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Southern California's First Asbestos Bankruptcy

By Brian L. Davidoff and Jeanne C. Wanlass

Litigation involving asbestos, which was used for decades as a fire retardant in many products, has littered the legal landscape for years. Several major companies have over the course of the last several years filed for bankruptcy as a result of the onslaught of this litigation. Since the 1980s, many asbestos manufacturers, including Johns Manville, declared bankruptcy under the weight of liability payouts. To date, an estimated 85 companies have filed for bankruptcy claiming asbestos liabilities as the cause. A Rand Institute for Civil Justice report indicates that more than 730,000 asbestos claims have been filed since the early 1970s. Roughly 200,000 claims are still pending in state and federal courts nationwide. Estimates predict that up to 2.4 million claims still may be filed before asbestos litigation finally runs its course.

With many of the major defendants having filed their own bankruptcies, Plaintiffs' lawyers are now bringing actions against 'second-tier' and 'third-tier' defendants, including manufacturers of products such as brake linings that contain relatively small amounts of asbestos, as well as premises owners and product suppliers. The asbestos cases filed against J.T. Thorpe, Inc., a refractory manufacturer located in Southern California was just one such example.

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