Document 44dKORDjVxeE6z7VzkoJOgVv1

Case Deponent Date Volume Swetonic Matthew MATTHEW SWETONIC 3/22/12 1 Issue Code Key: AIA/NA Swetonic Page Lines Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 002:01 A P P E A R A N C E S: 02 THE LANIER LAW FIRM 03 Attorneys for Plaintiffs 2049 Century Park East, Suite 1940 04 Los Angeles, California 90067 BY: H.W. TREY JONES, ESQ. 05 BRAD BENAHU (via telephone) RABI DAVID (via telephone) 06 STEPHANIE TAYLOR (via telephone) (310) 277-5100 (Telephone) 07 (310) 277-5103 (Fax) 08 DAVIS & GILBERT, LLP 09 Attorneys for the Witness 1740 Broadway 10 New York, New York 10019 BY: BRUCE M. GINSBERG, ESQ. 11 (212) 468-4820 (Telephone) (212) 974-6920 (Fax) 12 bginsberg@dglaw.com 13 WILKINSON, GOELLER, MODESITT, WILKINSON 14 & DRUMMY, LLP Attorneys for Defendants Pneumo Abex, LLP 15 and Dana Companies 333 Ohio Street 16 Terre Haute, Indiana 47807 BY: RAYMOND H. MODESITT, ESQ. 17 (812) 232-4311 (Telephone) (812) 235-5107 (Fax) 18 rhmodesitt@wilkinsonlaw.com Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 002 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 001:01 SUPERIOR COURT OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA FOR THE COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES 0 2 ------------------------------------------------- X 03 FREDRICK C. KENNEY and CCWC Case No. JCCP4674 04 SHERRELL VANHOOSER, LASC Case No. BC468065 05 06 Plaintiffs, 07 -vs- 08 ALFA LAVAL, INC., (sued 09 individually and as successor-in-interest to 10 SHARPLES CORPORATION), et al., 11 Defendants. 1 2 ----------------------------------------------- X 13 14 15 16 VIDEOTAPED DEPOSITION of MATTHEW SWETONIC, 17 taken pursuant to Notice, held at the law offices of 18 DAVIS & GILBERT, LLP, 1740 Broadway, New York, New 19 York, 10019, on Friday, March 23, 2012, at 20 10:30 a.m. before JEANNETTE MCCORMICK, a Certified 21 Shorthand Reporter, License No. XI00920, and a 22 Notary Public. 23 24 25 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 001 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 19 HAWKINS, PARNELL, THACKSTON & YOUNG, LLP 20 Attorneys for Defendant John Crane Company 4514 Cole Avenue, Suite 500 21 Dallas, Texas 75205-5412 BY: EDWARD M. SLAUGHTER, ESQ. 22 (214) 780-5103 (Telephone) eslaughter@hptylaw.com 23 24 25 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 002 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 003:01 A P P E A R A N C E S: (CONTINUED) 02 BRYDON, HUGO & PARKER 03 Attorneys for Defendant Toyota Motor Sales 135 Main Street, 20th Floor 04 San Francisco, California 94105 BY: JAMES C. PARKER, ESQ. 05 (415) 808-0300 (Telephone) (415) 808-0333 (Fax) 06 jparker@bhplaw.com 07 K & L GATES, LLP 08 Attorneys for Defendant Crane Co. 599 Lexington Avenue 09 New York, New York 10022-6030 BY: NICOLE M. KOZIN, ESQ. 10 (212) 536-3900 (Telephone) (212) 536-3901 (Fax) 11 nicole.kozin@klgates.com 12 LOW, BALL & LYNCH 13 (VIA TELEPHONE) Attorneys for Defendant Armstrong 14 International 505 Montgomery Street, 7th Floor 15 San Francisco, California 94111 BY: JAMES REGAN, ESQ. 16 (415) 981-6630 (Telephone) (415) 982-1634 (Fax) 17 jregan@lowball.com 18 HAIGHT, BROWN & BONESTEEL, LLP 19 (VIA TELEPHONE) Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 003 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 004:01 A P P E A R A N C E S: (CONTINUED) 02 PALMIERI TYLER, LLP 03 (VIA TELEPHONE) Attorneys for Defendant Cla-Val Co. 04 2603 Main Street, East Tower, Suite 1300 Irvine, California 92614 05 BY: ERICA M. SOROSKY, ESQ. (949) 851-9400 (Telephone) 06 (949) 825-5438 (Fax) esorosky@ptwww.com 07 08 BAKER, KEENER & NAHRA (VIA TELEPHONE) 09 Attorneys for Defendant York International Corp. 10 633 W. 5th Street, Suite 5400 Los Angeles, California 90071 11 BY: MICHAEL H. BAILEY, ESQ. (213) 241-0900 (Telephone) 12 (213) 241-0990 (Fax) mbailey@bknlawyers.com 13 14 TUCKER ELLIS, LLP (VIA TELEPHONE) 15 Attorneys for Defendant Jerguson Gauge & Valve Co. 16 515 S. Flower Street, 42nd Floor Los Angeles, California 90071-2223 17 BY: ANTHONY D. BROSAMLE, ESQ. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 004 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 Attorneys for Defendant Flowserve US, Inc 20 555 South Flower Street, 45th Floor Los Angeles, California 90071 21 BY: JENNIFER SAUNDERS, ESQ. (213) 542-8000 (Telephone) 22 (213) 542-8100 (Fax) jsaunders@hbblaw.com 23 24 25 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 (213) 430-3311 (Telephone) 18 (213) 430-3409 (Fax) anthony.brosamle@tuckerellis.com 19 20 HOWARD, ROME, MARTIN & RIDLEY (VIA TELEPHONE) 21 Attorneys for Defendant IMO Industries Inc 1775 Woodside Road, Suite 200 22 Redwood City, California 94061 BY: TRINA CLAYTON, ESQ. 23 (650) 356-7715 (Telephone) tclayton@hrmrlaw.com 24 25 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 003 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 004 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 005:01 A P P E A R A N C E S: (CONTINUED) 02 PERKINS COIE 03 (VIA TELEPHONE) Attorneys for Defendant Honeywell 04 Four Embarcadero Center, Suite 2400 San Francisco, California 94111-4131 05 BY: HANK HOLMBERG, ESQ. (415) 344-7000 (Telephone) 06 (415) 344-7050 (Fax) hholmberg@perkinscoie.com 07 08 GORDON & REES (VIA TELEPHONE) 09 Attorneys for Defendant Hennessy Industries 2211 Michelson Drive, Suite 400 10 Irvine, California 92612 BY: KEVIN E. WHELAN, ESQ. 11 (949) 255-6950 (Telephone) (949) 474-2060 (Fax) 12 kwhelan@gordonrees.com 13 GORDON-CREED, KELLEY, HOLL & SUGARMAN, LLP 14 (VIA TELEPHONE) Attorneys for Defendants Beck/Arnley 15 Worldparts, Inc. and Uni-Select, Inc. 222 Kearny Street, Suite 650 16 San Francisco, California 94108 BY: JEANETTE E. HAGGAS, ESQ. 17 (415) 421-3100 x107 (Telephone) (415) 421-3150 (Fax) Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 005 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 006:01 A P P E A R A N C E S: (CONTINUED) 02 BOOTH, MITCHEL & STRANGE, LLP 03 (VIA TELEPHONE) Attorneys for Defendant BorgWarner Morse 04 TEC, Inc. as successor by merger to Borg-Warner Corporation 05 707 Wilshire Boulevard, Suite 4450 Los Angeles, California 90017 06 BY: ALLEGRA PEREZ, ESQ. (213) 738-0100 (Telephone) 07 (213) 380-3308 (Fax) aperez@boothmitchel.com 08 09 VORYS, SATER, SEYMOUR and PEASE, LLP (VIA TELEPHONE) 10 Attorneys for Defendant The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company 11 52 East Gay Street P.O. Box 1008 12 Columbus, Ohio 43216-1008 BY: NINA I. WEBB-LAWTON, ESQ. 13 (614) 464-8389 (Telephone) (614) 719-5082 (Fax) 14 niwebb@vorys.com 15 JACKSON, JENKINS & RENSTROM, LLP 16 (VIA TELEPHONE) Attorneys for Defendant Dap, Inc. 17 55 Francisco Street, 6th Floor San Francisco, California 94133 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 006 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 18 haggas@gkhs.com 19 BECHERER, KANNETT & SCHWEITZER 20 (VIA TELEPHONE) Attorneys for Defendant CSK Auto, Inc. 21 1255 Powell Street Emeryville, California 94608 22 BY: LYSLE J. KAPP, ESQ. (510) 658-3600 (Telephone) 23 (510) 658-1151 (Fax) lkapp@bkscal.com 24 25 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 18 BY: DANIEL O 'SHEA, ESQ. (415) 982-3600 (Telephone) 19 (415) 982-3700 (Fax) d o 'shea@jjr-law.com 20 21 WILSON, ELSER, MOSKOWITZ, EDELMAN & DICKER, LLP (VIA TELEPHONE) 22 Attorneys for Defendant Gardner Denver Inc. 555 S. Flower Street, Suite 2900 23 Los Angeles, California 90071-2407 BY: ASHLEY L. TATE, ESQ. 24 JANA SCALZITTI, ESQ. (213) 443-5100 (Telephone) 25 (213) 443-5101 (Fax) ashley.tate@wilsonelser.com Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 005 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 006 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 007:01 A P P E A R A N C E S: (CONTINUED) 02 BASSI, EDLIN, HUIE & BLUM 03 (VIA TELEPHONE) Attorneys for Defendant J.T. Thorpe 04 & Son, Inc. 500 Washington Street, Suite 700 05 San Francisco, California 94111 BY: RANDIE LINTZ, ESQ. 06 (415) 397-9006 (Telephone) (415) 397-1339 (Fax) 07 lintzlaw@aol.com 08 SELMAN BREITMAN, LLP 09 (VIA TELEPHONE) Attorneys for Defendant Aurora Pump Company 10 11766 Wilshire Boulevard, Suite 600 Los Angeles, California 90025 11 BY: ROD J. CAPPY, ESQ. (310) 689-7085 (Telephone) 12 (310) 473-2525 (Fax) rcappy@selmanbreitman.com 13 14 FOLEY & MANSFIELD, PLLP (VIA TELEPHONE) 15 Attorneys for Defendant William Powell Co. 300 Lakeside Drive, Suite 1900 16 Oakland, California 94612 BY: KRISTI L.K. OKUMOTO, ESQ. 17 (510) 590-9537 (Telephone) (510) 590-9595 (Fax) Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 007 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 008:01 A P P E A R A N C E S: (CONTINUED) 02 POND NORTH, LLP 03 (VIA TELEPHONE) Attorneys for Defendant Genuine Parts 04 Company 350 S. Grand Avenue, Suite 3300 05 Los Angeles, California 90071 BY: TIMOTHY C. PIEPER, ESQ. 06 (213) 617-6170 (Telephone) tpieper@pondnorth.com 07 08 WOOD, SMITH, HENNING & BERMAN, LLP (VIA TELEPHONE) 09 Attorneys for Defendant Performance Industries, Inc. 10 5000 Birch Street, Suite 8500 Newport Beach, California 92660 11 BY: GRAEME R. FREEMAN, ESQ. (949) 757-4515 (Telephone) 12 (949) 757-4550 (Fax) gfreeman@wshblaw.com 13 14 McKENNA, LONG & ALDRIDGE, LLP (VIA TELEPHONE) 15 Attorneys for Defendant Lennox Industries, Inc. 16 101 California Street, 41st Floor San Francisco, California 94111 17 BY: ANDREA J. CASALETT, ESQ. