On January 18, 2022, the Connecticut Court of Appeals affirmed a lower court’s opinion which struck claims of negligence, premises liability and recklessness predicated on increased risk of future harm from asbestos exposure.
Background
In Poce v. O & G Industries, Inc, 210 Conn. App. 82 (2022), plaintiffs had worked as mason laborers in
On September 1, 2021, the South Carolina Court of Appeals affirmed the circuit court’s decision in the matter of Jolly v. General Electric, et al. in which it had (1) denied defendants’ motion for a JNOV, (2) granted a new trial nisi additur, and (3) denied motions to quash subpoenas requiring defendants’ corporate representatives to appear and testify at trial. The appeal was brought by two defendants, Fisher Controls International, LLC and Crosby Valve, LLC (hereinafter “Defendants”) who had received an adverse verdict following trial in July 2017. Most notably, the circuit court had granted the Plaintiffs’ motion for a new trial nisi additur and increased the total jury verdict from $300,000 to $1.87 million. This article examines several holdings in the Jolly opinion which present future implications for asbestos litigation in South Carolina, particularly with regard to the causation standard, the sophisticated intermediary doctrine, additur, and the setoff of verdicts.
The United States Supreme Court recently amended Federal Rule of Evidence Rule 807, the residual exception to the hearsay rule. These amendments significantly broaden the scope of the exception, which may lead to the admission of more hearsay statements under this rule.
Rule 807 provides for the admission of certain hearsay statements that are not admissible under the enumerated exceptions found in Rules 803 and 804. The previous version of the rule allowed for the admission of an otherwise inadmissible hearsay statement when the proponent could demonstrate that the statement was trustworthy, material, and more probative on the point for which it was offered than any other evidence the proponent could obtain through reasonable efforts, and that the admission of the statement was in the interests of justice.