Because of the bankruptcy of so many manufacturers and producers of asbestos products, Lipsitz & Ponterio, LLC has turned its attention toward the responsibility of companies which engaged in selling and installing asbestos products. Two of our clients have received substantial awards from three such companies.
In June 2002, a Niagara County jury awarded a former Carbide Graphite employee, nearly $2 million. The employee worked until 1999 when he could no longer do so due to shortness of breath. Two years later, he was diagnosed with lung cancer due to workplace exposure to asbestos. The jury found two local distributors of asbestos insulation products responsible for his injuries: Buffalo Insulation Distributors and Niagara Insulation Distributors, which sold asbestos to Carbide Graphite. The verdict was the first in Western New York against distributors of asbestos insulation products.