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 008 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 18 kokumoto@foleymansfield.com 19 ROGAN LEHRMAN, LLP 20 (VIA TELEPHONE) Attorneys for Defendant Jaguar Land Rover 21 and Jaguar Land Rover North America 12121 Wilshire Boulevard, Suite 1300 22 Los Angeles, California 90025 BY: ANDREA K. LENHARDT, ESQ. 23 (310) 917-4500 (Telephone) alenhardt@roganlehrman.com 24 25 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 (415) 267-4094 (Telephone) 18 (415) 267-4198 (Fax) acasalett@mckennalong.com 19 20 PRINDLE, AMARO, GOETZ, HILLYARD, BARNES & REINHOLTZ 21 (VIA TELEPHONE) Attorneys for Defendant Edelbrock, LLC and 22 Alfa Laval, Inc. 310 Golden Shore Parkway, 4th Floor 23 Long Beach, California 90802 BY: ARPI GALFAYAN, ESQ. 24 (562) 436-3946 (Telephone) (562) 495-0564 (Fax) 25 agalfayan@prindlelaw.com Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 007 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 008 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 009:01 A P P E A R A N C E S: (CONTINUED) 02 GORDON & REES, LLP 03 (VIA TELEPHONE) Attorneys for Defendants Warren Pumps 04 and Goulds Pumps 275 Battery Street, Suite 2000 05 San Francisco, California 94111 BY: JAMES G. SCADDEN, ESQ. 06 (415) 875-4118 (Telephone) (415) 986-8054 (Fax) 07 jscadden@gordonrees.com 08 BOWMAN AND BROOKE, LLP 09 (VIA TELEPHONE) Attorneys for Defendant Nissan North 10 America, Inc. 879 W. 190th Street, Suite 700 11 Gardena, California 90248-4227 BY: JOHN A. EBERLEIN, ESQ. 12 (310) 380-6559 (Telephone) (310) 719-1019 (Fax) 13 john.eberlein@bowmanandbrooke.com 14 YUKEVICH, CALFO & CAVANAUGH 15 (VIA TELEPHONE) Attorneys for Defendant Ford Motor Company 16 355 S. Grand Avenue, 15th Floor Los Angeles, California 90071 17 BY: EDWARD MARTINOVICH, ESQ. (213) 362-7777 ext. 274 (Telephone) 18 (213) 362-7788 (Fax) Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 009 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 010:01 A P P E A R A N C E S: (CONTINUED) 02 ADAMS, NYE, BECHT, LLP (VIA TELEPHONE) 03 Attorneys for Defendant 222 Kearny Street, 7th Floor 04 San Francisco, California 94108-4521 BY: MICHAEL SACHS, ESQ. 05 (415) 982-8955 (Telephone) (415) 982-2042 (Fax) 06 07 08 09 10 Also Present: 11 Tara Norris (The Lanier Law Firm) 12 Thomas Delvecchio (Videographer) 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 010 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 emartinovich@yukelaw.com 19 20 LEWIS, BRISBOIS, BISGAARD & SMITH, LLP (VIA TELEPHONE) 21 Attorneys for Defendant 221 N. Figueroa Street, Suite 1200 22 Los Angeles, California 90012-2601 BY: AREZOU KHONSARI, ESQ. 23 (213) 250-1800 (Telephone) (213) 250-7900 (Fax) 24 khonsari@lbbslaw.com 25 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 009 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 011:01 IN D EX 02 WITNESS EXAMINATION BY PAGE 03 MATTHEW M. SWETONIC 04 05 MR. JONES 19, 216 06 MR. MODESITT 165 07 MR. PARKER 201 08 MR. SLAUGHTER 215 09 MR. EBERLEIN 217, 219 10 MR. MARTINOVICH 218 11 12 E X H I B I T S 13 14 NUMBER DESCRIPTION PAGE 15 1 Substances Listed in the Twelfth Report on Carcinogens 25 16 11/21/69 Minutes of Health & 17 Safety Council/ACPA Annual Meeting, Bates Nos. 18 CRMC-Swetonic-001229 -36 37 19 3 10/16/70 Report of Meeting, Bates Nos. 20 CRMC-Swetonic-000639 - 40 50 21 4 4/3/74 Letter/Enclosure from Mereness to Fenner, Bates Nos. 22 CRMC-Swetonic-000901 - 15 61 23 5 5/31/66 Background Facts on the Environmental Health Aspects of 24 Asbestos, Bates Nos. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 011 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 CRMC-Swetoic-002726 - 29 25 69 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 23 to AIA/NA, Bates Nos. CRMC-Swetonic-000958 - 60 119 24 25 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 011 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 012 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 012:01 02 03 04 05 06 NUMBER 07 08 09 7 10 11 8 12 13 9 14 15 10 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad IN D EX (CONTINUED) EX H IB IT S DESCRIPTION 4/73 Asbestos & Health Info File, Bates Nos. T106933048 12/6/73 AIA/NA Board of Directors Meeting, Bates Nos. CRMC-Swetonic-002234 - 41 6/12/72 Letter from Swetonic to AIA/NA Member Companies (4 pages) 9/19/72 Letter from Swetonic to AIA/NA, Bates Nos. CRMC-Swetonic-001438 - 39 "Death of the Asbestos Industry" by Swetonic 5/4/71 Letter from Swetonic, to AIA/NA, Bates Nos. CRMC-Swetonic-001387 - 93 6/18/71 Letter from Swetonic to AIA/NA, Bates Nos. CRMC-Swetonic-001347 - 53 6/21/71 Re: Asbestos in Wom e n 's Coats - Test Results, Bates Nos. CRMC-Swetonic-001384 - 85 4/11/72 Letter from Swetonic 11/25/14 PAGE 85 89 93 99 104 107 111 114 Page 012 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 013:01 02 03 04 05 06 NUMBER 07 08 09 10 16 11 12 17 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 20 21 21 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad IN D EX (CONTINUED) EX H IB IT S DESCRIPTION 10/15/68 Reorganization, Environmental Health Task Force, Bates Nos. CRMC-Swetonic-002037 - 39 4/10/73 Letter from Swetonic to AIA/NA, Bates Nos. CRMC-Swetonic-002574 - 76 8/17/70 from Swetonic, Re: Update on Philadelphia Spray Situation, Bates Nos. CRMC-Swetonic-002136 - 38 3/5/71 Notes on Boston Hearings, Bates Nos. CRMC-Swetonic-000456 - 63 Current Status Asbestos Spray Situation as of May 18, 1971 Bates Nos. CRMC-Swetonic-002930 - 33 5/10/73 AIA/NA Minutes of Board of Directors Meeting, Bates Nos. CRMC-Swetonic-002221 - 27 Official Report of Proceedings before the US Dept. of Labor, 11/25/14 PAGE 125 127 131 133 133 136 Page 013 of 224 22 23 24 22 25 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 Matter of Standard For Exposure to Asbestos Dust, Proposed Rule Making, Public Hearing 141 6/7/73 "Why Asbestos?" Presentation before the Asbestos Textile Institute by Swetonic 156 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 23 24 25 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 013 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 014 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 014:01 02 03 04 05 06 NUMBER 07 23 08 09 10 11 12 25 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad IN D EX (CONTINUED) EX H IB IT S DESCRIPTION OSHA Regulations of Asbestos (2 pages) Excerpt of Official Report of Proceedings before the US Dept. of Labor, Matter of Standard For Exposure to Asbestos Dust, Proposed Rule Making, Public Hearing (Pages 178 - 192) 1/18/68 President's Bulletin, Statement on Asbestos and Human Health, Bates Nos. CRMC-SpecElec-000001 - 06 10/29/71 Executive Bulletin, Asbestos and Health, Bates Nos. CRMC-SpecElec-000007 - 09 10/24/72 Letter/Enclosure from Swetonic to AIA/NA, Proposed Employee Safety & Health Guide 11/25/14 PAGE 158 198 203 203 203 Page 014 of 224 015:01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 THE VIDEOGRAPHER: Good morning. We are now going on the video record. Today is Friday, March 23rd, 2012. The time is approximately 11:12 a.m. The location is the office of Davis & Gilbert, 1740 Broadway, New York, New York. My name is Thomas Delvecchio. I am the legal video specialist representing Henjum Goucher Litigation Services. The case numbers are CCWC, case number, JCCP4674 and case number BC468065 in the matter of Fredrick C. Kenney, et al, plaintiffs, versus Alfa Laval, Inc., et al, defendants. The deponent today is Mr. Matthew Swetonic. The video deposition is requested by plaintiff's counsel, The Lanier Law Firm. Now, will counsel please identify themselves for the record. MR. JONES: This is Trey Jones, counsel for the plaintiffs. And I 'm here with Tara Norris from my office. MR. SLAUGHTER: Ed Slaughter of Hawkins, Parnell, Thackston & Young. I 'm here for John Crane Company. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 015 of 224 016:01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 MS. KOZIN: Nicole Kozin, K & L Gates. I 'm here for Crane Co. MR. PARKER: Good morning, sir. My name is James Parker. I 'm here for Toyota Motor Sales, Inc. MR. MODESITT: My name is Ray Modesitt. I 'm here for Dana Companies and for Pneumo Abex, LLC. MR. GINSBERG: Bruce Ginsberg, Davis & Gilbert. I represent the witness, Mr. Swetonic. MR. SWETONIC: And I am Matthew Swetonic. THE VIDEOGRAPHER: On the telephone? MR. LINTZ: Good morning. Hi. This Randie Lintz from Bassi, Edlin, Huie & Blum for J.T. Thorpe & Sons. MR. REGAN: Good morning. James Regan of Low, Ball & Lynch for Armstrong International. MR. MARTINOVICH: Edward Martinovich for Ford Motor Company. MR. HOLMBERG: Good morning. Hank Holmberg for Honeywell. MR. BAILEY: Mike Bailey for York 018:01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 Jaguar and Land Rover and Jaguar Land Rover North America. MS. HAGGAS: Jeanette Haggas for Beck/Arnley Worldparts, Incorporated and Uni-Select Incorporated. MR. FREEMAN: Good morning. Graeme Freeman for Performance Industries, Inc. MS. OKUMOTO: Kristi Okumoto for the William Powell Company. MS. WEBB-LAWTON: Nina Webb-Lawton for Goodyear -- MR. BROSAMLE: Good morning. Anthony Brosamle for Jerguson Gauge & Valve Company. MS. WEBB-LAWTON: Nina Webb-Lawton from the Vorys, Sater, Seymour and Pease firm for the Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company. MR. PIEPER: Good morning. Tim Pieper of Pond North for Genuine Parts Company. MS. PHILLIPS: This is Meghan Lynn Phillips for Yarway Corporation. THE VIDEOGRAPHER: Thank you. Now will the court reporter please swear in the witness. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 016 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 018 of 224 017:01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 International. MS. CLAYTON: This is Trina Clayton for IMO Industries. MS. SAUNDERS: Jennifer Saunders for Flowserve US. MS. PEREZ: Allegra Perez for Borg-Warner. MR. KAPP: Good morning. This is Lysle Kapp for CSK Auto, Inc. MS. SOROSKY: Good morning. This is Erica Sorosky for Cla-Val Company. MS. KHONSARI: Good morning. This is Arezou Khonsari for American Honda Motors, Inc. MS. GALFAYAN: Good morning. This is Arpi Galfayan for Edelbrock, LLC and Alfa Laval, Inc. MR. SCADDEN: Jim Scadden for Warren Pumps. MR. EBERLEIN: Good morning. John Eberlein from Bowman and Brooke for Nissan North America, Inc. MR. CAPPY: Rod Cappy of Selman Breitman for Aurora Pump Company. MS. LENHARDT: Andrea Lenhardt for SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 019:01 MATTHEW M. SWETONIC, 02 having been first duly sworn 03 testified as follows: 04 05 EXAMINATION 06 BY MR. JONES: 07 Q. Good morning. 08 A. Good morning. 09 Q. Can you please introduce yourself to the 10 jury? 11 A. Hi. I am Matthew M. Swetonic. I was 12 formerly Executive Secretary of the Asbestos 13 Information Association of North America. And 14 before that I worked for Johns-Manville. 15 MR. PARKER: Excuse me, Mr. Jones, 16 before we get started, can we have a 17 stipulation that an objection by one defense 18 counsel will be an objection by all absent 19 someone opting out? 20 MR. JONES: Yes. And that includes 21 motions to strike. And counsel need not opt 22 out of a motion or an objection. Should they 23 choose to do so, they can make that election 24 at trial. 25 MR. PARKER: Very good. Thank you. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 017 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 019 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 020:01 MR. JONES: And thank you for doing 02 that. I 'm sorry I forgot. 