A $13 million wrongful death verdict against Hillshire Brands over asbestos exposure was recently upheld in the Court of Appeals for the State of California.

The lawsuit concerned 60-year-old decedent Mark L. who grew up in what is now considered a “ghost town”—Bettervaria, Calif., home of the Union Sugar Refining Company and housing for its workforce.

The Family’s Story

Although Mark succumbed to mesothelioma in 2015—a very specialized type of cancer directly linked to asbestos exposure—the legal claim actually began in 2014. It was changed to a survivor action, as indicated by the article, shortly after his death by his family.

According to the complaint, the town of Bettervaria was established in the last decade of the nineteenth century by the sugar refinery that was owned and operated by Hillshire Brands. Employee housing was also owned and maintained by them.

In a separate report by the Santa Maria Times, it was noted that the sugar plant used insulation that contained asbestos — exposing its workers. Mark was born in 1954 and spent at least the first ten years of his childhood there before moving to the nearby community of Santa Maria in the middle 1960s.

As indicated by the Times, testimony in the trial revealed that the sugar plant had a policy of shutting down twice a year for plant maintenance. During this time, employees allegedly removed asbestos from the boiler room and piping of the plant using hand-held tools. These tools would easily cause the asbestos fibers to become airborne—a very dangerous state because workers could then breathe inhale them and they could become lodged.

Reportedly, chunks of the insulation were ground up using electric grinders so that it could be repurposed as stucco. What remained was allegedly put in the town dump where countless children of workers played and allegedly experienced asbestos exposure there, including the deceased plaintiff.

After moving to Santa Maria, Mark reportedly continued to experience secondary exposure to asbestos. Hhis father worked at the plant, breathing in asbestos, well beyond the middle 1960s until 1993. His grandfather also worked at the plant as well.

The verdict upheld in recent appeal gave Mark’s family $11 million in non-financial damages and another $2 million in financial damages against Hillshire Brands. Hillshire is now known as Tyson Foods and was alleged to have not taken any precautions to protect workers or family members from asbestos, when the substance was clearly known as a serious human health danger, according to counsel for the survivors as quoted by Law360.

Punitive damages weren’t awarded in the first trial and this decision was upheld in appeal. Purportedly, there was difficulty showing evidence that Hillshire had full and complete knowledge of asbestos health dangers during the time period that Mark spent in Bettervaria.

The Asbestos Exposure Lawsuit is Case Number A152887 in the Court of Appeal of the State of California.