The New York-based, nine-week-long trial involving the death of the plaintiff due to asbestos exposure ended with the Manhattan jury ordering the defendants to pay $ 60 million to the family of the plaintiff. The claim states that the man was employed to rip the boilers that contained asbestos manufactured by A.O. Smith Corp., Burnham LLC, and Peerless Industries Inc. It was this exposure that led to his diagnosis of pleural mesothelioma in July 2015 and to his death a year later in 2016 at age 56. The lawsuit claims that the boiler companies knew about the health risks associated with asbestos, but did nothing to warn the public.
A call to reform the New York-based asbestos lawsuits was addressed by Tom Stebbins, executive director of the Lawsuit Reform Alliance of New York, as this verdict was nearly eight times the national average.
