Latest / The Jon and Marc Podcast / The Truth About Asbestos Lawsuits: Hard Work, High Stakes, and Human Stories

Transcript

The Truth About Asbestos Lawsuits: Hard Work, High Stakes, and Human Stories · The Jon and Marc Podcast

0:00
How have you been able to maintain your growth with those
0:03
rising costs and the increased competition around case?
0:06
Acquisition, we've seen a lot of people see the seven figure
0:08
number. They're like, oh, that was
0:09
interesting. Let me get into that.
0:11
Annoying. There have been, I mean people
0:15
certainly could jump into asbestos litigation if they
0:17
wanted to. We haven't seen any who have
0:19
done it successfully who haven't at least worked in asbestos
0:21
litigation before. If you enjoy the work and enjoy
0:24
helping people, then you will enjoy it here.
0:42
Welcome back to the John and Mark podcast.
0:44
We're here today with two people that I'm very excited to speak
0:46
to, Chris Layloff, Sarah Salger from Gory Law Firm.
0:50
Thanks for joining us today. Absolutely.
0:52
Yeah. Thanks for having us.
0:53
You guys are the first interview today.
0:54
We're at MTMP and 9:00 in the morning.
0:57
Appreciate you waking up early. It's Vegas.
0:59
We're. Still in central time, yeah.
1:02
Good point. Yeah, I couldn't sleep last
1:03
night either. You guys had dinner last night
1:05
and then you went to bed after Chris didn't go out and party.
1:09
No. Well, you know, stop, things are
1:11
right at the back right bar and then.
1:14
It is you have to pass it to go home, right?
1:16
So you're just like, I'll just real quick, just real.
1:19
Quick just you know we were having a good conversation with
1:21
Co counsel and just wanted to keep going I.
1:23
Was in the other tower so I got, I got to peel off right when we
1:26
came in, so it was a big one. And you guys were talking today
1:29
at 3:00, yes, right. You're moderating a panel.
1:32
Yes. Since you're moderating a panel
1:34
or you're the panel guests. So we are moderating the panel
1:39
and then there are a handful of guests, but then the way that
1:41
the panel is kind of evolved is there were topics that made
1:45
sense for us to talk about especially and there's some
1:47
Illinois specific topics. So we are moderating slash
1:52
offering insight depending on the topic and then being
1:56
available for questions. The folks that are on Vits and
1:58
asbestos breakout panel talk about the current status of it.
2:01
And I think between the various firms there, we've probably got
2:05
3/4 of the file that mesothelioma cases in the
2:08
country just based on the on the panel itself between you know,
2:11
Gory and Simmons and Whites and Pakaman and Ben Vinson.
2:16
Yeah. So it'll be, it'll be a good,
2:18
good panel, good conversation. You guys are the largest filer
2:22
of asbestos cases in the country.
2:24
That's right. Great.
2:26
That is amazing. We talked to Pi firms all the
2:28
time and if they come across one miso case, a couple of lung
2:31
cancer cases in their career, that's massive for them.
2:35
You guys are filing hundreds of cases a year.
2:37
How long did it take for you guys to get to that point?
2:41
What did that trajectory look like?
2:43
Was it like hockey stick? Was it slow growth?
2:45
It was more slow growth. So I was with the firm from the
2:48
its inception whenever Randy Gory left his prior firm and
2:52
joined Gary Julian. And when we started, we had less
2:56
than 20 people on staff including attorneys.
2:59
So I think that the original office there about 16 of us
3:02
total and that included all of our staff and that was in 2009
3:08
that we started with like I said about 15 people and now we have
3:12
just under 200 people, seven different offices.
3:15
I, I think we hit #1 filer of asbestos cases in 2017 and we've
3:22
kind of had it since then. And like you said, expanded as
3:25
the law changed, expanded to different states.
3:28
And I would say it was a slow growth initially and then just
3:31
kind of straight. Up.
3:33
That's like a major jump, yeah. Learning about like leadership,
3:35
There's like initial pain points you have it's like 50 employees,
3:38
like a pain point, then like 50, then 100, then 200.
3:41
And you've kind of managed through all those.
3:44
I know leading up to this. We're discussing some of the
3:46
challenges you're having dealing with 200 employees now.
3:48
Yeah, it's a unique one. So of the 200, I would say about
3:54
65 to 70% are local in the Saint Louis, Madison County area, and
3:59
then others are spread kind of all over.
4:01
So that was somewhat of a challenge of learning to manage
4:05
people who aren't where you're at.
4:07
But then COVID hit and you kind of had to learn to manage people
4:09
where you're not where you're at anyway.
4:11
Not to say COVID was a good thing, but it kind of just
4:14
helped. What's your?
4:17
Strategy for hiring towns and people in one area.
4:20
I hear from a lot of people hiring at a law firm is
4:24
extremely difficult and hiring someone in that office is
4:27
becoming even more difficult because everyone's used to
4:30
hiring remotely, searching around, and people just don't
4:32
want to come to an office. So like what's been the strategy
4:35
to continue to grow that? Like everybody else, we look for
4:38
people have trial experience, which are usually, you know,
4:40
public defenders, states attorneys out there who've, you
4:42
know, been in the courtroom in front of a judge and three of
4:46
our partners or former prosecutor.
4:48
How? Many total lawyers do you guys
4:49
have? Right around 50, so I have the
4:51
200 and about 50 lawyers and then 150 support.
4:54
And so then for the staff themselves, you know, we have a
4:59
lot of training program, but they'll come in.
5:00
A lot of people come in, this is a first office job.
5:03
They work as a data clerk, you know, then they work as a legal
5:06
assistant and then someone go get a paralegal certificate that
5:08
the firm pays for and then they become paralegals.
5:11
And I was just talking to someone the other day and we're
5:14
interviewing another legal assistant to come in.
5:15
And it will be her first office job.
5:17
And she's telling her this is a great place.
5:19
You know, this is a, you can have a career here.
5:21
I've been here a long time. And if you enjoy the the work
5:25
and enjoy helping people, then you will enjoy it here.
5:27
And that's what kind of heart warming to hear, you know, like
5:29
hearing that. And if the lawyers will also
5:32
pull in, we've got a very robust legal clerkship program.
5:36
And so we'll pull in a ton of law clerks, usually 8 or 9 in
5:39
the summer if we have room. Office space is always at a
5:43
premium just because of so many people.
5:45
But yeah, we'll pull in law clerks and train them.