03 MR. GINSBERG: Can I ask you a question? 04 Being I 'm a New Yorker, I 'm assuming that all 05 objections other than as to form are reserved 06 until the trial? 07 MR. JONES: Yes. This deposition is 08 being taken pursuant to the California Rules 09 of Civil Procedure, and trial objections are 10 reserved. 11 THE WITNESS: What else would you like 12 to know? 13 Q. What do you do for a living today? 14 A. I am retired. 15 Q. Would it be fair to say that throughout your 16 career you've specialized in helping companies who 17 sell dangerous products stay in business? 18 MR. GINSBERG: Objection to the form. 19 If we're going to start this deposition with 20 that kind of attitude, Mr. Jones, I think 21 we're going to be having problems. 22 THE WITNESS: I would say that what we 23 did was we would be retained by companies 24 that were having problems with health or 25 environmental issues that could be helped by SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 022:01 Q. But several of your big projects have 02 involved products where there were at least 03 allegations that the product or an ingredient in the 04 product hurt people, right? 05 A. T h a t 's correct. 06 Q. That's true? 07 A. That is correct. 08 Q. Okay. In business jargon what you've done 09 for a living has been called crisis management; is 10 that true? 11 A. That is correct. 12 Q. The clients in your career have typically 13 been corporations; is that true? 14 A. Corporations and occasionally a trade 15 association. 16 Q. And a trade association is a group of 17 corporations within the same industry? 18 A. A perfect example of that would be the work 19 that we did on behalf of the people who manufactured 20 vinyl chloride and PVC end products. And the client 21 in that case was the Society of the Plastics 22 Industry, which was an umbrella group representing, 23 oh I d o n 't know how many, 15 or 20 manufacturers' 24 products. 25 Q. And all 15 or 20 of them had the same health Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 020 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 022 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 021:01 better communications with the public, 02 government agencies, whatever, through the 03 media, as to the true nature of what those 04 difficulties or those problems were. 05 Q. Those health and environmental problems were 06 typically reports that the product your clients sold 07 hurt or killed people, right? 08 MR. GINSBERG: Objection to the form. 09 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Objection. 10 Argumentative. Can we move the microphone a 11 little closer to the witness. I can hear 12 Trey quite well, but I 'm having difficulty 13 hearing the witness. 14 MR. GINSBERG: I also object to the 15 vagueness. You have asked for a situation 16 that you've described as typical. 17 MR. JONES: I'm only two questions in. 18 (Discussion off the record about the 19 microphones for the telephone participants.) 20 THE WITNESS: No. Some clients would 21 come to us with simple questions. If they 22 were accused of perhaps too much noise coming 23 out of a plant was bothering neighbors, water 24 pollution, not accused of actually killing 25 anybody. I t 's a wide variety of things. SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 023:01 or environmental problem, right? 02 A. Well, they had the same issue, not 03 necessarily the same problem. In that particular 04 case, there turned out to be very few cases of -- it 05 was a rare form of liver cancer that actually showed 06 up. And some companies never saw any cases at all. 07 Q. You have held the title of Senior Vice 08 President and Director of Environmental Operations 09 in your career, true? 10 A. Yes, I believe that was the title at E. Bruce 11 Harrison. 12 Q. You have also held the title of Senior Vice 13 President and Director of the Division of 14 Scientific, Technical and Environmental Affairs? 15 A. That was at Hill & Knowlton. 16 Q. Your clients have included the makers of 17 Agent Orange? 18 A. That is correct. One manufacturer, Dow 19 Chemical. 20 Q. Dow Chemical manufactured Agent Orange and 21 they were your client, right? 22 A. That is correct. 23 Q. And Agent Orange included a dioxin; is that 24 true? 25 A. I t 's a contaminant, yes. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 021 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 023 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 024:01 Q. And dioxin is a carcinogen, true? 02 A. Not that I know of. 03 Q. Give me one second. You are familiar, I'm 04 assuming, from your long career in environmental and 05 health issues with the National Toxicology Program, 06 Department of Health & Human Services report on 07 carcinogens, are you not? 08 A. It depends on what year it might be. 09 Q. I have the Twelfth Report on Carcinogens, 10 which is 2011. 11 A. No. I 've never seen that. 12 Q. Are you familiar with the report generally? 13 A. Not really. 14 Q. You've never -- you -- the reason you 15 consulted with Dow Chemical was because of 16 allegations that dioxin and Agent Orange was a 17 carcinogen, true? 18 A. No. 19 MR. GINSBERG: Objection. Mr. Jones, 20 Mr. Swetonic is here today in connection with 21 an asbestos case, not a dioxin case. And, 22 frankly, w e 're just not going to present him 23 for testimony on issues that d o n 't relate to 24 asbestos or d o n 't relate to this case. 25 Moreover, h e 's not a party, and h e 's not SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 026:01 7, 8 Tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin. 02 Q. You know it? 03 A. Of course I know it. W e 're back to Agent 04 Orange again. 05 MR. GINSBERG: You can show the exhibit 06 but, Mr. Jones, I am going to instruct him 07 not to answer. 08 MR. JONES: Okay. 09 MR. GINSBERG: I t 's got nothing to do 10 with asbestos as I 'm aware of. 11 MR. JONES: And I 'll just inform you 12 that under the California Rules of Civil 13 Procedure, which is the rule of the 14 deposition, that is not a proper objection to 15 a question. And i t 's not a proper 16 instruction to have the witness not answer. 17 MR. GINSBERG: And I will instruct you 18 that if you want to pursue that you can go to 19 the court in Westchester County where you 20 filed the subpoena because Mr. Swetonic is 21 not subject to the jurisdiction of the 22 California court. 23 MR. JONES: I can do that. We have a 24 New York office. 25 MR. GINSBERG: We will be waiting. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 024 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 026 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 025:01 working for any party in this case. So I ask 02 that you keep your questions in line with 03 what w h a t 's relevant to this lawsuit. 04 MR. JONES: Thank you. 05 Q. I am going to show you what I have marked as 06 Exhibit 1 to the deposition. 07 (Whereupon, Plaintiff's Deposition 08 Exhibit No. 1 was marked for 09 Identification.) 10 MR. GINSBERG: You can show it to me 11 first, please. 12 MR. JONES: Oh, of course. 13 MR. GINSBERG: And do you have a copy 14 for me? 15 MR. JONES: I don't. 16 MR. GINSBERG: Are you going to be 17 showing copies to the other lawyers in the 18 room? 19 MR. JONES: It's a two-page document 20 entitled, "Substances Listed in the Twelfth 21 Report of Carcinogens." 22 MR. GINSBERG: Would anyone like to see 23 it first? 24 MR. JONES: And it's a list of 25 carcinogens. I'm going to ask him about 2, 3 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 027:01 MR. JONES: We are worldwide. 02 Q. Now, I 'm going to hand this back to you. Are 03 you familiar with -- in general, are you familiar 04 with the -- I 'm going to try that again. 05 In general, are you familiar with the 06 National Toxicology Program of the Department of 07 Health & Human Services List of Carcinogens? 08 A. I d o n 't believe I 've ever actually looked at 09 it. 10 Q. Okay. Have you ever heard of it? 11 A. No. 12 Q. Okay. Would it surprise you that the dioxin 13 found in Agent Orange is listed as a carcinogen? 14 MR. MODESITT: I'm going to object as 15 relevance. I'm also going to object to the 16 foundation. The witness is not an expert 17 witness for any party in this litigation. 18 MR. GINSBERG: And I'm instructing the 19 witness not to answer. 20 BY MR. JONES: 21 Q. You've worked for lead paint companies? 22 A. Yes. 23 Q. You've worked for cigarette companies? 24 A. Yes. 25 Q. You've worked -- well, we know cigarettes Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 025 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 027 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 028:01 cause cancer, don't we? 02 MR. GINSBERG: Objection. 03 THE WITNESS: I think w e 're all agreed 04 that cigarettes are a significant risk factor 05 for lung cancer, yes. 06 Q. Vinyl chloride, you mentioned before you've 07 done work for vinyl chloride companies? 08 A. Well, as I said, we worked for the trade 09 association. 10 Q. And we know that vinyl chloride causes 11 cancer? 12 A. It causes -- yeah -- in heavily exposed 13 workers, yes. Small numbers of people. 14 Q. And you got your start working for asbestos 15 companies; is that true? 16 A. Correct. 17 Q. And we know that asbestos is a carcinogen, 18 true? 19 A. T h a t 's correct. 20 Q. In your career, when you're successful in 21 your representation of your clients, they can keep 22 selling these different products, true? 23 MR. PARKER: Objection to the form. 24 Vague and ambiguous. Overbroad as phrased. 25 THE WITNESS: Well, they can continue to SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 030:01 specific as to who that is. 02 Q. Asbestos, when you're working for the 03 asbestos trade association, you're trying to tell 04 the asbestos health story in a light most favorable 05 to the asbestos companies, true? 06 MR. MODESITT: Objection. Until we know 07 which asbestos companies you are referring to 08 in the trade association at the time Mr. 09 Swetonic was there. 10 MR. JONES: That's a relevance 11 objection. Those were reserved. And I would 12 appreciate it if you'd just hold onto those 13 and wait until trial. Other than that -- 14 MR. MODESITT: Whether you appreciate it 15 or not, I am going to make it. 16 MR. JONES: Well, that's a speaking 17 objection, and those are also not proper. 18 So, under California law, which is the law of 19 the deposition, this is a California case, if 20 I had to call a judge, I would call a 21 California judge, the law is you can't do 22 speaking objections. 