Maryland Mesothelioma Verdicts and Settlements

Baltimore City is one of the most active asbestos litigation venues in the country, anchored by decades of cases tied to Sparrows Point, Port of Baltimore shipyards, and Baltimore-based insulation contractors. The $1.56 billion Craft talc verdict returned on December 22, 2025, the largest single-plaintiff talc award on record at the time, sits at the top of a docket that also includes landmark appellate holdings on causation, damages caps, and the discovery rule.

Major Maryland Mesothelioma Verdicts

Craft v. Johnson & Johnson and Pecos River Talc (2025)

On December 22, 2025, a Baltimore City Circuit Court jury returned a $1.56 billion verdict for plaintiff Cherie A. Craft, age 54, diagnosed with peritoneal mesothelioma in January 2024. Case No. 24-X-000005, filed in the Baltimore City Asbestos Litigation docket, named Johnson & Johnson, its subsidiary Pecos River Talc LLC, and Kenvue Inc. (the J&J consumer products spinoff). J&J agreed before trial to indemnify Kenvue for all liability in the case.

Craft alleged decades of daily use of J&J talc-based baby powder and that J&J fraudulently misrepresented and concealed the product’s asbestos content. The jury agreed, finding fraudulent misrepresentation and concealment and awarding $59.84 million in compensatory damages, $1 billion in punitive damages against J&J, and $500 million in punitive damages against Pecos River Talc.

News reports announcing the verdict were published December 23, 2025; the jury return date was December 22. J&J called the verdict “egregious and patently unconstitutional” and announced an immediate appeal. As of June 2026, the appeal is pending and no post-trial reduction has been confirmed.

Wallace & Gale Asbestos Settlement Trust v. Busch (2017, affirmed 2019)

On February 16, 2017, a Baltimore City Circuit Court jury awarded William E. Busch, Jr., a retired steamfitter from Pasadena, Maryland, $14,568,528.33 after a trial before Judge Shannon Avery. Busch was diagnosed with mesothelioma in March 2016. His exposure ran from 1967 through 1976, when he worked as a steamfitter for Honeywell at Loch Raven High School and encountered asbestos-containing magnesia block insulation installed by Wallace & Gale in the school’s boiler room. He also alleged home renovation exposure during the same period.

The jury’s award broke down as follows: $10 million in noneconomic damages, $1.25 million in economic damages, $318,528.33 in past medical expenses, and $3 million for loss of consortium. Cross-claims against absent defendants reduced the entered judgment to approximately $7,284,264.17.

The Court of Special Appeals affirmed in 2018 (No. 1055, Sept. Term 2017). The Court of Appeals of Maryland affirmed on July 3, 2019 in Wallace & Gale Asbestos Settlement Trust v. Busch, No. 58, Sept. Term 2018, 464 Md. 474, 211 A.3d 1166, holding that sufficient circumstantial evidence supported the jury’s inference that Wallace & Gale installed asbestos-containing products in the boiler room even without direct product identification testimony.

Dixon v. Ford Motor Company (2010, reinstated 2013)

In April 2010, a Baltimore City jury returned a $15 million verdict in favor of the estate of Joan Dixon and her surviving family. Dixon was diagnosed with mesothelioma in March 2008 and died in February 2009 at age 68. Her exposure was entirely take-home: she washed the work clothes of her husband Bernard Dixon, which carried asbestos dust from Ford brake pads he worked on during the 1960s and 1970s.

The jury allocated $5 million to the estate, $4 million to Bernard Dixon, and $1.5 million each to four daughters. Maryland’s non-economic damages cap under Md. Code § 11-108(b)(3)(ii) reduced the entered judgment to $6,065,000, $5 million to the estate, approximately $426,000 to Bernard Dixon, and approximately $159,750 per daughter.