5:49
Sarah was a law clerk here at the firm and just stayed the
5:53
whole time. I started at the firm at Randy's
5:55
prior firm when I was actually an undergrad and I worked the
5:59
mail room and did the dishes and did like paper filing because it
6:03
was before like anything was online and before law firms
6:07
bought dishwashers apparently. Oh.
6:09
Like the actual dishes? No.
6:10
Did like the actual like coffee cups.
6:12
No, no, no. Yeah, did the actual dishes.
6:15
So I always say like there is not a job at the firm that I
6:17
asked people to do that I have not done myself, including some
6:20
that are absolute no because we have dishwashers.
6:22
So not people. In the firm, sorry, it was a
6:25
paperless system, which back in what O nine O 8, whatever was
6:30
that was cutting edge, you know, built in the ability to expand
6:34
out nationwide and like we have. And then also when COVID had the
6:38
ability to work virtually was already sort of implemented.
6:41
I mean, when COVID had, we just said, OK, everybody just take
6:44
your printer home and we'll see you in a week.
6:47
And then 18 months later, that's crazy, came back.
6:50
I don't think this is going away.
6:53
So you guys are moderating the panel on asbestos litigation.
6:57
We're in 2025. Asbestos has evolved in many
7:00
different ways over the past decade, 2 decades.
7:03
How would you describe the current state of asbestos
7:07
litigation? And then we'll go a little bit
7:09
more into some of that evolution.
7:11
The state of asbestos litigation has obviously transitioned quite
7:15
a bit over. I've only done this for gosh
7:18
when I start 2013, twelve years, even in that 12 year period it's
7:22
expanded out. Now we have talcum powder is an
7:24
issue. We have many more bankrupt
7:26
companies. We have bankruptcy trust that
7:28
are looking at lung cancer cases and not focusing in on the
7:32
diagnosis report for the statute.
7:34
Instead, the actual diagnosis, the statue limitations, which is
7:38
going to restrict a great deal of firms out there that are
7:41
picking up lung cancer clients that were maybe diagnosed in
7:45
2015 and no longer be able to recover from the trust.
7:48
So it's tightened up a little bit on that and there's a lot
7:51
more firms out there that are filing malignancy cases for
7:56
bankruptcy only and leaving behind.
7:58
So we're litigation of bankruptcy firm, right?
8:00
So we do lit on almost all lung cancers, 99.9% lung cancer
8:05
victims that we help. We do a litigation for them,
8:09
which means we take it to the court.
8:10
There's a deposition if we could do 1.
8:12
And, you know, if there's needs to be a trial, there will be a
8:14
trial. A lot of the firms out there are
8:16
picking up lung cancer cases with the intent of only filing
8:19
bankruptcies for them, which is, you know, in our opinion, you
8:22
leave money on the table for these people who are really
8:25
severely injured. Mesophilioma cases, I think for
8:28
the most part, are all litigated unless there's an extraordinary
8:31
reason or maybe they came to the United States only in a talc era
8:35
and there's no one to go after. And those are tough cases, but.
8:39
Is it accurate to say that the proper way to handle any
8:43
asbestos case, lung cancer or meso is effectively the same
8:46
regardless of whether it is a a meso diagnosis or lung cancer,
8:49
to properly take it through the Truss and to litigate?
8:53
That would be our opinion, yeah. I mean, you assume that you're
8:55
going to take on a client with the sole purpose of getting them
8:58
as much money as you can for them and their family.
9:00
And the way to do that is through litigation or for almost
9:03
all of them, sometimes not or certainly cases.
9:06
We only do bankruptcy on a dozen a year of the hundreds because
9:10
it's just, you know, dad's gone, you know, and he had the
9:15
diagnosis and there's no one around who worked with him in
9:17
the 60s when he was insulator. And then he went and worked at
9:20
an office as an accountant for the rest of his life.
9:22
So there's no one around from the 1960s.
9:25
So, you know, the file the bankruptcy trusts that we can
9:28
for him and that's sort of the end of it.
9:30
It's also it's very client specific.
9:32
It's you can have the system that is your normal system, but
9:37
then you know each individual clients like exposures and wants
9:42
and desires for the lawsuit are different.
9:44
You know, sometimes we'll have a client that says I'm not doing a
9:47
deposition. I want to do this for my family,
9:50
but I'm not doing a deposition. I'm not spending my last days
9:53
with a bunch of lawyers, which is fair.
9:55
And so it this. Is you guys.
9:58
It's a big time and emotion commitment.
10:00
Right. So you also have to be able to
10:02
pivot based on what the wants of the client are.
10:05
You know that may not be what we would necessarily recommend.
10:08
You're going to maximize the recovery the more testimony you
10:11
can give and in that case would not do necessarily a full
10:15
litigation case or we'd wait and find Co workers or something
10:17
like that. So it is similar for both meso
10:19
and lung cancer, but it's not a class action, it's not an MDL,
10:23
right? So it's every case is a
10:25
individual litigated its own case number case.
10:29
The practice of asbestos is so different than everything else,
10:33
right? We're at MTMPI, guess it's the
10:35
closest aligned, right? But it's a very, very different
10:39
area of practice timeline horizon for people who haven't
10:43
litigated these cases. You want to kind of talk through
10:45
how it differs from some of the other types of litigation that
10:48
you guys handle? And because it's each case is
10:50
individually litigated, you're going to be on more of like a
10:52
normal, like personal injury timeline and depending on the
10:55
jurisdiction. So if we take Madison County,
10:57
Saint Clair County, you know you're going to file the case,
11:00
you're going to serve the case 30 days from service.
11:02
You can do a deposition, you go to the court, ask for a trial
11:05
date. So each case kind of moves
11:09
through the court like a a normal personal injury case
11:11
would verse with, you know, like an MDL where you're setting the,
11:14
the leadership, setting the guidelines, they're doing
11:16
depositions altogether as a group and picking bellwether
11:19
cases. I would say for the most part,
11:21
these cases will resolve quicker than most mass torts just
11:26
because you're continually moving them through the court
11:28
system. Depending on if a client dies or
11:31
you know, for the case comes in deceased, it may take longer
11:33
because with the deceased case drafting to look for Co workers,
11:36
the courts don't give them as early of trial dates.
11:38
If it's not a living plaintiff, you know, living plaintiffs take
11:41
priority as you know, they probably you should for to try
11:44
to get to see their day in court.
11:46
But for the most part, I would say in asbestos case, we'll move
11:48
quicker on the litigation side, the bankruptcy side.