23 MR. MODESITT: What do you think you 24 just did? 25 MR. JONES: W e 're just talking. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 028 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 030 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 029:01 sell them only if they are demonstrated to be 02 safe in the way they're being used or in the 03 amount that people are exposed to, yes. 04 Q. And your job is to help these companies 05 demonstrate that their products are safe, true? 06 A. Well, our job -- remember -- d o n 't forget, we 07 are public relations firm, we were, and our job in 08 these sorts of circumstances is to try and get 09 accurate scientific information out on these issues 10 to the public through the media, through government 11 agencies, again, and to assist in their positioning 12 them as to what the truth of the particular science 13 was given any particular issue. 14 Q. But you weren't working for the Red Cross, 15 were you? 16 A. Actually, we had worked for the Red Cross at 17 one time or another. I did not personally myself. 18 Q. Okay. You haven't? 19 A. T h a t 's right. 20 Q. Okay. When you're working on behalf of one 21 of these companies that sells a suspected 22 carcinogen, you're trying to tell their story, true? 23 MR. MODESITT: Objection. I don't know 24 who their is and I don't know who -- 25 A. Yeah, I think you need to be a little more SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 031:01 MR. MODESITT: That's what we did. 02 MR. JONES: I am meeting and conferring 03 about your procedures in this deposition. 04 That's what I 'm doing. 05 THE WITNESS: Can you repeat the 06 question again since we went through all 07 that? 08 Q. Certainly. When you are representing a 09 company or a trade association -- 10 A. Well, you were specific about asbestos, but I 11 d i d n 't quite -- 12 Q. When you're doing crisis management, you 13 represent a client, true? 14 A. Yes. But you were talking about asbestos. 15 Q. I asked a different question. 16 MR. GINSBERG: Mr. Swetonic, just listen 17 to the question and answer the question, 18 please. 19 THE WITNESS: Fine. 20 Q. When you represent a company or a trade 21 association, that's who you work for, right? 22 A. That is correct. 23 Q. You're hired to tell their story, right? 24 A. Well, w e 're hired to help them tell their 25 story. We d o n 't normally tell their story for them. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 029 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 031 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 032:01 Q. Well - 02 A. In other words, I d o n 't go out or somebody 03 who would work for Hill & Knowlton does not go out 04 and represent the company to the media in terms of 05 trying to explain a health situation to them. 06 Instead, we help the company formulate their ability 07 to explain what they know about the science of a 08 particular situation in a fashion that makes it 09 understandable to the general public and to the 10 media. 11 Q. And favorable to that company's position? 12 A. And, yes, assuming that what they've got to 13 say is correct. 14 Q. I mean, when you're trying to put forth the 15 company's story, you try to find the things that 16 help the company, right? 17 A. We try to find what the truth is. If you 18 look at any of my writings, you will see that I say 19 that sound science should be the basis for public 20 policy. And that's what we try to do is to help 21 public policy people arrive at proper decisions by 22 making sure that they are aware of the sound science 23 regarding an issue. Invariably, many of the 24 products that I have represented do have health 25 risks. Nobody is denying that. I t 's a question of SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 034:01 A. Well, most people d o n 't buy asbestos 02 products. You know, you d o n 't go out and you buy 03 packing for your -- or gaskets and things like that. 04 Mostly i t 's an end product is what they -- I can 05 only think of basically floor tile that somebody, a 06 consumer, might actually go out and buy. I suppose 07 there are some others, but none of which, you 08 know -- a contractor would buy siding, you know, 09 asbestos siding, something like that. But the 10 normal consumer doesn't come in contact with it that 11 much in terms of purchasing. 12 Q. I will move to strike as nonresponsive. 13 My question is a yes or no question. When 14 you worked for asbestos, was it at least one of the 15 concerns of members of the trade association that 16 publicity about asbestos hazards could hurt sales? 17 MR. PARKER: I have to object. That is 18 vague and overbroad and undefined as to the 19 trade association or working for, quote 20 unquote, asbestos. 21 THE WITNESS: None of them ever 22 discussed that with me. 23 Q. Okay. A concern of your clients has been 24 that their product would be banned or regulated to 25 the extent that it was a practical ban; is that Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 032 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 034 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 033:01 are they as bad as they are being led to believe, 02 people are trying to paint them, or are they 03 somewhat less than that, and how do you control 04 them. T h a t 's what we try to do. 05 Q. The usual threats to the companies and trade 06 associations that you represent where there have 07 been allegations of their products hurting people, 08 have been public reports of danger that have hurt 09 sales, true? 10 MR. GINSBERG: Objection to the form. 11 THE WITNESS: I d o n 't know that w e 've 12 ever paid a lot of attention to the sales. 13 Normally we just really deal with the issue. 14 I 'm sure that sales are involved in some 15 issues, but I d o n 't recall that being a big 16 thing that we have been asked to think about. 17 I mean, some products were in the process of 18 actually being banned but, you know, to say, 19 you know, a specific thing is going to lose 20 10 percent market share or something like 21 that, I d o n 't recall discussions like that. 22 Q. Well, in your work for asbestos one of the 23 concerns of the members of the trade association was 24 that negative press about asbestos could hurt the 25 consumer market for their products, true? SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 035:01 true? 02 MR. GINSBERG: Objection. 03 MR. PARKER: Objection to the term 04 client. 05 MR. GINSBERG: Agreed. Should we 06 understand, Mr. Jones, that you are asking 07 for asbestos-related clients? 08 MR. JONES: I'm not clarifying my 09 question, and I'm happy with the way I asked 10 it, but thank you. 11 MR. GINSBERG: And I will instruct the 12 witness that he can't answer it. I mean, 13 you're asking for his entire career, every 14 single witness, every single client he worked 15 for. It's impossible to answer the question 16 the way you have asked it. 17 THE WITNESS: It is. 18 Q. Clients you've represented where there has 19 been an allegation that their product hurts people. 20 You have done that, right? 21 A. Yes. 22 Q. Okay. You faced circumstances where those 23 clients were concerned the government was going to 24 ban their product, true? 25 A. I can think of one anyway, yes. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 033 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 035 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 036:01 Q. You've also had clients where there were 02 allegations that their product could hurt people 03 where they were worried the government would 04 regulate the product to a degree that it was 05 practically banned? 06 A. I suppose that's true as well. 07 Q. Another concern for companies that you have 08 consulted for is that they would face lawsuits in 09 the future? 10 A. Actually, that's not true. The majority of 11 the companies that came to us where litigation was 12 involved were already involved in lawsuits. I c a n 't 13 recall of any client coming who was concerned that 14 lawsuits might arise in the future. Most of them 15 were already in litigation. 16 Q. Well, asbestos, they were worried about 17 lawsuits in the future? 18 A. Not really, not while I was there. 19 Q. When you started at -- it's your testimony 20 that when you started at the Asbestos Information 21 Association I believe in the beginning of 1972 -- 22 A. Yes. 23 Q. -- that the members of that association 24 weren't worried about lawsuits? 25 A. Not at that particular point in time. Now, I SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 038:01 the Asbestos Information Association initially 02 primarily for the purpose of receiving the data from 03 the various companies it would be necessary to 04 allocate dues. That was my initial, you know, 05 contact with them. And then Bradley Walls, who I 06 see here listed, was involved as our counsel 07 specifically, and was with us during the OSHA 08 hearings in 1972. 09 Q. And that's Mr. Walls' signature on the cover 10 letter; is that true? 11 A. You got me. 12 MR. GINSBERG: I 'll just remind the 13 witness, when you said "our counsel," you 14 should identify what entity that is. 15 THE WITNESS: Oh, that would be the 16 Asbestos Information Association. 17 Q. Can you flip to the next page? 18 A. Yes. 19 Q. The cover letter attaches a document entitled 20 "Minutes of the First Annual Meeting of the Health & 21 Safety Council/ACPA, November 21, 1969." 22 Did I read that correctly? 23 A. Um-mm. 24 Q. And are you familiar with the ACPA? 25 A. I 'm just reading that. Asbestos Cement Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 036 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 038 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 037:01 went through the same thing with your boss ten years 02 ago. When I speak of litigation, I am talking about 03 product liability litigation, and he was including 04 in that things like Workmen's Comp cases. And that 05 is simply not the language that I use or anybody 06 that I know uses to discuss litigation. 07 Q. I'm talking about product liability 08 litigation. 09 A. Well then the answer is no. 10 Q. I am going to show you what I have marked as 11 Exhibit 2 to the deposition. 12 (Whereupon, Plaintiff's Deposition 13 Exhibit No. 2 was marked for 14 Identification.) 