Heather Roush was in her 20s and 35 weeks pregnant. She was with her husband, Jayneson Roush, 37, when they checked into the Kimball, a condominium hotel. The Roushes were celebrating their wedding anniversary. Their hotel room was located next to the hotel’s boiler room, which became filled with carbon…
From 1959 to 1964, Rivers Sampson worked as a sandblaster and used silica as an abrasive agent. In 2014, at the age of 77, Sampson died of sepsis and silicosis, which is a progressive disease caused by inhaling silica dust. Having silica dust attached to the lungs causes inflammation and…
Nathaniel Cooper, 24, was working in the packing area of a United Parcel Services (UPS) facility when he suffered heat exhaustion that led to his fatal cardiac event. He is survived by his fiancé and a minor child. His fiancé, on behalf of the couple’s child, sued UPS claiming it…
An Illinois jury has entered a $7.5 million verdict against a railroad company for the injuries to a worker exposed to benzene. The worker had been employed by two different railroad companies over 30 years. His job included loading and unloading creosote-soaked railroad ties, which caused him to be covered…
Dennis Seay worked for Daniel Construction Co., which was a contractor for Celanese Corp. From 1971 through 1980, he did maintenance work at the Celanese polyester fiber plant located in Spartanburg, S.C. Seay was exposed to asbestos-containing products while working at Celanese. The different jobs that Seay had included handling…
There are more than 1,200 lawsuits pending against Johnson & Johnson by women who used talc powder products for feminine hygiene and now claim they developed ovarian cancer. In a three-week trial in Missouri state court, the jurors deliberated for a day before returning a verdict in favor of the…
Carl Rogers had been working at a tire plant owned by Kelly-Springfield Tire Co., which is a Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. subsidiary. He started working at the plant in 1969 and left employment after just one year. He returned to work there in 1975, and he continued working through…
On Jan. 9, 2014, a tank at Freedom Industries in Charleston, W.Va., leaked coal-cleaning chemicals into the Elk River about a mile and a half upstream from a water treatment plant. Tap water in the area began to smell like licorice. The water also had a blue-green color. Drinking the…
In a case that involved thousands of toxic tort liability cases, the Illinois Appellate Court has ruled that an industrial manufacturer must turn over documents it alleged were privileged to a company indemnifying it. In March 1999, automotive systems manufacturer BorgWarner Inc. acquired Kuhlman Corp. and its subsidiaries, including Kuhlman…
James Folta had stopped working at Ferro Engineering 41 years before he was diagnosed with peritoneal mesothelioma. He claimed that while working for Ferro Engineering he was exposed to “tremendous amounts of airborne asbestos fibers.” According to the lawsuit, Folta knew that exposure to asbestos dust was dangerous, but Ferro…