“Toxic Toys”

An AAJ article June 4, 2009 looks at the practice of courts sealing litigation documents to the advantage of manufacturers in certain product cases. For example, Bausch & Lomb settled hundreds of cases involving contact solution that involved blindness where the court ordered the documents to be sealed.

An AAJ article today reported on the case of Caperton v. A.T. Massey Coal Co. in which the Court held in a 5-4 decision that state court judges that get big campaign contributions cannot sit in judgment of their biggest contributors.

In a decision dated June 4, 2009, In the Matter of Allstate Insurance Company v. Rivera, the Court of Appeals handed down a ruling regarding SUM claims. Essentially the Court ruled that insurers under a SUM policy are “able to reduce the coverage limits of the tortfeasor’s policy