15 MR. JONES: Do we have the exhibit back? 16 I am sorry. I didn't mean to rush you. 17 Q. Exhibit 2 has a cover page which is a letter 18 from a law firm Burns & Van Kirk, and the letter is 19 dated December 10, 1969. Is that true? 20 A. Yes. 21 Q. Are you familiar with that law firm? 22 A. Yes. 23 Q. How are you familiar with the law firm of the 24 Burns & Van Kirk? 25 A. Well, they represented the trade association, SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 039:01 Products Association -- not really. I mean, I 've 02 heard the name. 03 Q. Okay. And according to this, you were at a 04 meeting of the Asbestos Cement Products Association; 05 is that true? 06 A. T h a t 's what it says. 07 Q. Do you disagree that you were there? 08 A. I d o n 't remember being there. 09 Q. This says that you were at the very first 10 Health & Safety Council meeting of that 11 organization, true? It's on the front page of the 12 document. 13 A. Yes, t h a t 's what it says. 14 Q. And can I bring your attention to that first 15 page again? 16 A. Sure. 17 Q. I want to ask you about some of the 18 individuals there. There's a listing of an M.M. 19 Swetonic? 20 A. That is me. 21 Q. Who is that? That's you? 22 A. T h a t 's me. 23 Q. And it says that you were at Johns-Manville. 24 Were you at Johns-Manville in 1969? 25 A. Yes. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 037 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 039 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 040:01 Q. Okay. Do you recognize the names of the 02 other individuals listed as employees of 03 Johns-Manville? 04 A. Actually, the only one that I recognize is 05 H.M. Ball, who I believe was general counsel. Herb 06 Ball I think his name was. 07 Q. Okay. 08 A. The other people, no, I d o n 't recognize any 09 of them. 10 Q. You recognize the name A.H. Fay, National 11 Gypsum Company? 12 A. Yes. 13 Q. Mr. Fay was, in fact, the first president of 14 the Asbestos Information Association; is that true? 15 A. No. He was the second president. 16 Q. When was he the president? 17 A. I believe from the late part of '71 through 18 the fall of '72. 19 Q. He's the one that hired you? 20 A. T h a t 's correct. 21 Q. Okay. Do you recognize any companies that 22 were members of the Asbestos Information Association 23 listed on this document? 24 A. Certain-teed, Flintkote, GAF, National 25 Gypsum. I 'm not sure about Supradur. I d o n 't SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 042:01 Q. And it says, "Herbert Morton Ball, Vice 02 President and General Counsel of Johns-Manville 03 Corporation, delivered an address on product 04 liability." 05 Did I read that correctly? 06 A. Yes. 07 Q. "Mr. Ball discussed potential problems of 08 common law liability facing manufacturers of 09 products that contain asbestos fiber as an 10 ingredient. His remarks did not touch upon in-house 11 problems which are generally covered by Workmen's 12 Compensation Insurance." 13 Did I read that correctly? 14 A. Yes. May I interrupt you for a second? 15 Q. No. Now, you would agree with me that 16 Mr. Ball is not talking about Workers' Compensation 17 suits? 18 A. Well , it says that here. 19 Q. Okay . The next sentence is, "He limited his 20 subject to third party common law product liability. 21 He identified third parties as persons who are not 22 employees of asbestos cement manufacturers." 23 Did I read that correctly? 24 A. Yes. 25 MR. GINSBERG: Mr. Jones, we can all Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 040 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 042 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 041:01 remember them to be honest with you. They may have 02 been or they may not have been. I d o n 't know. 03 Q. And United States Gypsum was not a member? 04 A. No. 05 Q. So on -- it looks like at this meeting there 06 were members of 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 Asbestos Information 07 Association members, true? 08 A. Well, the Asbestos Information Association 09 did not exist at this time. 10 Q. Right. These companies would in a couple of 11 years be members of the Asbestos Information 12 Association? 13 A. That is correct. 14 Q. True? Now, if you could do me a favor and 15 flip to the second page of this document under the 16 heading 3, there's a heading that says "Product 17 Liability," true? 18 A. Right. Um-mm. 19 Q. And under Product Liability there's an entry 20 for a Herbert Morton Ball? 21 A. Right. I identified him as general counsel. 22 And I see that's what he was. 23 Q. General counsel means he was a lawyer that 24 worked for Johns-Manville in-house, right? 25 A. Um-mm. SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 043:01 agree y o u 're doing a nice job reading the 02 documents, but do you have any questions for 03 this witness's personal recollection of the 04 meeting? 05 MR. JONES: I 'm going to be done with my 06 questions when I 'm done with my questions. 07 When I 'm done with my questions, I invite you 08 to ask all of the questions that you have. 09 MR. GINSBERG: L e t 's take a minute and 10 let the witness read the rest of the document 11 if you have questions about it. 12 Q. Sure. Sure. Take your time. Do you want to 13 go off the record? 14 MR. JONES: Let's go off the record. 15 THE VIDEOGRAPHER: The time is 11:48 16 a.m. We are off the record. 17 (Recess from 11:48 to 11:52.) 18 THE VIDEOGRAPHER: The time is 19 approximately 11:52 a.m. We are back on the 20 record. 21 BY MR. JONES: 22 Q. Have you had a chance to look over Exhibit 2? 23 A. Yes. 24 Q. And I gave you as much time as you needed. 25 Did you take all the time you needed? Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 041 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 043 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 044:01 A. I think so. 02 Q. Okay. And you've seen minutes like this in 03 your career representing trade associations, true? 04 A. Surely. 05 Q. And you have told us that you recognize the 06 name of Mr. Walls, right? 07 A. Um-mm. 08 Q. And if you look at the last page, you will 09 see the signature of Mr. Walls? 10 A. Right. 11 Q. And was it uncommon for the law firm 12 representing a trade association to actually type up 13 the minutes and send it out? 14 A. I would not -- no, he did not do that. This 15 is not my trade association. 16 Q. I didn't ask you that question. 17 Was it uncommon for a law firm representing a 18 trade association to send out the minutes? 19 A. I d o n 't know. 20 Q. Mr. Ball, who you recognize, in his speech 21 was clearly talking about third-party product 22 liability lawsuits, true? 23 A. Well, according to these minutes. And I said 24 previously, and I will repeat myself, I do not 25 remember being at this meeting. SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 046:01 Q. Go to the last two paragraphs. Do you see 02 that? 03 A. Um-mm. 04 Q. The second to last paragraph on the page 05 says, "Mr. Ball also recommended that adequate money 06 be advanced for the appropriate research to 07 determine that the true risks" -- I'm going to try 08 that again. Mr. Ginsberg said I was good at reading 09 things. I don't know if I'm so good. 10 MR. MODESITT: I agree with you. 11 MR. JONES: Right? 12 Q. "Mr. Ball alsorecommended that adequate 13 money be advanced for the appropriate research to 14 determine what the true risks are and to eliminate 15 these risks." 16 Did I read that correctly? 17 A. Yes, you did. 18 Q. And that's something that the Asbestos 19 Information Association did, true? 20 A. Which? 21 Q. They advanced money for research to be 22 performed to find out what the risks of the products 23 were? 24 A. On a very limited basis. Wefinanced a study 25 up at Harvard to see -- for an early determination Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 044 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 046 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 045:01 Q. Okay. Okay. But the minutes show you're 02 there, right? 03 A. T h a t 's what it says, but I do not remember 04 being there. 05 Q. Are you saying you weren't there? 06 A. No. I 'm saying I d o n 't remember being there. 07 Q. Fair enough. 08 A. We are looking at something from 44 years 09 ago. 10 Q. True. 11 A. Eight to 12. Or is it 9 to 12? Sorry. 12 Forty-three years. 13 Q. It's 43. I don't mind you rounding up a 14 little bit. Mr. Ball who -- 15 Did you interact with Mr. Ball while you were 16 at Johns-Manville? 17 A. Very seldom. 18 Q. You knew who he was? 19 A. That was about it. He was not involved to 20 any extent. In fact, I d o n 't think he was involved 21 at all in anything having to do with the information 22 association. 23 Q. On the fifth page of the document -- can you 24 flip to that page? 25 A. I am on it. Yes. SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 047:01 through chest sounds of asbestosis in early stages. 02 A doctor in New Jersey came up with what he thought 03 might prove beneficial for mesothelioma. We sent 04 him a small amount of money that he asked for. 05 Q. $5,000, right? 06 A. Something like that, yes. There was 07 something in California about the membrane filter 08 method, try to get that a little more accurate for 09 monitoring. But in terms of any large health study, 10 no, we were not involved in that. The biggest 11 contributor to that sort of thing was the Quebec 12 Asbestos Mining Group. 13 Q. And one of the things that you did at the 14 association was to make sure that the studies 15 sponsored by industry found their way into the 16 scientific realm, true? 17 A. No, not necessarily. The studies would be 18 published or whatever. 19 Q. And you would publicize them. You wanted to 20 make sure that the media was aware of the research 21 the industry was doing, true? 22 A. No. What we were trying to do was make sure 23 that the media was aware of what all of the research 24 told us about asbestos-related disease, not just 25 industry research. In fact, if you -- Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 045 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 047 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 048:01 Q. So you gave a press -- are you saying that 02 any time a study came out about asbestos you did a 03 press release? 04 A. No, of course not. 05 Q. And there was research that came out that 06 said, while you were at the association, that there 07 is no known safe level of exposure to asbestos where 08 mesothelioma will not develop, true? 09 A. You would have to show me the study. I d o n 't 10 remember that study. 