WTO wins first asbestos case tried to verdict in Boston in 10 years

WTO lawyers won the first asbestos case tried to verdict in Boston in 10 years - a case closely watched by equipment manufacturers whose products were often insulated with asbestos by third parties. In 1949, our client's predecessor company supplied, but did not manufacture, refractory materials containing asbestos used to insulate four large boilers on a Navy destroyer.

The plaintiff, assigned to that ship for two years in the early 1960s and later diagnosed with mesothelioma, alleged that our client and other defendants who provided various asbestos-containing parts used in the boiler room had breached their implied warranties of merchantability and had been negligent in failing to warn of the dangers of asbestos.

Of 47 defendants originally sued and 12 defendants remaining in the case when trial began, all but four reached a settlement with the plaintiff within the first two weeks of the five-week trial. The jury found for our clients and the other remaining defendants on all counts.