11:51
We always say that can take years just because at new trusts
11:55
are constantly opening. So like Georgia Pacific filed
11:57
for bankruptcy in 2017, that bankruptcy still pending.
12:01
The trust is not open yet. So any case since 2017 is kind
12:06
of just piling up for that trust.
12:07
So it may be a case that it is closed for us.
12:09
They've seen all their settlements, but 35, however
12:12
many years from now that that gets resolved, they could be
12:15
back in litigation with GP or filing a bankruptcy claim.
12:18
So the bankruptcy side, I would say is the more you can't really
12:22
pinpoint how long it's going to take.
12:23
That's what clients ask. So how long is this going to
12:25
take? Is this technically it's
12:26
probably just going to be open forever because there'll be
12:29
maybe a supplemental payment that comes down with a
12:31
bankruptcy trust look and say, oh, we should have paid a little
12:33
bit more. You know, the actuarials didn't
12:35
come up with the right math and they send a check out, you know,
12:37
for us to distribute to the clients or you know, sometimes
12:40
even their grandchildren with clients from the early aughts,
12:44
you know, and it's running down and finding the heirs to
12:47
distribute the money is that in itself is a big left, but we
12:51
believe we have an obligation to do that.
12:53
One of the unique things of the asbestos cases, you deal with a
12:56
lot of people that are on unlimited time frame of how much
12:59
life they have to live, especially with Misos, they're
13:02
right against the clock. And what kind of unique
13:03
challenges like does that come with dealing with not only the
13:06
person who has the cancer and then also dealing with their
13:10
family? Only certain litigations exist
13:12
where you have an injury that's currently ongoing and that will,
13:16
you know, ultimately result and get worse.
13:18
And I worked on Pi cases and Mednol cases and the injuries
13:22
already done in the healing process has begun, you know,
13:24
hopefully at least moving down that way.
13:26
And this is a race against the clock, especially mesothelioma
13:30
victims because it's, you know, an 18 month, 6 to 18 month
13:34
average, the time, which I understand is a wide range, but.
13:38
Still, not a lot of time, not a lot of months goes quick.
13:40
As Sarah said, sometimes they don't want to sit around in a
13:42
room with a bunch of lawyers. I mean, I had a client up in
13:45
Milwaukee and he said, Chris, you know, I've worked hard my
13:48
whole life. You know, I'm 90 years old.
13:51
I've had a good run. I'm on borrowed time.
13:53
Some people say, and we're going to do this because I'm going to
13:56
send my great grandkids to college so they don't have to be
13:58
a pipe fitter. And it's like, that's a
14:00
wonderful way to think about it, Sir.
14:02
Let's do your deposition. And we did it, you know, in the
14:06
living room of his house and his lazy boy chair because he
14:09
couldn't get up when he was on oxygen.
14:10
And they didn't, you know, I had a good outcome for him, but he
14:15
worked that well for it. So as long as the clients and
14:18
their families understand what we can do for them, and if it's
14:21
what they want us to do, then we'll do everything we can to
14:23
make sure we preserve their testimony and move it through
14:26
litigation as needed. Because you're dealing with the
14:28
family while they're still living and then the case can be
14:31
ongoing after they pass. Unfortunately, then you have to
14:33
deal with that, dealing with the litigation in the middle of them
14:37
doing that traumatic experience and try to keep it moving and
14:40
stuff and. Most of the time the families,
14:41
everyone gets along well, but sometimes not so.
14:46
It's especially when there's money.
14:48
When there's death, add money involved.
14:49
There's a lot of emotion. So, you know, we try to make
14:52
sure that they understand this is this is what will happen, you
14:55
know, following your passing. Talk about it now because
14:59
otherwise your kids may just end up fighting if they don't get
15:01
along now. So you should work on that.
15:03
And and they do, for the most part, so well.
15:05
Another talking about the six to 18 month life expectancy and
15:08
that's kind of gone up a a bit from what it used to be.
15:11
There are a lot of new treatments, immunotherapies that
15:15
are not always covered by insurance.
15:17
So a lot of times that's another incentive or the reason somebody
15:20
pursues a case is not even necessarily to pay for their
15:23
great grandkids college, but to live as long as possible.
15:26
And so if you know proceeds of a lawsuit can help them pay some
15:30
of these out of pocket expenses. There are certain facilities and
15:33
hospitals and that are able to do more than others.
15:36
So there's a lot of travel expenses that insurance
15:38
obviously doesn't pay for. So a lot of times too, our
15:41
clients will pursue it because they want to be that 1800 plus,
15:43
right? And a lot of instances, A
15:46
lawsuit gives them the opportunity to be able to do
15:49
that. We've seen great medical
15:50
advances in lung cancer with immunotherapy and we will
15:53
continue to do so. Mesothelioma, some of it
15:55
overlaps, but there's only 3300 cases of mesothelioma diagnosed
15:59
in a year. So you don't end up with a lot
16:02
of people putting R&D money into it and a lot of companies
16:05
putting R&D money into it. So you're hoping for an NIH
16:08
grant or maybe the FDA will grant orphan drug status so that
16:12
you can have some advancements that are mesothelioma specific.
16:15
But for lung cancer, it's remarkable in 10 years how much
16:18
longer of a life expectancy you can have, as long as you hit
16:21
certain things for certain immunotherapies.
16:23
Yeah, I had to think about it because you guys take people
16:25
across the nation. So just because there's great
16:28
treatment of this hospital, they cannot be anywhere close to it.
16:30
So they need to travel to it to get the treatment, stay there,
16:33
live there, whatever they need to do, and that racks some big
16:35
bills. If I had lung cancer, thank God
16:39
I don't, I would travel to any hospital that could help me live
16:43
an extra month. Like, here's all my money, this
16:45
is what I'm going to do. Yeah.
16:47
This is, this is what we're doing here.
16:49
This is our plan is, yeah, surviving.
16:51
What states are like the some of the leading hospitals in.
16:54
Well, most advancements in treatment.
16:57
Johns Hopkins is good, MD Anderson, Baylor U Chicago, the
17:02
University of Nebraska Hospital systems.
17:04
There's been some really good, good advancements.
17:07
Kaiser, yeah, Brigham, Brigham Women's and then Kaiser, the
17:11
Kaiser systems out in California, the Mayo in Florida,
17:14
they, they see a lot of miso victims.
17:16
And there are great doctors across the country who treat it
17:19
as wonderful. And we also have the ability to
17:22
share technology and knowledge. And so these doctors, I think,
17:24
do a very good job, you know, oncology doctors and sharing all
17:28
the information that they have on treating miso.
