SAINT PAUL, Minn. (Legal Newsline) – The Minnesota Supreme Court has refused to give a widow – and others in her situation – extra time to file her asbestos lawsuit.
The court found July 1 that the statute of limitations on an asbestos wrongful death case in the state begins running when the plaintiff learns he or she has an asbestos-related disease, rather than when he or she identifies a certain product as a possible cause.
Deborah Palmer filed her case against Honeywell and Walker Jamar Company more than six years after husband Gary died from mesothelioma. She said she filed it within the six-year window, because it didn’t begin until Gary could identify brakes sold by Bendix as a possible cause. Honeywell is the successor in interest to Bendix.
Gary had already filed an asbestos product liability case in North Dakota against 177 companies.
The Minnesota Supreme Court said other cases cited by Deborah Palmer’s lawyers did not convince them to stray from a finding in DeCosse v. Armstrong Cork Co., a 1982 asbestos decision.
“(B)ecause of the unique character of asbestos-related deaths, wrongful death actions brought in connection with those deaths accrue either upon the manifestation of the fatal disease in a way that is causally linked to asbestos, or upon the date of death – whichever is earlier,” that decision says.