The defense of environmental claims, including toxic tort, environmental contamination, and chemical exposure cases is a significant part of our practice. The Environmental Litigation team of Campbell Conroy & O'Neil, P.C. represents clients in state and federal enforcement proceedings involving hazardous waste and materials, toxic substances, and clean air and clean water regulations.
We represent oil companies, manufacturers of hazardous chemicals and toxic solvents, companies that use hazardous chemicals in the manufacture of their products, owners and operators of properties alleged to be contaminated, lenders who have secured interests in property alleged to be contaminated, distributors of allegedly tainted food products, property owners in lead and carbon monoxide exposure cases, companies that incorporated or sold products containing asbestos, and insurance companies in coverage disputes. These cases often involve claims brought under both state and federal environmental statutes, as well as in tort. Our experience also extends to personal injury claims involving exposure to hazardous materials.
In asbestos cases, Campbell Conroy & O’Neil, P.C. serves as lead trial counsel for Ford Motor Company for “friction products” cases filed in New England. Most of these cases involve mesothelioma, and our attorneys have developed substantial technical knowledge of toxicology, epidemiology, environmental medicine, occupational medicine, preventive medicine, industrial hygiene, pathology, and engineering.
For over a decade the firm represented Monsanto in In re Paoli Railroad Yard. This matter entailed a number class actions brought in both state and federal court in which approximately 300 plaintiffs who either worked or lived adjacent to the Paoli Railroad Yard alleged that they suffered from a variety of illnesses as a result of exposure to polychlorinated biphenyls, also known as PCBs, on the site. The cases resulted in three landmark decisions on the admissibility of expert testimony in toxic tort litigation that remain the leading guideposts within the Third Circuit.
We also represented Monsanto in a high profile putative class action brought by several former workers at General Electric’s Pittsfield, Massachusetts, plant who alleged they or their decedents had developed cancer because of on-the-job exposures to PCBs manufactured and supplied by Monsanto. The firm successfully opposed class certification, obtained summary judgment on all but one of the individual claims, and postured the remaining claim for settlement at a fraction of the anticipated cost of defense.
Campbell Conroy & O’Neil, P.C. also represented Mobil Corporation in a groundwater contamination case brought in the United States District Court in Providence, Rhode Island, by a private school alleging that petroleum and waste products from an abutting service station had migrated onto its property, impairing its use and value.