A Chicago federal appeals court has overridden a downstate federal judge, who sent an ex-Boeing worker’s asbestos suit against the company back to state court, saying the case belongs under federal jurisdiction because Boeing claims the federal government was in control of its bomber production and knew the danger of asbestos was involved.
Cook County has avoided a spot on the list of America’s worst “judicial hellholes” this year. However, the county’s civil courts still received a “dishonorable mention” in an annual report calling attention to some of the country’s most litigious local court systems.
As the number of new asbestos lawsuits declined nationally, activity in Illinois’ three hotbeds for asbestos litigation showed few signs of ebbing in 2017, even though the distribution of filing activity has shifted slightly.
Three years after the U.S. Supreme Court moved to significantly limit general personal jurisdiction over corporations, the Illinois Supreme Court at last has used that precedent to perhaps achieve legal venue reforms long sought by business groups and reform proponents - and long ignored by state lawmakers.
Illinois citizens - and particularly those living in Cook, Madison and St. Clair counties - need to change their voting habits to reduce the problems that landed them near the top of American Tort Reform Association's most recent "Judicial Hellholes" list, an ATRA spokesman said.
The U.S. Supreme Court has denied review of an Illinois Supreme Court decision that cleared tobacco company Philip Morris of a $10 billion judgment. On June 20, the justices rejected a petition from plaintiff Sharon Price, who won the judgment in the court of former Madison County circuit judge Nicholas Byron in 2003. The Supreme Court had denied review of the same case in 2006, after the Illinois Supreme Court reversed Byron.
A divided Illinois Supreme Court has upheld its decision 10 years ago to toss out a $10 billion class action judgment against tobacco giant Philip Morris, saying more recent statements from the Federal Trade Commission concerning how the agency had regulated the marketing of so-called “light” cigarettes does not grant lower state courts the authority to reopen the case or reinstate the judgment. On Nov. 4, the state Supreme Court ruled 4-2 to overturn a ruling by a state appellate court.