11 Q. Well, while you were at the association, were 12 you aware of a level of asbestos exposure where 13 mesothelioma wouldn't develop? 14 A. No. I d o n 't think anybody knew of a level 15 where it would either. 16 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Objection. Calls for 17 expert opinion. 18 A. Let me say what we did do. 19 Q. Well, I didn't ask you that. 20 MR. GINSBERG: Have you finished 21 answering the question, Mr. Swetonic? 22 THE WITNESS: I suppose so. 23 MR. GINSBERG: I 'd also ask you, 24 Mr. Jones, y o u 've cut him off in the middle 25 of an answer several times. I 'd ask that you SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 050:01 Q. The threat to asbestos products when you got 02 involved is that that business was going to go away, 03 true? 04 A. No, not really. Certain products were really 05 not being called into question. Basically, the only 06 products that were really being shown to be at risk 07 were some of the insulation materials, in particular 08 the ones that were, as we described them, friable 09 where they could be easily crumbled and the fibers 10 could be released into the air in significant 11 quantities. That was the nature of the problem with 12 the people that Dr. Selikoff studied. 13 Q. But you would agree with me that it was a 14 concern of your association that concerns about a 15 couple of products could spread to a ban of all 16 asbestos products, true? 17 A. No. We were not looking at bans at all in 18 those days. 19 Q. I'm going to show you what we will mark as 20 Exhibit 3 to the deposition. 21 (Whereupon, Plaintiff's Deposition 22 Exhibit No. 3 was marked for 23 Identification.) 24 MR. MODESITT: Trey, just so we 25 understand one other, you agree that Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 048 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 050 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 049:01 let the witness complete his answers. 02 MR. JONES: I d o n 't think I 've done it a 03 single time, but thank you. 04 MR. GINSBERG: I 'm sitting here and I 05 saw it. So next time I 'll let you know when 06 you do it. 07 MR. JONES: Well, w e 've got a court 08 reporter. S h e 's going to write it all down. 09 W e 'll figure it out if we have to figure it 10 out. Okay? 11 MR. GINSBERG: I think w e 'll figure it 12 out right now as we are sitting across from 13 each other. So next question, please. 14 MR. JONES: Okay. 15 Q. "Mr. Ball concluded by stating 'We must all 16 recognize that if we are going to remain in 17 business, there is no easy way out, legally or 18 otherwise. A fully coordinated and concerted 19 maximum effort on the part of all is necessary.'" 20 A. Sounds reasonable. 21 Q. Did I read that correctly? 22 A. Yes. 23 Q. And do you agree with that statement? 24 A. Yes. Not that I remember him saying it, but 25 I agree with it. SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 051:01 relevance objections are in fact preserved? 02 MR. JONES: Yes. It's a trial 03 objection. 04 MR. MODESITT: I just don't want anybody 05 to suggest that we waived that by not 06 repeatedly making that objection. That's 07 all. 08 MR. JONES: They are not waived. 09 Q. Just let me know when you are ready, 10 Mr. Swetonic. 11 A. Okay. I 've read it. 12 Q. Okay. Mr. Swetonic, the document I've handed 13 you is dated October 16, 1970; is that true? 14 A. T h a t 's right. 15 Q. And below that it says, "Report of Meeting," 16 true? 17 A. Yes. 18 Q. And then it says -- there's another date 19 October 13, 1970, and it says, "Public Relations 20 Subcommittee, Environmental Health Task Force." 21 Did I read that correctly? 22 A. Yes, you did. 23 Q. In 1970, you were on the public relations 24 subcommittee of the Environmental Health Task Force 25 at Johns-Manville, true? Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 049 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 051 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 052:01 A. That is true. 02 Q. And there's a list of attendees and your name 03 is third on the list, true? 04 A. That is correct. 05 Q. And I will represent to you that I got this 06 document from the Johns-Manville document repository 07 in Denver, Colorado. 08 Can you flip to the second page? The 09 document is signed by two individuals, true? 10 A. Yes. 11 Q. You are one of the individuals that signed 12 this document, true? 13 A. T h a t 's correct. 14 Q. That is your signature, true? 15 A. Yes. 16 Q. This document -- I'm reading under item 2, it 17 says, "The Subcommittee feels that the situation 18 with regard to the banning of asbestos products is 19 fast becoming a serious problem for the industry. 20 Indications are that asbestos-containing products 21 other than spray compounds may soon be regulated or 22 banned because of potential public health hazards." 23 Did I read that correctly? 24 A. You did. 25 DEFENSE COUNSEL: I 'm going to object. SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 054:01 A. I c a n 't remember any state regulators to be 02 honest with you. 03 Q. You have at least had communications with 04 them like -- 05 A. Yes. 06 Q. -- California, Illinois, right? 07 A. I d o n 't remember specifically. I t 's a long 08 time ago. 09 Q. You testified before OSHA? 10 A. Yes, I did. 11 Q. Please tell the jury about your medical 12 training. 13 A. I d o n 't have any. 14 Q. You're not a medical doctor, true? 15 A. No, I 'm not a medical doctor. And what I 16 testified for in front of OSHA had nothing to do 17 with medicine. Wait a second. Please give me a 18 chance to answer something. 19 Q. Go ahead. 20 A. All right? What my testimony was before OSHA 21 was with regard to the rule-making, what changes or 22 interpretations we wanted in the proposed 23 regulations. It had nothing to do with health. It 24 was things like were the respirator, what you could 25 use, was that sufficient, under what set of Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 052 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 054 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 053:01 The document speaks for itself. 02 Q. And do you have any reason to dispute that 03 this is in fact a Johns-Manville document? 04 A. No. 05 Q. Do you have any reason to dispute that you 06 were at this meeting? 07 A. No. What is your point? Do you have a 08 question? 09 Q. I made my point. 10 A. Not really. 11 Q. Well, the good news is that's for 12 people 12 that aren't in this room to decide. Because I would 13 lose -- if you're keeping score, it would be bad 14 against me. 15 Now, in your career you've written position 16 papers on -- I keep messing it up. In your career 17 you've written position papers on complicated 18 scientific issues, true? 19 A. Yes. Or some people who worked for me would 20 do them, yes. 21 Q. You've met with city, state and federal 22 regulators dealing with product regulations, true? 23 A. No. Just really in the asbestos area. 24 Q. In the asbestos area you've met with city, 25 state and federal regulators, true? SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 055:01 circumstances, recordkeeping, change of clothes, all 02 sorts of things in there. We had bunches of 03 comments on that. T h a t 's the testimony that I gave, 04 which was really put together by others who were 05 more experts in that area than I was. 06 Q. I will move to strike as nonresponsive. 07 I didn't ask you what you testified at OSHA 08 about, did I? 09 A. Well, you brought up the subject, so I wanted 10 to educate you. 11 Q. True. Can you do me a favor and just answer 12 the questions I ask? You may be anticipating or 13 want to say something about a subject that I didn't 14 ask a question about. Your lawyer is going to come 15 back and ask you questions, and you all can clear up 16 anything that needs to be cleared up. Okay? 17 MR. GINSBERG: And I'll ask the witness 18 not to be misled by Mr. Jones. When he asks 19 you a question, it's your right to give an 20 answer and a complete answer, and you can 21 continue to do so. 22 THE WITNESS: Thank you. 23 BY MR. JONES: Q. Please tell the jury about all your formal scientific training. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 053 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 055 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 056:01 A. I have none. A H I had was one year of 02 engineering in college. I w a s n 't particularly keen 03 on it. I did well in it. When I went to Columbia 04 Graduate School of Journalism, I specialized in my 05 second term in science journalism and just felt 06 comfortable doing it. And over many years of 07 working in the area acquired a certain ability to 08 look at scientific material and in many cases 09 understand what i t 's saying, what i t 's not saying. 10 Q. Your degree is in creative writing, true? 11 A. Well, actually, it was in English, writing. 12 I just thought creative writing sounded a little bit 13 better. 14 Q. You've described it as a degree in creative 15 writing, true? 16 A. It was described, yes, but that's not what it 17 was in. I just told you that. 18 Q. You said the second semester of your 19 master's -- your master's is in journalism, right? 20 A. That is correct. 21 Q. You said that your second semester for your 22 master's you concentrated on scientific writing; is 23 that right? 24 A. No, I d i d n 't say I concentrated. We had sort 25 of what amounted to a thesis which is -- d o n 't SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 058:01 true? 02 A. Correct. 03 Q. I'm guessing the kind of things in the 04 company magazine were employee of the month? 05 A. Yes, that sort of stuff. 06 Q. Bake sale on the second floor? 07 A. Well, no.No, not necessarily that. That 08 would be like a local newsletter. But the company 09 had many, many plants around the country, so there 10 would be profiles on new products. I went to -- an 11 example, I went to the Johnson Space Center because 12 they had a lot of insulations on the Mercury 13 spacecraft. So we did a feature story for the 14 magazine on that, that sort of thing. 15 Q. After a couple of years of doing that, you 16 were approached about helping with Johns-Manville's 17 public relations problem, true? 18 A. On asbestos, yes. 19 Q. And that public relations problem was reports 20 were getting out that asbestos killed people, true? 21 A. No. Reports were getting out, not just that 22 it killed people, but that all asbestos products 23 were dangerous, that there was no safe way to use 24 it, all sorts of things that exaggerated the issue. 