17:30
Only some of them may do a very good job with surgeries that
17:32
need to occur. What comes the actual treatment
17:35
of miso and lung cancer? I think the information is
17:37
getting disseminated widely. So if you're near a big city,
17:40
you can get into a large hospital system like we're in
17:43
Saint Louis with Simon Cancer Center is one of the best in the
17:46
country. We're lucky that people travel
17:48
from, you know, 200 miles away. There's always hotels around the
17:51
hospital for people who come in to receive the treatment.
17:54
And then they will go back home and treat locally with, you
17:57
know, the radiology or chemotherapy center with the
18:00
prescription, I guess, written by the oncologist of the
18:03
treatment plan. And then we're talking about the
18:05
doctors getting together. We're a corporate sponsor of the
18:08
Mesa Foundation and they have their kind of yearly symposium
18:11
coming up. And there's normally our intake
18:13
staff goes to that symposium to find out what's the cutting edge
18:17
treatments. They run into a lot of our
18:18
clients that attend the symposium.
18:20
But a lot of the doctors from throughout the country will get
18:23
together and talk about, you know, new treatments, new
18:25
surgeries. And it's a really cool area
18:28
where they kind of all compare notes.
18:30
If you live in, you know, Boise, ID, that there could be
18:34
somewhere close that you can get to.
18:36
It is really collaborative from the health provider standpoint
18:40
too. And there's even a conference
18:42
every year, every two years, where worldwide all the doctors
18:45
who focus on mesothelioma treatment, they get together and
18:48
talk about different advances that they've had, what they're
18:50
seeing in their practices. The collaborative effort is
18:53
really fantastic, and I think most doctors who treat
18:55
mesothelioma victims, while most oncologists and most doctors do
18:59
care a great deal, but I think mesothelioma doctors care a
19:01
great deal because sometimes I feel like they're just treading
19:04
water and they want to be able to move the ball a little bit
19:07
better. I think everybody watching this
19:09
knows that MISO cases are extremely valuable for both the
19:14
clients and the law firms. That brings a lot of unique
19:18
challenges. And over the years we've we've
19:20
talked about this, right, there's 3300 diagnosis a year.
19:24
What percentage of those would you say actually go and file or
19:28
sign up with a law firm? We'll start with that 2/3, OK.
19:32
So roughly, you know, 2100 wind up signing with the firm.
19:36
These cases generally, and this is all publicly available
19:39
information, right? But generally they're worth
19:42
approximately how much to the claimant.
19:44
I know it's it depends on the defendants, it depends on a lot
19:47
of factors. But if we were just to say like,
19:49
you know, finger in the air, how much is it a case wind up being
19:52
worth? Seven figures.
19:53
The acquisition cost for a case that is worth 7 figures is very,
19:59
very high and we have seen that acquisition costs increase
20:04
exponentially. How have you been able to
20:06
maintain your growth? With those rising costs and the
20:10
increased. Competition around case
20:12
acquisition, we've seen a lot of people see the seven figure
20:15
number. They're like, oh, that was
20:16
interesting. Let me get into that.
20:17
Annoying. There have been.
20:21
The cost or the other work that that's involved?
20:23
There have been, I mean, people certainly could jump into
20:27
asbestos litigation if they wanted to.
20:28
We haven't seen any who have done it successfully, who
20:32
haven't done at least work in asbestos litigation before.
20:34
It's such a unique practice. The doctors are all unique.
20:38
You know, the niche of asbestos litigation is very much, you
20:42
know, a tight group of people that most everybody knows
20:45
everybody else, Some folks have tried to jump in and they have
20:47
not done well. And then, I mean, even some
20:49
people have tried filing in where we do in Manchester
20:52
County, Illinois, for a lot of our mesophilioma cases and
20:55
didn't work well. And we came in and helped out.
20:58
Another way we've been able to offset that cost is we do handle
21:01
a lot of lung cancer cases. The cost of those are going up
21:05
as well. The settlements are normally
21:07
less than a mesothelioma case, but there are more diagnosis of
21:10
lung cancer each year and a lot of them can be pinpointed to
21:14
asbestos exposure. The fact that we're able to
21:16
handle lung cancer cases and that we do both that bankruptcy
21:19
and the litigation side of it and a high volume is helpful
21:23
because then if you're doing campaigns to bring in cases,
21:27
you're not just looking for the needle and that like you were
21:31
getting lung cancer cases and then hopefully not hopefully for
21:34
the client, but you may in one of those campaigns get a
21:36
mesothelioma case, but then you have 30 lung cancer cases that
21:40
you're also working up. And, and the way that that we
21:42
looked at it is that they're sick too.
21:44
They were exposed to, to a product they shouldn't have been
21:46
exposed to. They weren't warned.
21:48
And they deserve compensation just as much as the seven figure
21:52
mesothelioma case. I mean, I think that's really
21:54
what's helped us to, you know, the marketing costs are still
21:57
high, but keep the costs down and help as many people as we
22:00
can. How many referrals do you get
22:02
from, you know, past clients, families or referrals from other
22:06
law firms in the area that have one come across their desk where
22:09
they know to send it to you guys?
22:10
Or nationwide. Or nationwide versus the
22:13
marketing efforts? There are a lot of referrals
22:14
from family members and friends and you know, we're very pro
22:17
labor law firm. We work with a lot of unions.
22:19
Similar situation there. So I don't know how many as a
22:23
number, but dozens in a given year from that method and then
22:27
from other law firms, hundreds of cases.
22:30
You know, we have we believe a very good practice and you know,
22:34
we're very grateful for people who send us cases and and trust
22:37
us with their clients to work them up and it's worked out well
22:40
for everyone involved. So and then from marketing
22:43
itself, you know the residual few 100 cases.
22:47
If a firm locally somewhere in the country comes across someone
22:50
who has been exposed to asbestos and they believe there is a case
22:53
there, what should they do? How do they handle it to make
22:56
sure that that case gets treated the right way?
22:58
Well, first of all, you need to move quickly, especially if it's
23:00
a mesothelioma case. We've already talked at length
23:02
about the life expectancy, so it's a situation where you need
23:05
to move as quickly as possible with the competition.
23:08
You also want to move as quickly as possible.
23:11
You know, what we recommend to our, you know, referring firms
23:14
that send us cases is we have an intake e-mail address that has
23:18
Chris and I and other partners and our entire intake staff on
23:21
that is monitored almost 24/7 for the most part and an.
