals court in Philadelphia threw out a $1.3 billion settlement in the case after concluding that the interests of the plaintiffs were too diverse to be represented adequately in a single settlement that would bind all those who did not opt out of the agreement.
The appeals court said the settlement was particularly harmful to the interests of people who had not yet developed any asbestos-related disease and who might not even realize they had been exposed to the defendants' products, a group of unknown number that accounted for a great majority of the plaintiffs as defined by the lawsuit.
The appeals court said that not only were the interests of these people adverse to those in the class of plaintiffs with actual injuries, who would be first in line to claim the limited amount of money available for damages, but also that many in the uninjured group might forfeit their rights to future lawsuits by failing to opt out of the class action. Seeking to preserve the settlement, the manufacturers appealed to the Supreme Court.
The other case the court agreed to review Friday was brought in New York by 140 workers for the Metro-North commuter railroad. In this case, the plaintiffs' exposure to asbestos while working on the pipes under Grand Central Terminal is undisputed. Until the late 1980s, when the railroad instituted protective measures, they would emerge from the catacombs so covered with the white powder that they were known to fellow workers as the ``snowmen of Grand Central.''
Although doctors testified that the men faced statistically significant increased risks of dying from asbestos-related diseases, they have not yet become ill. The question for the Supreme Court is whether, as the federal appeals court in Manhattan ruled last April, the workers are nonetheless entitled to sue for damages under a federal law that governs railroads' liability for injuries to their employees.
KEYWORDS: U.S SUPREME COURT ASBESTOS by CNB