Troy Lofton, a 71 year old former oil and well drilling man in Mississippi, was awarded more than $15 million early last month after a jury found that his former employer negligently exposed him to asbestos. Troy lives with a disease known as asbestosis. Asbestosis is caused by exposure to airborne asbestos fibers; it cripples the lungs and causes various body pains, transforming day to day activities into strenuous tasks. In addition to needing to breath from an oxygen tank throughout the day, Troy also suffers from an increased likelihood of developing a fatal cancer such as mesothelioma.
CP Chem, Troy’s former employer and a division of the well known ConocoPhillips Company, was found responsible for his health condition after just eight days at trial. It was shown that CP Chem knowingly shipped a product known as Flosal that contained asbestos dust. The Flosal was received by Troy and others like him and then dumped into other equipment by hand. This dangerous practice left the air full of dangerous asbestos dust, but was condoned by CP Chem just the same.
The dangers of asbestos have been known for quite some time. Employees that worked with asbestos were complaining of respiratory ailments as early as the beginning of the twentieth century, and medical trials soon followed that found the asbestos fibers responsible.
The usefulness of asbestos and its cost efficient production and implementation hindered the forming of regulations regarding its safe handling for nearly a century. Asbestos producing companies as well as their biggest buyers actively formed the public’s opinion of asbestos through positive campaigning, and in some cases even paid researchers to back bogus claims concerning its harmlessness.
After much difficulty, the United States EPA finally passed the Asbestos Ban and Phase Out rule in the late 1980′s, but it was overturned in the early nineties after company with large asbestos interests sued the agency.
Today, heavy regulations and restrictions apply to the use and handling of asbestos materials. While asbestos is still legal in the United States, companies that have endangered their employees with the substance in full knowledge of its potential toxicity can be held liable.
Troy Loften’s $15.2 million victory proves that CP Chem acted negligently with asbestos products throughout the 1980′s, and opens the doors for other former employees to file lawsuits. More than 700 other lawsuits involving former employees of ConocoPhillips or its subsidiaries that developed asbestos related diseases are pending.