23:27
E-mail hits an inbox. Everyone's jumping on it.
23:29
E-mail immediately with the Meza Thealama case.
23:32
We normally send an attorney out.
23:33
We can have somebody at the home in 24 hours or less.
23:36
Lung cancer case, if it's local, we normally go meet with them.
23:39
Otherwise, get them on the phone immediately start going through
23:41
their potential exposures to start getting the case on file.
23:44
Because like I said, you really want to start that clock of
23:46
getting the case on file, serving it and getting that
23:48
deposition done before the client has chemo brain or
23:53
before, you know, they start really getting into the the
23:56
treatment which they need to do. Because that's the, you know,
23:58
you want to prong your life as much as possible.
24:00
But it is just really important to don't sit on it, get it
24:03
moving so. I don't know if everybody truly
24:06
understands like we do, the level of competition for these
24:09
cases. It's not just finding the lead,
24:12
a lead contacts. I've seen 234 firms, maybe more.
24:18
When they contact those firms, they're asking very specific
24:21
questions. And then it's not like API case
24:25
or a mass tour case where you just E sign it.
24:27
I mean, I'm sure it happens, right?
24:28
But like you said, you get someone on a plane and you're
24:31
going to their house and you're sitting with them and you're
24:33
explaining the process. And this is someone who just got
24:37
a recent diagnosis or a family member of someone maybe has just
24:40
passed away. It is extremely competitive from
24:44
literally the moment that someone gets diagnosed with NISO
24:48
all the way until the point that that case turns like winds up
24:51
getting signed. I'm sure both of you have gone
24:54
and done sign ups of cases, right?
24:56
Can you talk about what it's like to deal with other law
24:59
firms who may be walking in the door as you guys are walking out
25:02
for a meeting on the couch? There are a lot of law firms
25:05
that if a client signs with them, they are going to do a
25:08
good job for them, right? Like Chris was talking about
25:10
earlier, this is a niche area of the law, so you want to go with
25:13
a firm that knows what they're doing that has handled these
25:16
cases. Number one, we like to be in the
25:18
living room when there is so much competition.
25:20
You want to be able to establish a rapport and get a personal
25:24
relationship with the client. I just don't think you're
25:27
necessarily can always get over Zoom or over the phone.
25:30
So we like to be in the living room and it's kind of comes down
25:33
to just who do you have that relationship with?
25:35
We always stressed our people. Never talk bad about the other
25:38
firms. You don't know what other firms
25:40
we work with or what other firms we have relationships with.
25:43
When you're going in, you should be establishing report with the
25:46
client and you should be telling them what we do.
25:48
Well, I think we do a lot of things well at the firm.
25:51
We've done a long time and not relying on cutting down other
25:55
firms and just saying like This is why you know what we can do
25:59
for you. Yeah, agree that I also really
26:01
like the idea of sending someone out because of the timeline and
26:06
how fast we need to move for someone with mesothelioma,
26:09
especially sending someone out there in the living room and
26:12
it's almost like the first prep session we get to extract all
26:14
the information we can from them.
26:16
It really is a fasting process. You'll go in and sit down and
26:19
start talking to, you know, a gentleman's a pipe fitter in the
26:21
60s and 70s and his wife and kids have no idea what he did at
26:26
work other than he was a pipe fitter.
26:27
And when you start talking about, tell me a little bit
26:29
about the refinery you're at. You know, did you work on the,
26:32
you know, the cat cracking system?
26:33
You know, what did you do there? Were there shutdowns?
26:36
Did you work on the boilers? You know, how about cooling
26:38
tires? All these different products.
26:40
It blows the mind of the family because it was just dad who came
26:42
home and never talked about work.
26:43
And there's a whole side of them that you never.
26:46
Also men back dad didn't really talk about their work days or I
26:48
don't know, didn't really say they had a bad day at work.
26:50
Right, right. There's a, well, a lot of times,
26:54
like I said, we only send attorneys on mesothelioma
26:57
visits. And actually a lot of times it's
26:59
a partner. So most of the time the attorney
27:02
that's going out, if they decide to sign with us is doing, you
27:06
know, kind of the initial prop of the case.
27:08
Because chances are the person they're they're meeting with is
27:10
either going to be the attorney handling their deposition or
27:13
overseeing their case of the partner that's overseeing the
27:15
team handling their case. So it is not only a good time to
27:19
to meet the client and hopefully sign it, but to hit the ground
27:23
running. They established that
27:24
relationship right away. It's not like, for example, in
27:27
Pi, you see a guy's head on an advertisement you're calling in,
27:30
you're talking into a person, and odds are you're not actually
27:33
going to deal with that attorney unless the case is a really big
27:36
case. There's a lot of firms that do
27:38
Pi where you know they may talk to wonderful paralegal the whole
27:41
time because that's all the case you know, needs is this
27:45
parallels are so experienced anyway they.
27:49
That's good, yeah, they can establish a relationship with
27:51
the attorney that's can be working their case right away.
27:53
I'm from the get go. There's no hand off and you can
27:55
just really hit the ground and. That attorney will come back and
27:58
send an e-mail about the case. We'll send an e-mail to the
28:00
firm. A complaint gets drafted, gets
28:02
on file, it goes out for service, sometimes needs to be
28:05
rushed within three days to sign up, and hopefully we can
28:09
expedite the depot if needed. Or we could be in a room doing a
28:12
deposition under 30 days sometimes.
28:15
What are some of the ways that you acquire asbestos cases that
28:20
directly that people may not think of as a way that these
28:23
cases come to your door? We do get a decent number of
28:26
cases from client referrals. One facility that we had a
28:31
client out of and three of the Co workers in the case that
28:35
helped with her case ended up unfortunately being diagnosed
28:37
with mesothelioma. And because they knew our firm
28:41
or done depos for prior cases and came back to us and, you
28:45
know, reach back out, I would say that's one of the best ways
28:48
to get it 'cause it's a, you know, a compliment that a family
28:51
felt, yeah, that we did a good job and the family trusted us to
28:53
send us their family. I don't know if there's any
28:55
other, you know, kind of the traditional marketing,
28:58
traditional working with other firms that don't necessarily
29:01
handle these types of cases or that don't handle lung cancer
29:04
cases. You know, a lot of times we'll
29:06
work with other firms that may handle Amiso case but don't do
29:08
lung cancer, and so they'll reach out to us to handle that
29:11
case. The lung cancer cases are an
29:13
interesting part of it. Most people don't know that lung
29:16
cancer cases are recoverable for asbestos exposures.