The Maryland Court of Special Appeals reversed the verdict in 2012 (Dixon v. Ford Motor Co., 206 Md. App. 180, 47 A.3d 1038), finding error in the admission of causation testimony. The Court of Appeals reversed COSA and reinstated the full verdict in 2013 (Dixon v. Ford Motor Co., 433 Md. 137), holding that the trial court did not abuse its discretion in admitting expert testimony from Dr. Laura Welch that every exposure to asbestos is a substantial contributing cause of mesothelioma, read alongside her testimony on the frequency, intensity, and proximity of the specific exposure at issue.

Copland, Ellison, and Alford v. General Electric (2007)

In 2007, a Baltimore Circuit Court jury awarded a combined $3,970,000 to the families of three Sparrows Point steelworkers who developed asbestos-related lung cancer (not mesothelioma) from asbestos-containing crane brake linings manufactured by General Electric. Individual awards were $1,205,000 to the Copland family, $760,000 to the Ellison family, and $1,960,000 to the Alford family. GE announced plans to appeal. The appellate disposition of this case is not confirmed in retrieved neutral primary sources.

Why Baltimore City

Baltimore City Circuit Court has functioned as one of the country’s primary asbestos litigation venues since the 1980s, when cases tied to Bethlehem Steel’s Sparrows Point plant and the Port of Baltimore’s shipyard complex began entering the docket in volume. The court operates a dedicated asbestos litigation track, Baltimore City Asbestos Litigation, that handles consolidated scheduling and discovery for thousands of filed cases. That institutional infrastructure draws plaintiffs with Maryland-connected exposures and keeps case timelines shorter than in many other jurisdictions.

The Sparrows Point complex, which operated as an integrated steel mill and shipyard from the late 19th century until its closure in 2012, used asbestos-containing insulation, refractories, pipe coverings, and equipment throughout its production facilities. Workers at the mill, as well as contractors who performed insulation and maintenance work there, account for a significant share of Maryland’s asbestos disease burden. Contractor defendants, including Wallace & Gale, ACandS, and others, ran alongside product defendants like Ford, General Electric, and Johnson & Johnson in Baltimore City’s consolidated docket.

Maryland’s Three-Year Clock and the Occupational-Disease Exception

Maryland imposes a three-year statute of limitations on asbestos personal injury claims under Md. Code, Cts. & Jud. Proc. § 5-101. For latent diseases like mesothelioma, the period runs from when the plaintiff knew or reasonably should have known of the disease and its causal connection to asbestos, not from the date of exposure. That discovery rule was established by the Court of Appeals in Harig v. Johns-Manville Products Corp., 284 Md. 70, 394 A.2d 299 (1978), and it remains the foundational authority for SOL accrual in Maryland asbestos cases.

Wrongful death actions carry the same three-year window, running from the date of the decedent’s death under Md. Code, Cts. & Jud. Proc. § 3-904. Maryland also provides an occupational disease exception for wrongful death claims: where the death arises from an occupational disease, the action must be filed within the earlier of ten years from death or three years from the claimant’s discovery of the cause. Mesothelioma, as a latent occupational disease, squarely implicates that exception. Families whose loved ones died from mesothelioma should not assume the standard three-year-from-death window applies without verifying which limitations period governs their specific facts.

Because mesothelioma has a latency period of 20 to 50 years, linking current disease to specific products and employers from decades ago requires extensive investigation. The earlier that investigation starts after diagnosis, the more options remain open.

How Baltimore Cases Actually Resolve

Most Maryland mesothelioma cases never reach a jury. Defendants with Maryland asbestos exposure, insulation contractors, equipment manufacturers, product companies, include many that have declared bankruptcy and established asbestos trust funds that pay claims without litigation. Plaintiffs with Maryland-connected exposures frequently file simultaneously in the Baltimore City Circuit Court against solvent defendants and in the trust fund system against bankrupt ones.

Settlement amounts in filed cases vary widely based on exposure evidence, the number of defendant products identified, the plaintiff’s diagnosis and prognosis, and the strength of medical causation evidence. No government or academic body publishes current average settlement figures for mesothelioma cases, and figures cited by plaintiff law firm marketing materials are not independently verifiable from primary sources.