Judge Denies W.R. Grace Trial Extension

June 16, 2006 - Chief U.S. District Justice Don Molloy has told attorneys for W.R. Grace and Company that they’ve had ample time to prepare their case, denying them the four month extension they’ve been seeking. 

W.R. Grace, who’s vermiculite mine in Libby, Montana sickened hundreds in the small town – many of whom did not work at the mine – is faced with the indictment of seven of its company officials who are believed to have concealed the dangers of working around the tremolite asbestos that is released from the vermiculite mine. 

According to an article in The Missoulian (Missoula, MT), the seven Grace defendants are charged with serious felonies carrying penalties of between five and 15 years in a federal penitentiary.

Attorneys for W.R. Grace have argued that they haven’t had ample time to review the more than 1.4 million pages of documents associated with the case.  Judge Molloy disagrees.

“Most defendants are given no more than 70 days to prepare, even in complex multi-defendant cases,” Molloy wrote in his order. “It is a rare case that requires ... a year for preparation. I allotted a year and a half. ... The purpose in doing so was to ensure that the schedule, and the trial date, would weather any delays brought on by the logistical challenge of processing a huge volume of information and the procedural wrangling that naturally occurs in a case involving eight defendants and dozens of lawyers.”

According to facts stated in the indictment, the death rate from asbestosis is 40 to 80 times higher in Libby than elsewhere in Montana and the United States.

Mesothelioma, an aggressive asbestos-caused cancer that normally occurs in only nine out of a million individuals, has been found in at least 20 of the 8,000 residents of Libby and surrounding areas, notes the indictment.

Furthermore, stresses the article in The Missoulian, approximately 1,200 of the northwestern Montana town's residents have been identified as having asbestos-related diseases. Seventy percent of those people never even stepped foot into the mine, proving that direct daily contact with asbestos (i.e. working in the mine) is not required in order to develop asbestos-related diseases.