29:20
And so there's an estate attorney out in Florida and
29:22
Arizona. And two of them I could think of
29:24
that, you know, we dealt with for estate issues.
29:27
And just talking to them, they said, oh, OK.
29:28
Yeah. You know, it's like, well, if
29:30
you have any with lung cancer, you know, you're an estate
29:32
attorney. We're happy to help them like,
29:34
oh, I didn't know about that. And so they have since sentence
29:36
cases and lung cancer cases do not just meso cases out there,
29:39
but we try to be in every possible form of advertising or
29:44
communicating with our referral groups, Co counsel, new Co
29:48
counsel as much as possible so that we're just everywhere.
29:52
Do you have any advice you can give to people that are
29:54
listening on how to grow your referral network from other law
29:58
firms? Part of your success is you've
30:00
built a great relationship and brain across the nation where
30:02
people happily call you up of a asbestos related case comes
30:06
across, but that wasn't built overnight.
30:08
What advice do you guys have for building up that referral
30:10
network? Do a good job for the clients
30:12
and now I stay in touch. I think those are probably the
30:15
two biggest things when you have a referral relationship, it's
30:17
it's truly a Co counselor relationship.
30:19
You know, we're all working on the case together one way or the
30:21
other. And so having a good
30:23
relationship with them and with their client so that, you know,
30:26
they look good back home from wherever they're from, I think
30:29
it's probably the most important.
30:30
Well, and even attending like seminars like this that that
30:33
you're with, you know, attorneys that like we have asbestos only
30:37
seminars, but most people that are coming to those already do
30:40
asbestos cases. It's also good to come to a case
30:42
like this. We also handle mass work cases,
30:44
Pi cases. But we get to meet attorneys
30:47
that don't necessarily have asbestos on their radar and say,
30:51
hey, you know, this is what we do.
30:52
What do you do? Kind of try to establish that
30:56
reciprocal referral relationship, meet people you
30:58
like and send work their way and they'll send it your way.
31:01
Yeah. Old school, right?
31:04
What are some of the things that used to work that just don't
31:06
work anymore aren't as effective?
31:08
I always get concerned about TV, old school TV.
31:11
Miso ads like became a joke for a while.
31:13
Yeah, so just traditional TV broadcasts.
31:16
I'm not super excited about putting advertisements in
31:19
newspapers, sending those out across the country.
31:22
I know people who do it and they get cases out of it.
31:24
I don't know how well they do. We haven't done one in a long
31:26
time. You're looking for a needle in a
31:28
haystack, like really, right? Like 3300 people out of the
31:32
millions and 10s of hundreds of millions of people with asbestos
31:35
exposure. You talk about pipe fitters,
31:36
right? People who worked in
31:37
manufacturing years and years ago.
31:39
You've got veterans, you know, referrals coming from veterans
31:43
and unions and there are definitely these pockets.
31:46
How are you seeing asbestos exposure transition from those
31:50
like traditional cohorts to like the new generation of people who
31:54
are getting diagnosed? So you still have some of the
31:56
secondary cases, the wives, the children of the people that did
32:01
kind of your stereotypical asbestos exposure jobs, right,
32:04
Right. At home on their clothes and
32:06
stuff like that. We still seeing mechanics and
32:09
family members and mechanics because most friction products
32:12
contain asbestos longer than other products, but the talc
32:16
component has really expanded what we're looking at.
32:19
I've been doing this 20 years now and we used to get a 30
32:23
something year old female musothelioma case somewhere
32:26
like, you know, that was born and you know, past 1972 when a
32:31
lot of companies stopped using asbestos or post 1977.
32:35
And we were like, we don't know what to do for your case, right.
32:37
The evolution of those exposures and the top contamination with
32:42
asbestos has kind of just opened up a whole new litigation sub
32:46
sect of asbestos cases. I think that there's a lot of
32:49
case. I'd like to go back and have a
32:51
redo for the family because at the time I was like, I don't, I
32:55
don't know where you were exposed, but.
32:57
I think about those young female peritoneal mesothelioma
33:00
peritoneals mesothelioma in the stomach well the.
33:03
Thank you because I had no idea. No, that's right.
33:05
The younger female peritoneal mesothelioma victims where we
33:09
just said we don't know, you know, both your parents were
33:11
lawyers and we, we don't know where this is from, you know,
33:14
and, and never asked about talcum powder exposure because
33:17
it wasn't, you know, on the public sphere.
33:19
Yeah. I heard one of a gentleman who
33:21
was like super healthy, got musically in his 30s and the
33:25
exposure was his mom would put talcum powder on his bed when he
33:29
was a baby before he went to bed and then he just laid in it and
33:31
they slept in and inhaled it all night.
33:33
Yeah, I mean there's a lot of companies out there that
33:35
advertise, you know, put it between the sheets so that, you
33:38
know, in non air conditioning times, you know, that you
33:41
wouldn't get all sweaty and stick to the sheets.
33:43
You know, it would slide at night.
33:44
And I'd never heard of that until this.
33:46
And now when you talk to the victims of mesothelioma who use
33:49
a lot of talk, like, Oh, yeah, we use it in our sheets, it's
33:51
like, Oh, my. God, yeah.
33:52
I went to my mom. I was like, do you use Taco?
33:53
She's like, we use it all the time.
33:54
And I was like. Yeah, there's only 3300 cases a
33:59
year, so. Are you seeing any female
34:03
females who have both ovarian and meso?
34:06
I don't know that I've seen that.
34:08
We've had a peritoneal ovarian mesotheliomo, one case like
34:15
that. Hazopelium is formed when
34:17
asbestos enters into the body, and this is a very simplified
34:21
version of it, but the asbestos fiber will go through the tissue
34:24
and get into the mesophelial lining.
34:26
Mesophelial lining is sort of a Saran wrap type around all of
34:30
our organs so that our organs aren't just lungs rubbing
34:34
against rib cages. It has this protective area so
34:36
that things slide as we breathe in and out, we move.
34:39
Most of our organs are covered with this mesothelial lining.
34:42
So if the asbestos gets into the cell of the lining and scrambles
34:46
up the DNA in a cell, then you have a bad luck circumstances.
34:51
You know the cell divides genetically altered and you have
34:54
a tumor that grows and that's mesothelioma.
34:57
So you can get mesothelioma on any organ.
