NEW ORLEANS (Legal Newsline) – A Louisiana appeals court has affirmed a multimillion-dollar asbestos verdict against carbon black manufacturer Birla Carbon USA.
Lawyers at Unglesby Law Firm and Baggett McCall convinced the state’s Fourth Circuit Court of Appeal on April 1 not to toss the verdict in favor of the family of Elray Lege, who died from mesothelioma.
The decision, which affirmed Birla Carbon is 51% at fault for Lege’s death, sustains $4 million for Lege’s pain and suffering and $2 million to widow Brenda for wrongful death.
The verdict also featured $500,000 to each of the Leges’ children, but the appeals ruling struck $800,000 of that, leaving a total verdict of about $7.2 million.
Elray Lege worked for The Cajun Company at a carbon black plant in the late 1970s and claimed in his pre-trial deposition that he was responsible for tearing out and installing asbestos-containing insulation.
The defense argued his job wouldn’t have had him performing these duties but jurors didn’t buy it, assessing it the majority of fault. The Cajun Company was found 20% at fault, with several companies found to be at small percentages of fault.
Lawyers for Birla Carbon said the 51% allocation was too high because there was evidence Lege spent a short time at the carbon black facility, compared to all the time he spent working in other locations.
“Birla’s argument ignores the well-settled precedent that the relevant consideration is not the length of the exposure, but rather whether the evidence established ‘significant exposure to the asbestos-containing product complained of to the extent that it was a substantial factor in bringing about the injury,’” Judge Dale Atkins wrote.
Testimony from a plaintiffs expert said Lege would have been breathing very fast at the plant because of the “very physical” nature of the work he said he was doing. He also said 77 tons of asbestos were removed from the plant in the years after Lege worked there.
The expert said Lege could have inhaled a year’s worth of asbestos in a single day at the plant.