Asbestos measure added to bill to reduce lawsuits

By Karen Brooks, Star-Telegram

Protection for companies that face asbestos lawsuits, such as Houston-based Halliburton, were added Tuesday to a major lawsuit-limitation bill rumbling its way through the Texas House.

The proposal, which one lawmaker called "a big gimme to the vice president of the United States," was part of a series of floor changes to House Bill 4, which make it difficult for Texans to file and win lawsuits against doctors and corporations.

"This takes care of Dick Cheney's problem," said state Rep. Steve Wolens, D-Dallas, whose law practice handles similar cases. "This would protect the liability of the purchaser to the detriment of an officer, a director, or a shareholder of the selling or merging company."

Wolens abstained from the votes on those proposals.

Halliburton - the industrial giant once led by Vice President Cheney - agreed in December to pay about $4 billion in cash and stocks to settle about 300,000 current and future asbestos claims. Most of those claims involve people who were exposed to asbestos while working at manufacturing plants or in places where asbestos was used.

Most claims were inherited four years ago when the company - an oilfield services, engineering and construction business - acquired Dresser Industries for $7.7 billion.

State Rep. Will Hartnett, a Dallas Republican who helped write the clause that added those protections, said "victims of asbestos won't lose a penny."

The proposal applies to current cases as well as those filed later, and "shifts liability to the other ... co-defendants who actually manufactured, distributed or had direct involvement with the asbestos," Hartnett said. It shields innocent companies that "merely entered into a merger agreement," he said.

Bill supporters said asbestos litigation has become "a hot-button issue" recently and a problem that needs to be fixed.

"It has been so abused that the U.S. Supreme Court has asked Congress to fix it twice," said Ken Hoagland, communications director for Texans for Lawsuit Reform. "You have companies that have never produced asbestos, but buy companies that have produced it, and they're being sued into bankruptcy."

Wolens answered that the companies had plenty of time to examine their potential purchases before buying the companies and agreeing to take on the liability.

Lawmakers will continue to take up the bill, which has more than 380 proposed amendments, today. Among issues they'll look at is a possible rate rollback for medical-malpractice insurance.

Weeks of bitter and partisan fighting over HB 4 entered Round Two of floor debate, as sponsors took a second shot at House passage. The bill was derailed last week by opponents who objected that it was crafted in a secret meeting of the House Civil Practices Committee, chaired by bill sponsor Joe Nixon. Their objection was sustained after more than 18 hours of debate. Nixon, R-Houston, hastily convened the committee the same day. The panel then voted again and sent the bill back to the floor.

On Tuesday, Democrats objected to House Speaker Tom Craddick's decision to allow debate on the bill to resume. Craddick ruled that the committee's second vote in a properly posted hearing was enough to overcome the problems associated with the earlier secret meeting.

A series of impassioned personal privilege speeches, rare on the House floor, extolled the virtues of open government and the importance of working together, and lambasted the way the bill had been handled by House leadership.

"Rules are OK when everybody follows them," said state Rep. Pete Gallego, D-Alpine. "Rules are OK when everybody plays by the same rules."

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