35:00
Primarily we see a plural which is the lungs, peritoneal, which
35:04
is below the lungs and pericardial and then testicular
35:09
mesothelioma. But you can get it on the
35:13
ovaries apparently in that one case that we saw.
35:15
And that one would be an interesting, it would have been
35:18
an interesting study to see if it's from breathing in the
35:22
asbestos that passes through the lungs in the mesothelial lining
35:26
into the pleural cavity is picked up through the lymphatic
35:29
process, which is carrying the asbestos down to the peritoneal
35:32
cavity because there's a barrier.
35:34
And then the asbestos gets loose in the peritoneal cavity and
35:38
then gets into the lining and causes cancer down below.
35:42
Which for women who use body powders on their genitals, you
35:48
can have another entry point that men do not typically have.
35:51
And so you have a lot of female peritoneal mesotheliomas, which
35:56
I and others and mostly the doctors think is caused by
35:59
talcum powder exposure versus you know a traditional brakes or
36:04
gaskets or something like that where it's very hard for
36:07
secondary exposure case for the whole process to occur when
36:11
traveling through the lymphatic systems.
36:12
Biplural is the most common, right?
36:14
They breathe it in from the brake pads or.
36:17
It's a very detailed medical lesson of how.
36:19
Very well done. Its version.
36:23
With the the discovery of the link between talcum powder and
36:27
miso, do you think that miso diagnosis are going to climb?
36:32
Are they have they leveled off? Like over the years the general
36:35
consensus has been less and less miso diagnosis.
36:37
This is a dying litigation. Do you think that it's now going
36:41
the other way? There was kind of a study to
36:43
climb, but the decline correlated to with COVID.
36:47
I was on panels with, you know, defense attorneys and insurance
36:50
adjusters during that time that said, oh, the amount of
36:53
diagnosis are going to steadily go down.
36:56
Now, at the time, I disagreed and said, I don't think we know
36:59
that because, you know, you were having breathing issues in
37:03
2020-2021. You didn't assume I have a rare
37:06
form of cancer, right? You assumed I have COVID right?
37:09
Or long COVID? COVID might have taken those
37:11
people out that might have had cancer already.
37:13
That's yeah, that's my theory is that, you know, it's not backed
37:16
by anything, but you have a lot of men and women who are in
37:20
their 80s who may have mesophilioma or may be diagnosed
37:23
with mesothelioma, mesothelioma, but also have COVID and have
37:28
enough issues on their own trying to survive that that
37:31
perhaps, you know, COVID took them before meso.
37:35
I think the answer to your question is kind of unknown
37:37
because it's now gone back up since that time.
37:39
Did it go back to the levels it was before Kovid?
37:42
No, no, it's. Probably it has rebounded.
37:45
So, so there is some decline, I don't think we can say yet.
37:50
Is it because there's just less cases of it or is that they pick
37:54
back up because Covid's over? Is it because of Tau cases?
37:57
And I think that that's something the Medical Group will
38:00
figure out as we as we see a couple more years down the road.
38:03
How the defense experts trying to figure out.
38:06
When it will end? When it will end and whether
38:09
it's caused by asbestos or not, which obviously we disagree
38:12
with, but. Do you see asbestos litigation
38:15
expanding outside the US? No.
38:21
I know some people do in Canada. Besides that, I haven't heard
38:23
much of it. There is asbestos litigation in
38:25
Canada. There has been for a very long
38:27
time. They have a very good, we'll
38:29
call it work comp pipe system up there where they go in and if
38:32
you get mesophilioma, they'll come in and they'll set your
38:35
house up with a ramp for wheelchair access.
38:37
They're going to pay for your treatment.
38:39
There's a lump sum of money that varies depending on, you know,
38:42
do you have a spouse or not, something like that, but that
38:45
they will pay you. And obviously Canada covers the
38:47
treatment. And then if you sign up for that
38:49
work on system, then the Canadian government uses a law
38:54
firm to file bankruptcy claims and then recover money through
38:57
the bankruptcy system on behalf of the government.
39:00
Got it, got it, got it. There are not great paths to
39:04
recovery and litigation in Canada for mesothelioma victims,
39:08
as I understand it. Mark cares because Mark was born
39:11
in Canada. When he said no, I just didn't
39:14
have to have any further questions.
39:19
What we will see is Canadian clients who have come to the US
39:24
and either worked within the US, were exposed to asbestos, or
39:26
traveled to the US, were exposed to asbestos and then either
39:30
stayed here or went back to Canada.
39:32
We're seeing some of those cases with Canada and Mexico.
39:37
You'll see some you know people will come up working Texas
39:41
Louisiana area to. Europe, yeah.
39:44
Guy who grew up here, lived here, then moved away to Europe,
39:47
represented them. Maybe a handful of folks from
39:50
the Dominican Republic that we've had over the years.
39:52
All people like I'm guessing came here.
39:54
Came here, worked where and then went back.
39:55
Yeah, there are cases, you know, people who are Puerto Rican,
39:59
we've had Puerto Rican cases. They're Americans.
40:01
But you know, people don't think that always.
40:03
So to anyone who worked in America.
40:06
Or territory or something like that.
40:08
Then there's a litigation that we could do for them and people
40:10
have tried in other countries, but I don't see it getting that
40:14
big of a exposure. Australia had the cases against
40:17
Hardy James Hardy Company. It's a lot, a lot of Australia
40:20
diagnosis. Yeah, they use a tremendous
40:23
amount of espouses in Australia and same as the United States,
40:26
but longer. And Canada actually had mines.
40:28
So in Asbestos, Quebec, South Africa, I think they tried doing
40:33
litigation down there and didn't get anywhere.
40:34
And then they tried litigating it in England.
40:37
I don't think that got anywhere either.
40:39
I think you know this. I don't know if I ever told you
40:41
my grandfather had miso baby, right?
40:45
He died when I was 1330 plus years ago.
40:50
And I found out it was miso when I started working in the
40:54
asbestos industry, right? So or the legal side of the
40:57
asbestos industry a little over a decade ago.
40:59
And the way I found out was because my parents had told me
41:03
that my grandfather died of Melanoma.
41:05
You come across that a lot where people just like don't, can't
41:08
like comprehend it. It's like 2 different things or
41:11
it gets misspelled. Not easy to spell word miso,
41:14
right? But we, we went back and my mom
41:17
said, yeah, he died of Melanoma. And I'm like, Are you sure?
41:20
Like he fits the pattern, right? He owned an upholstery business.
41:24
He was in the Navy. It makes sense.
