Written Testimony to Texas House of Representatives Committee on Judiciary and Civil Jurisprudence - Subcommittee on Asbestos Interim Charge 4: Study the degree of transparency in asbestos bankruptcy trusts and how it affects litigation of asbestos exposure claims in Texas courts. Interim Charge 6: Study whether the asbestos and silica multidistrict litigation courts should be allowed to dismiss, without prejudice, claims on the court s inactive dockets for want of prosecution under certain circumstances. Submitted by David Slayton, Administrative Director, Office of Court Administration
The House Judiciary and Civil Jurisprudence Committee s Subcommittee on Asbestos requested the Office of Court Administration (OCA) collect the following data regarding multidistrict litigation (MDL) cases involving asbestos-related injuries: the number of cases filed and disposed by year, the number of cases pending by year and the age of the cases at time of disposition. The subcommittee also requested information regarding the disposition status of asbestos cases that were referred back to their county of origin from 2008 to 2011. MDL asbestos cases are those cases that have been referred to a pre-trial judge by the MDL panel under Rule 13 of the Texas Rules of Judicial Administration for consolidated or coordinated pretrial proceedings. Judge Mark Davidson of Harris County was appointed by the MDL panel to serve as the pretrial judge in asbestosrelated injury cases. OCA does not maintain or collect case data specific to MDL cases, but because all MDL asbestos cases are referred to Judge Davidson in Harris County, OCA was able to obtain the requested data from Harris County. Summary of Cases Filed/Pending The following chart provides information regarding the asbestos cases referred to the MDL asbestos court from 2004 through 2011. Year New Filings Number of Plaintiffs on New Filings Designated MDL within Harris Co. 1 Disposed Transferred back to the County of Origin 2 Transferred back to Harris County Court of Origin 2004 995 8413 247 70 64 6 2005 2619 16331 307 80 35 6 2006 1239 17222 397 97 44 4 2007 430 7259 141 89 29 3 2008 268 1026 112 87 10 7 2009 200 1102 128 75 11 4 2010 229 394 130 86 7 0 2011 221 368 205 64 4 2 1 These are cases that were originally filed as regular asbestos cases but later filed a notice to designate as an MDL case. 2 This is a subset of the total disposed number. 2
10000 8000 6000 4000 2000 0 Pending Asbestos MDL Cases 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 Observations: New filings peaked in 2005 and have declined steadily over the years. The number of cases disposed per year ranges from 64 to 97. The number of disposed cases that were referred back to the county of origin for final disposition varies by year. Note that the number of cases pending appears to increase by more than the number of new cases filed each year. This is because the MDL court sometimes severs the cases, which consist of multiple plaintiffs, into several distinct cases. When a case is severed, the filed date of the severed case is the date that the original case was filed, not the date that the case was severed. This process happens regularly and makes it impossible to calculate an accurate case disposition rate. Age of Disposed Cases The following chart provides information regarding the age of disposed asbestos cases by year. 120 100 80 60 40 20 over 36 months 18-36 months 12-18 months 6-12 months 3-6 months 0-3 months 0 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 3
Observations: Since 2004, 64 to 89 cases have been disposed of annually and the eight-year average is 81. In 2004, 98% of disposed cases were less than 12 months old. In 2011, 37% of disposed cases were less than 12 months old. In the last four years, an average of 370 new asbestos cases (new filings and cases designated as MDL within Harris County) have been added to the docket. At the average disposition rate of 81 cases per year, the docket will have approximately 280 additional cases added to its backlog annually. Age of Pending Cases The following chart provides the age of pending asbestos cases by year. 10000 9000 8000 7000 6000 5000 4000 3000 2000 over 36 months 18-36 months 12-18 months 6-12 months 3-6 months 0-3 months 1000 0 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 Observations: In 2007, the number of cases over 36 months jumped from 262 to 2994. Though some of these cases are the result of new cases that were filed and had not been disposed of, because of the issue regarding the dating of severed cases, it cannot be determined with accuracy, how many of the cases that comprise this number are cases that were severed from another case. The number of cases over 36 months old has increased from 4% in 2004 to 92.5% in 2011. 4
Outcome of Cases Referred Back to County of Origin The Asbestos Subcommittee also asked OCA to research Disposition after remand the outcome of 30 cases that were remanded Judgment 11 (transferred) back to the county of origin, excluding Settled 2 Harris County, from 2008 through 2011. The pretrial Non-suit 4 court may order remand of a case or separable trial Dismissed 6 portions of a case when pretrial proceedings have been Pending 7 completed to such a degree that the purpose for the Remands 30 case to be transferred to the pretrial court has been fulfilled or no longer applies. Of the 30 cases that were remanded back to the county of origin, only seven appear to still be pending. The other cases either resulted in a judgment, were settled, dismissed or non-suited. 5
Summary Statistics of MDL Asbestos Cases 2004 through 2011 Number of Designated MDL Transferred back to Transferred back Year New Filings Plaintiffs on New Filings within Harris Co.* Disposed the County of Orgin** to Harris County Court of Orgin Pending 2004 995 8413 247 70 64 6 2879 2005 2619 16331 307 80 35 6 6404 2006 1239 17222 397 97 44 4 7598 2007 430 7259 141 89 29 3 8069 2008 268 1026 112 87 10 7 8412 2009 200 1102 128 75 11 4 8759 2010 229 394 130 86 7 0 8860 2011 221 368 205 64 4 2 9095 * These are cases that were originally filed as regular Asbestos cases but lated filed a notice to designate as an MDL. ** This is a subset of the Disposed number. Age of Pending MDL Asbestos cases Year 0-3 months 3-6 months 6-12 months 12-18 month18-36 months over 36 months Pending 2004 465 1318 836 20 125 115 2879 2005 873 1018 1615 1773 941 184 6404 2006 98 160 859 1902 4317 262 7598 2007 93 110 257 267 4348 2994 8069 2008 88 60 194 198 1289 6583 8412 2009 55 72 151 156 675 7650 8759 2010 37 43 119 132 494 8035 8860 2011 36 49 113 93 391 8413 9095 Age of Disposed MDL Asbestos Cases Year 0-3 months 3-6 months 6-12 months 12-18 month18-36 months over 36 months Disposed 2004 38 21 10 1 0 0 70 2005 18 15 32 12 3 0 80 2006 21 16 20 15 22 3 97 2007 5 8 22 17 24 13 89 2008 4 6 11 11 28 27 87 2009 7 9 8 6 18 27 75 2010 6 4 9 7 10 50 86 2011 6 5 13 5 5 30 64