Joseph Henson Norris, a veteran of the U.S. Navy, was exposed to dangerous asbestos while he served as a gunner’s mate onboard the U.S.S. Bremerton in the mid-1950s. Norris died as a result of this exposure, which can cause mesothelioma, an incurable cancer linked to asbestos. Norris’ family challenged the causes of his injury in a civil suit, and they recently received a $3.9 million personal injury verdict from a California personal injury jury.

A manufacturer of asbestos components, Crane Co., will have to pay the amount. Norris’ family argued that Crane Co. did not do enough to prevent Joseph Henson’s malady, despite the fact that asbestos and its dangers have been known since the early 1901. The symptoms of asbestos exposure might not show up for many years. Norris discovered his mesothelioma only 15 months before he died.

In Pennsylvania, a concern about personal injury lawsuits may lead to some hunting grounds closing their doors to sportsmen. The development follows a recent jury verdict that held a landowner partially responsible for a stray bullet that struck and injured a woman. The landowner has since restricted his land for hunting use.
Concerned that they too could be held responsible in such an accident, other Pennsylvania landowners could follow suit. The Pennsylvania personal injury verdict may be the first of its kind in the state. Some feel that this is an overreaction, and are worried about the vitality of Pennsylvania’s hunting industry. The jury decision in this Pennsylvania personal injury case could be reversed in the future, however, and even today there is legislation that many thought protected a landowner in just such a situation.

A recent Connecticut personal injury case went all the way to the Supreme Court, which ultimately affirmed an initial reward verdict. A jury originally awarded $2.2 million to two carpenters who were hurt on the job when a roof bracket failed and caused a support system to collapse.
This particular Connecticut personal injury case was important because the court’s decision went against an older law in which the negligence of a second wrong-doer could supersede the negligence of a first wrong-doer. The new judgment, which applied to issues of negligence and defective products, set the stage for a new trial and a change in Connecticut personal injury law.
The case took eight years, and two jury trials, to reach its ultimate conclusion in the Supreme Court. Neil Barry and Bernard Cohade were hurt in a construction accident back in early 1998.

New York personal injury suits filed on behalf of plaintiffs in Nw York, Delaware, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, New Jersey and South Carolina join the long list of pending litigation against Pfizer in relation to the cholesterol drug Lipitor.
The New York personal injury claims, like a host of other Lipitor cases, allege that the company used deceptive markting practices and failed to adequately warn physicians and patients of known side effects.

Personal injury cases often hinge on the reaction of juries to the parties, and there’s been much controversy about the fact that judges can and often do alter awards entered by juries. While some experts–primarily those in the insurance industry and the personal injury defense bar–have claimed that jurors are unqualified to make determinations in large, complex cases, even they were probably be surprised by the data presented by Professor Nancy King of Vanderbilt University: many jurors fall asleep during trial.
King studied juror misconduct across the twenty-year period from 1796 through 1996, and discovered that sleeping jurors hardly disrupted the trial process these days. According to King, 69% of judges surveyed had encountered at least one sleeping juror during the past three years, and most did not grant mistrials. However, in 85% of the cases, the sleeping juror was dismissed from the case.