41:26
And so she went back and looked at the death certificate.
41:28
She was, oh, yeah, you're right, It's mesothelioma.
41:31
Like, oh, Sol is blown. But you know that you guys come
41:35
across that pretty frequently. I think we, we used to come
41:37
across it more now with all the marketing, the TV ads.
41:41
Now I think we get the reverse. We'll have people call that say,
41:44
oh, I have mesothelioma like on the commercial and it's
41:46
Melanoma. But I think that now it's just
41:48
so known or a lot of people call and say, I have asbestos cancer
41:53
that, you know, a doctor has told them where where he has
41:55
asked where we exposed to asbestos.
41:57
And that's on both the lung cancer and the meso side.
41:59
But I think that now we're at a point, like you said, the
42:02
advertising had almost become a meme and was on, you know,
42:05
sitcoms and that that most people now, when they, they hear
42:09
it, know it so. Finding a way to help out that
42:12
1/3 of people who don't know that they can litigate or
42:16
perhaps don't want to litigate, but know there's some money to
42:18
help them out. That's the hardest part is, you
42:21
know, there's people out there who deservedly should have some
42:24
sort of recovery that you can't get anything for them.
42:26
And so sometimes it's, you know, maybe like that where they would
42:29
look at mesothelioma, but thought it was Melanoma and, and
42:32
then put it together. Or now whether you have someone
42:35
who they don't believe in litigation and they don't want
42:39
to do anything like that and sue people.
42:41
And it's like, well, I understand, but you know, these
42:44
insurance companies are the ones who are paying.
42:45
You. I don't want to sue my former
42:47
employer, like, you know, OK, Yeah.
42:51
What about all these bankruptcy tests?
42:53
You know, we can get money for you if you recall these products
42:55
and I don't know, it's it's a shame that do you have people
43:00
who really need the money and then can't, can't use it, can't
43:04
get a hold of it for whatever reason.
43:05
The educational component is actually a big part of this
43:08
litigation. We were talking about this in a
43:09
prior episode with API attorney, I think it was Rob, right?
43:13
Rob Levine was talking about how he is focused not on the
43:17
competition. He is focused on the 40 to 50%
43:21
of people who go to the insurance company instead of
43:24
filing a claim with a lawyer. And it's, it's the same thing
43:27
here, right? It's a third, but still
43:29
relevant. How do you reach those people,
43:31
whether it's they don't understand exactly what they
43:34
have or they've been diagnosed with maybe English as a second
43:37
language and they don't comprehend like, oh, this is a
43:40
route to recovery. And or maybe they just don't
43:42
want to step forward and just say, well, that's bad luck, you
43:45
know, and I can't do anything about it.
43:47
And maybe they don't like lawyers.
43:49
Certainly how? Are they possible guys right?
43:52
I think another thing is that talking about the education
43:54
piece of it, you know, I think it's getting more known that
43:57
talc can be contaminated with asbestos.
43:59
But for the longest time, you know, you talk to a potential
44:02
client and say, you know, where were you exposed to asbestos?
44:05
Oh, I never, I was never exposed to asbestos because they're
44:07
thinking of those stereotypical mechanic pipefitter,
44:10
Boilermaker. And then you ask, you know,
44:12
would you ever do any home remodeling?
44:14
And they're thinking like large construction jobs, Not like your
44:17
brother punches a hole in the wall and you're patching it up
44:20
and you're using an asbestos containing joint compound.
44:22
A lot of times too, it's just a individual client.
44:24
And that's kind of where our job comes in, is to go through and
44:28
try to get as much of A detailed history of all of their
44:32
potential exposures as possible because it's not something that
44:35
most people are going to think of.
44:36
Oh, you know, this is when I was exposed, right?
44:39
This was, you know how I got this.
44:42
It's not like a Roundup where you're like, yeah, I was sitting
44:44
there spraying chemicals all day, right?
44:46
Right. Right.
44:48
It's very straightforward, yeah. Last question is going to be an
44:51
open-ended one. I want you guys to tell us
44:54
something about the asbestos industry we haven't talked about
44:57
today as like a parting tip for people watching.
45:01
I would say partner with somebody that knows how to do
45:04
this right, and then we'd love to partner with anybody
45:06
watching. There's a lot of very successful
45:08
master lawyers, very successful Pi lawyers, but it's so
45:11
different #1 the staffing needs, you know, I said we have 200
45:15
people. It's the staff needed to get a
45:17
case across the finish line and to do it well, make sure you're
45:20
getting the client deposed and making sure you're moving the
45:22
case. It requires a lot of people.
45:24
Well, that's why we have, you know, 200 people at the firm
45:27
because it is different and it is its own kind of niche.
45:30
I would say that anyone is interested in learning more.
45:32
You guys are at mostly every major.
45:35
Legal conference and we love to talk asbestos.
45:38
I'd say I've had many happy hours with asbestos attorneys
45:41
from our background and the number one complaint to hear
45:44
about from all of them is how much work it is.
45:46
I think back in what she was saying earlier is that the firm
45:48
when it started had 16 people and, what, 20 cases?
45:53
Yeah. And it took 16 people, four or
45:56
five of them that were extremely experienced asbestos attorneys,
45:59
just to move those very few cases across the finish line.
46:02
And the entire staff, by the way, was all trained up with the
46:04
spouses they had left. It takes a lot of work and a lot
46:07
of people who know what they're doing to, you know, do a good
46:10
job, not commit malpractice, and get a good recovery for the
46:13
clients. Going back to the question you
46:15
had, we have a database of decades worth of discovery and
46:20
documents and knowledge. Products.
46:22
Products. Literal products.
46:24
We have valves and steam traps and dry cleaner laundry press
46:29
because the pads were made of asbestos.
46:31
I mean, we've got. Barrels for.
46:33
Plastic, I mean, we've got it all.
46:35
And so that's what helps us do best for our clients.
46:38
And I think that's probably the one thing that is overlooked, I
46:42
think by people wanted to jump into the asbestos litigation.
46:45
Thank you so much. Yeah.
46:47
Thanks for having us. Super informative.
46:48
I had a great time. Yeah, this.
46:50
Was a lot of fun. Yeah, hopefully everybody
46:53
learned the insurance and outs of asbestos litigation.
46:55
And if you have questions about asbestos litigation, Sarah and
46:58
Chris, super friendly, great people, reach out to them.
47:02
I'm sure they'd be happy to talk to you.
47:04
And until next time, thanks for joining us.
47:06
And then John and Mark podcast.