25 And so that we felt it was necessary to kind of, you Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 056 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 058 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 057:01 forget, i t 's a journalism school -- which was to 02 prepare a long research piece on some subject that 03 would be sort of acceptable for The New York Times 04 magazine section for want of a better example. 05 Q. And your master's program was one year, 06 right? 07 A. T h a t 's correct. 08 Q. And out of that one year the work you did 09 related to science was a long feature piece in an 10 area in the specialty and you picked science, true? 11 A. That is correct. 12 Q. So, other than writing that feature piece, 13 and I think you testified a couple of advance math 14 classes, that's your scientific formal training, 15 true? 16 A. Formal, yes. 17 Q. And you're not a scientist, are you? 18 A. No, I 'm not. 19 Q. Your first job when you left that master's 20 program I believe in 1965 -- or was it 1966? 21 A. '65. 22 Q. Your first job was at Johns-Manville, true? 23 A. That is correct. 24 Q. For a couple of years you were the assistant 25 editor and then editor of their company magazine, SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 059:01 know, put -- bring some common sense to it. 02 Recognizing what the hazards were, which were 03 significant for certain groups of workers, but not 04 for others. 05 Q. You reported to Jack Solon and Bill Raines at 06 Johns-Manville, true? 07 A. Correct. 08 Q. You wrote papers onasbestos and health, 09 true? 10 A. At that time, no. Hill & Knowlton was doing 11 most of that papers. 12 Q. Over time youstarted doing that work? 13 A. Yes. 14 Q. You also wrote drafts of speeches for 15 executive who were going to testify before 16 government bodies? 17 A. Correct. 18 Q. You've testified that by 1971 Johns-Manville 19 had more than 4,000 articles on asbestos and health? 20 A. Well, okay. I must have remembered that if I 21 testified to that effect. 22 Q. Does that sound in the ballpark at least? 23 A. Yes, I guess. 24 Q. It was a lot, right? 25 A. A lot, yes. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 057 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 059 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 060:01 Q. The purpose of the background papers that you 02 or Hill & Knowlton wrote was to give to the media, 03 true? 04 A. Yes. 05 Q. And Hill & Knowlton, that's a public 06 relations firm, right? 07 A. That is correct. 08 Q. Johns-Manville hired Hill & Knowlton to help 09 get their side of the asbestos health story out? 10 A. That iscorrect. 11 Q. And you worked with Hill & Knowlton to do the 12 same thing, true? 13 A. Yes. 14 Q. Now, during your career -- let me ask this. 15 When you were at Johns-Manville and then at the 16 Asbestos Information Association -- when did you 17 join that organization? 18 A. I was hired in late winter or late year of 19 1971 to become effective January 1st, '72. I flew 20 up to Buffalo because I remember there was snow on 21 the ground to meet with Al Fay. He was the then 22 president, and we agreed on a dollar number, and I 23 was hired. 24 Q. You've read a lot of papers about asbestos 25 and health? SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 062:01 And if I do, I can give it back to you. I 02 just want to figure out if he's seen it 03 before. No problem. You don't have to 04 memorize it. 05 Q. If you could just flip through -- that's a 06 cover letter. It's actually from Mr. Mereness, who 07 succeeded you -- 08 A. T h a t 's correct. 09 Q. -- as the executive secretary, right, or the 10 executive director? 11 A. Yes. He changed it to executive director. 12 MR. GINSBERG: Can you just give the 13 witness a minute to flip through the 14 document, please? 15 Q. Sure. The first page says he's attaching a 16 summary that you did. All I'd like to ask you right 17 now is to flip through that and see if you recall 18 putting something like that together? 19 MR. GINSBERG: Mr. Swetonic, you should 20 look at the front page that Mr. Jones has 21 characterized and the rest of the document as 22 well, and take as much time as you need. 23 Q. You can take your time. I'm not going to ask 24 any in-depth questions about it right now. 25 A. That makes sense. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 060 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 062 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 061:01 A. I did in those days, yes. 02 Q. For about a five-year period you read an 03 awful lot of asbestos and health papers? 04 A. I would say that's true. 05 Q. And, in fact, when you left the organization 06 you wrote a summary of what people would call the 07 state of the art as it relates to asbestos health? 08 A. I 'm not sure what you are referring to, to be 09 honest with you. 10 Q. Give me one second. I will show you what I'm 11 talking about. 12 A. Sure. 13 Q. It was hiding on top. 14 A. That will do it. 15 Q. Yes. Every time. 16 MR. JONES: We are up to 3, does that 17 sound right? 18 MR. PARKER: I think you are at 4. 19 Q. I will show you what I will mark as Exhibit 20 4. 21 (Whereupon, Plaintiff's Deposition 22 Exhibit No. 4 was marked for 23 Identification.) 24 MR. JONES: It's just a literature 25 review. I'm not going to get that in-depth. SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 063:01 MR. PARKER: I 'm sorry, the letter is 02 from a different person than Mr. Swetonic? 03 MR. JONES: Correct. 04 MR. PARKER: Can we get the name again? 05 MR. JONES: The letter -- let me -- 06 Q. Mr. Swetonic, would you agree with me that 07 the cover letter is dated April 3, 1974. 08 A. T h a t 's right. 09 Q. And it's a letter from R.H. Mereness? 10 A. Mereness. 11 Q. Mereness. Thank you. 12 A. Y o u 're welcome. I t 's Robert. 13 Q. And he signs it Bob, right? 14 A. Yes. 15 Q. Okay. To Edmund M. Fenner, true? 16 A. Yes. 17 Q. Go ahead. 18 MR. PARKER: I just needed the name for 19 my notes. 20 THE WITNESS: I t 's very possible I did 21 this. 22 MR. GINSBERG: Just wait for a question. 23 Q. Do you recall putting together a summary for 24 Mr. Mereness? 25 A. Well, yes, he -- no, I do not remember, but Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 061 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 063 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 064:01 he asked me to do it. And I see it went to Fenner, 02 and then to go on to other health experts in 03 Manville's employ, or as -- to go through it and see 04 if it made any sense what I put together. We always 05 did that. I mean, I d i d n 't send out stuff just 06 because I wrote it. It always was cleared with 07 appropriate people either at Manville or the trade 08 association or both. 09 Q. And you looked through this. Does this 10 appear to be your writing style? 11 A. Yes, it appears to be. 12 Q. Do you have any reason to disputethat the 13 document attached to the April 3, 1974 is in fact 14 your review of asbestos health literature? 15 A. I have no reason to doubt that. 16 Q. Okay. When you started at Johns-Manville, 17 Johns-Manville was the -- when you started at 18 Johns-Manville, that company was the country's 19 largest producer of asbestos products; is that true? 20 A. T h a t 's correct. 21 Q. Johns-Manville and Hill & Knowlton, the 22 public relations firm, came up with the idea of 23 creating a trade association for the asbestos health 24 problem, true? 25 A. Well, I think the real initiative for that SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 066:01 exactly what was going on in those discussions. 02 Now, sometimes Jack would audiotape some of the 03 meetings and he would play it for Solon and me and I 04 guess for the Hill & Knowlton people as well. But 05 that was our only -- w e 're not in a position, you 06 know, to comment or say anything about it. It went 07 on and we were not part of that committee. 08 Q. Johns-Manville wanted -- strike that. 09 Johns-Manville wanted to continue doing press 10 about asbestos, but it didn't want its name in the 11 paper all the time, true? 12 A. T h a t 's correct. 13 Q. And that's one the reasons Johns-Manville 14 wanted to form this trade association so they could 15 continue to do public relations only under the name 16 of the trade association? 17 A. T h a t 's what a lot of trade associations do 18 for a living, yes. T h a t 's why you join them, so 19 they can represent the industry taken as a whole. 20 Q. Johns-Manville completely staffed and funded 21 the Asbestos Information Association for the first 22 year? 23 A. Correct. 24 Q. And, in fact, the Asbestos Information 25 Association's office when it started was at the Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 064 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 066 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 065:01 came from the British, who had formed a similar 02 group a few years earlier, and they felt that this 03 was this a -- this would be an appropriate way to 04 deal with the general public rather than just one 05 company doing it, which is kind of standard really. 06 Q. When you say the British, you're talking 07 about asbestos product manufacturers in England, 08 right? 09 A. And many of whom were also miners. 10 Q. And the Asbestos Information Association was 11 patterned after a British version of the same thing? 12 A. T h a t 's why the title -- I got the title of 13 executive secretary as opposed to something else 14 because that's what they called it. 15 Q. Okay. When you were at Johns-Manville, 16 Johns-Manville, we already talked about, had a 17 health task force? 18 A. Yes. 19 Q. And what that task force did prior to the 20 formation of the Asbestos Information Association 21 was really the same thing the association would do, 22 the same things? 23 A. Well, I did not sit on the health task force. 24 The only person from the PR subcommittee who sat on 25 that was Jack Solon. So, we were not privy to SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 067:01 Johns-Manville offices, true? 02 A. T h a t 's right. 03 Q. When you became the executive secretary, did 04 you have to change offices? 05 A. We were in the same building. I think we 06 changed offices because we wanted to be someplace 07 where we had a conference room. So I think we 08 changed floors as I recall. 