National advertising for lung cancer victims helped contribute to yet another record for newly filed asbestos cases in Madison County in 2013, according to local counsel.
The Circuit Clerk’s office reports that 1,678 new asbestos cases were filed last year, eclipsing a previous record in 2012 by more than 100.
Interestingly, a New York plaintiffs’ firm that opened in Edwardsville a few years ago – Napoli, Bern, Ripka & Shkolnik – filed the most at 525-plus, showing up hometown suers Simmons of Alton and Gori and Julian of Edwardsville.
Brian Huelsmann, asbestos defense attorney and partner at HeplerBroom in Edwardsville, commented on the court’s caseload doubling in the last four years and tripling since 2007.
“That is, to me, a very significant increase in the amount of asbestos cases,” he said.
The numbers rose steadily from 2006 until 2011, increasing roughly 100 cases per year with a slight drop in 2010.
However, approaching 2012, Madison County jumped by more than 600 cases from the previous year. In years past, records show there were 325 cases filed in 2006; 455 cases in 2007; 659 cases in 2008; 814 in 2009; 752 in 2010; 953 in 2011 and 1,563 in 2012.
Even without the new record, Madison County laid claim to the largest asbestos docket in the country. It was dubbed the “epicenter” of asbestos litigation by the American Tort Reform Association in its 2013 “Judicial Hellholes” report.
View the entire story at the Madison County Record.