Levy Konigsberg LLP partner Moshe Maimon has received the Best Lawyers “Lawyer of the Year” award for Mass Tort Litigation/Class Actions – Plaintiffs in New York City. This award will be featured in the 2020 edition of The Best Lawyers in America.
Moshe Maimon has been at the forefront of groundbreaking litigation in numerous high-profile tort cases – most notably cases against talc manufacturing giant Johnson & Johnson for claims that the company produced and marketed consumer baby powder products that contain asbestos. In 2018, Mr. Maimon won the first mesothelioma verdict against Johnson and Johnson in New Jersey Mr. Maimon represented Steve and Kendra Lanzo against Johnson & Johnson for claims that Mr. Lanzo was diagnosed with mesothelioma after exposure to asbestos in the manufacturer’s Baby Powder and Shower to Shower talc products. The jury’s awarded a total of $117 million, which included compensatory damages, along with $55 million in punitive damages against Johnson & Johnson and $25 million against Imerys Talc America upon finding that the defendants acted intentionally and with deliberate indifference to the rights of Mr. Lanzo.
Mr. Maimon also secured a major verdict against Johnson & Johnson in California on behalf of Terry Leavitt, who developed mesothelioma as a result of using Johnson & Johnson’s Baby Powder and Shower to Shower in the 1960s and 1970s. After finding that the talc products were defective and that the manufacturer failed to warn consumers about the health risks of its products, the jury awarded the plaintiff and her spouse $29.4 million in damages.
In another victory against J&J in New Jersey, Mr. Maimon represented plaintiffs with peritoneal mesothelioma. The Middlesex County, New Jersey jury awarded $37.3 million dollars in compensatory damages for exposing plaintiffs to asbestos through its talc products, including Johnson & Johnson’s Baby Powder and Shower to Shower. This case was the first consolidated trial for claims by plaintiffs who were diagnosed with mesothelioma caused by the asbestos in Johnson & Johnson products.
Mr. Maimon’s expertise in asbestos-contaminated talc cases tracks back to his victory in the nation’s first verdict in a talc asbestos cancer lawsuit in 2006 brought by the widow of a pottery artisan from New Jersey, who earlier died of mesothelioma. In this landmark case, the jury awarded more than $3.35 million dollars in compensatory damages against R.T. Vanderbilt Company who was found liable for the asbestos-contaminated industrial talc Peter Hirsch used in mixing pottery glazes.
Mr. Maimon also has a long history of representing victims of mesothelioma in asbestos cases occurring arising from industrial settings. In a groundbreaking verdict involving “take home asbestos exposure” in New Jersey, Mr. Maimon represented Bonnie Anderson and her spouse against Exxon Mobil for her peritoneal mesothelioma as a result of “take-home” exposure to asbestos fibers unknowingly brought home on the work clothes of her husband during the decades he worked at Exxon Bayway Refinery. A $7.5 million dollar verdict for pain and suffering and loss of consortium was later affirmed by the New Jersey Appellate Division.
In February 2019, Mr. Maimon received the Gerald B. O’Connor Award at the 2019 New Jersey Association for Justice Awards Dinner.
Best Lawyers recognition is based on a process consisting of nomination, peer review, analysis of feedback, eligibility check, and release of the results. This practice enables other lawyers in the same geographical region and practice specialty to recognize the skills of their colleagues. “Lawyer of the Year” recognition is awarded to individual lawyers who have received the highest overall peer feedback for a specific geographic region and practice area and is given to only one lawyer in each specialty and location.
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