09 Q. But same building? 10 A. Same building, yes. If you look at all the 11 literature we put out, i t 's got the same address on 12 it. 13 Q. When did Hill & Knowlton start working for 14 Johns-Manville? 15 A. Well, let me put it this way. I got 16 involved -- when my mother passed away, I came 17 across a clipping from our local paper that said I 'd 18 started on that particular task on January 1st, 19 1968. Well, Hill & Knowlton was already in place at 20 that time point because one of the first things they 21 did was they took me over to meet the people at Hill 22 & Knowlton who were working on the account. So they 23 must have been there some time in '67, but I d o n 't 24 know when exactly. 25 Q. And when you started with the Asbestos Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 065 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 067 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 068:01 Information Association -- 02 A. Which, as an employee or through Manville? 03 Q. Through Manville. 04 A. Okay. 05 Q. -- you were doing a lot of the same things 06 that you were doing for Manville before, right? 07 A. Yes. 08 Q. The association was doing essentially the 09 same public relations campaign that it was doing at 10 Manville a few days before the association was 11 created? 12 A. Well, I think "campaign" would be a rather 13 strong word, but were they responsible for the 14 public relations aspects of it, yes. 15 Q. And the plan or campaign for Johns-Manville 16 and Hill & Knowlton that the association took on was 17 to mislead the public and the press -- 18 A. Not at all. 19 Q. -- about the hazards of asbestos, true? 20 A. Absolutely not. Absolutely not. 21 MR. GINSBERG: Objection. 22 Argumentative. 23 THE WITNESS: Our task was to make sure 24 that the people who needed to know the facts 25 about asbestos and health were aware of them SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 070:01 marked as Exhibit 5. It's dated May 31, 1966; is 02 that true? 03 A. Um-mm. 04 Q. And it's entitled "Background Facts on the 05 Environmental Health Aspects of Asbestos," is that 06 true? 07 A. Well, i t 's what i t 's titled, but I c a n 't 08 comment on this. I t 's a year and half before I had 09 any involvement in the issues. How can I comment on 10 this document? 11 Q. I will move to strike as nonresponsive. 12 The document is entitled "Background Facts on 13 the Environmental Health Effects" -- strike that. 14 The document is entitled "Background Facts on the 15 Environmental Health Aspects of Asbestos," true? 16 A. Yes. You read properly. 17 Q. And do you see there is a list of people this 18 is addressed to and a list of people that it's cc'd 19 to. Do you see any names of people that were later 20 involved in the Asbestos Information Association? 21 A. Just -- just W.P. Raines up top. And C.L. 22 Scheckler in the second group. He was an 23 environmental engineer type. And Carl Thompson from 24 Hill & Knowlton. 25 Q. This is dated 1966. That's when you were at Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 068 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 070 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 069:01 based on science. I go back to my point 02 about sound science being the basis for good 03 public policy. We were not out to mislead 04 anybody. 05 Q. I'm going to show you what I have marked as 06 Exhibit 5 to the deposition. 07 (Whereupon, Plaintiff's Deposition 08 Exhibit No. 5 was marked for 09 Identification.) 10 MR. JONES: Why don't you go ahead and 11 change tapes while they're looking at it. So 12 we will go off record. 13 THE VIDEOGRAPHER: This is the end of 14 tape number one of the videotaped deposition 15 of Mr. Matthew Swetonic. The time is 16 approximately 12:31 p.m., and we are now off 17 the record. 18 (Recess from 12:31 to 12:40.) 19 THE VIDEOGRAPHER: This is tape number 20 two of the videotaped deposition of 21 Mr. Matthew Swetonic. The time is 22 approximately 12:40 p.m., and we are now back 23 on the record. 24 BY MR. JONES: 25 Q. Mr. Swetonic, I've handed you a document SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 071:01 Johns-Manville but before you took a position in the 02 Environmental Health Task Force, true? 03 A. T h a t 's correct. 04 Q. This document appears to be from an F.J. 05 Solon, Junior? 06 A. Yes. T h a t 's Jack Solon. 07 Q. And what was his role at Johns-Manville? 08 A. He was Vice President Advertising Public 09 Relations. 10 Q. Was he involved with the association? 11 A. Yes. He was Johns-Manville voting member on 12 it. 13 Q. This document purports to attach a position 14 statement of the company; is that true? 15 A. T h a t 's what it says. 16 Q. And in your career at Johns-Manville, were 17 you aware of position statements dealing with 18 asbestos? 19 A. Not this one. 20 Q. You're aware of others? 21 A. No, but certainly I 'm not aware of this. 22 Q. You're not aware of any? 23 A. Well, we worked on them through Hill & 24 Knowlton on putting stuff together before the 25 association, but this is not one of those. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 069 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 071 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 072:01 Q. This is before you started? 02 A. This is before I started. I have no 03 knowledge of this whatsoever. 04 Q. And who is Dr. Kenneth Smith? 05 A. I really d o n 't know him. It says here he is 06 medical director, but I d o n 't even know that I 've 07 ever met the man. 08 Q. You're aware at least when you started that 09 Johns-Manville and Hill & Knowlton -- strike that. 10 You were aware when you started in the 11 Environmental Health Task Force that Johns-Manville 12 and Hill & Knowlton were responding to negative 13 information in the press about asbestos, true? 14 A. Well, they were gearing up to. I d o n 't know 15 how much actual responding they were doing in those 16 days, to be honest with you, because I w a s n 't seeing 17 a lot of comments from industry at all on the issue. 18 It was mostly, strictly what the other side was 19 talking about, which is why I think they hired Hill 20 & Knowlton was to try to formulate some stuff that 21 would be useful with the public and with the media, 22 which would make sense. 23 Q. Now, if you flip to the position statement, 24 it says at the top, "Interim Position Statement, 25 Revised 5/31/1966," true? SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 074:01 rest up. 02 Q. Under "General Comment" the first sentence 03 says, "No one really knows what causes cancer." 04 Did I read that correctly? 05 A. You read it. 06 DEFENSE COUNSEL: I 'm going to object. 07 The document speaks for itself. Calls for 08 speculation. Lack of foundation. 09 Q. That was not a true statement in 1966, is it? 10 MR. MODESITT: Objection. Foundation. 11 THE WITNESS: I 'm in no position to know 12 what was in the minds of the people who wrote 13 this document. 14 Q. I didn't ask you -- I 'll move to strike as 15 nonresponsive. 16 I didn't ask you what was in their minds, did 17 I? 18 A. You asked basically -- 19 Q. Let me ask my question. My question is -- 20 A. Y o u 're asking me what was in the mind of the 21 guy who wrote this. 22 Q. No, I didn't ask that. 23 MR. GINSBERG: Mr. Jones, it seems like 24 what you are asking him to do is to become an 25 expert in the literature, and to be able to Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 072 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 074 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 073:01 A. Yes. 02 Q. And under "General Comment" it says, "No one 03 really knows what causes cancer. Therefore, any 04 medical testimony which points a finger at a 05 potential suspect is understandably of interest and 06 concern to the public." 07 Did I read that correctly? 08 A. Well, you can keep reading, but I c a n 't 09 comment on whether this is a real document because I 10 have no knowledge of it whatsoever. This may be 11 fabricated for all I know. And I also have no 12 knowledge that any of these statements were ever 13 used with the press or anybody else outside. So, I 14 have done -- what information I can give you on 15 this, which is identify a few people's names. 16 Q. Let me ask the question again. And I 'll move 17 to strike as nonresponsive. 18 A. You seem to strike a lot of stuff just 19 because you d o n 't like the answer. 20 Q. Do you want to talk about all of my 21 objections? 22 A. No. I 'm just giving you a general one. 23 MR. GINSBERG: Mr. Swetonic, le t 's wait 24 for Mr. Jones to ask a question, and w e 're 25 soon going to have a lunch break and we can SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 075:01 say what the science was in 1966. Mr. 02 Swetonic wasn't even involved with asbestos 03 in 1966. 04 Q. The statement "No one really knows what 05 causes cancer" was not true in 1966, was it? 06 MR. MODESITT: Objection. Foundation. 07 THE WITNESS: Without knowing the 08 context in which he made the statement, I 09 c a n 't answer the question. 10 Q. In your review of the literature dealing with 11 asbestos hazards and the knowledge of those hazards, 12 you acknowledge that by the 1950s people knew 13 asbestos caused lung cancer, true? 14 A. That is correct. 15 Q. And you also acknowledged that by 1960 16 asbestos caused mesothelioma, true? 17 A. That is correct. 18 Q. And certainly Johns-Manville had those 19 documents because that's where you got them, true? 20 A. Yes. 21 Q. So, in 1966 Johns-Manville knew that asbestos 22 caused cancer, true? 23 A. I would have to believe so. 24 Q. So the statement "No one really knows what 25 causes cancer" is not true? Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 073 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 075 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 076:01 MR. MODESITT: Same objection. 02 Foundation. 03 THE WITNESS: Probably not, at least as 04 far asbestos is concerned. 05 Q. This statement mentions studies that 06 Johns-Manville was funding, one with the Asbestos 07 Textile Institute, and one through the Quebec 08 Asbestos Mining Association. 09 Are you familiar with those initiatives? 10 A. The textile institute one, no, I c a n 't recall 11 what that is. The mining one, yes, of course, that 12 was Corbett McDonald's big study at McGill. 13 Q. And you were aware when you were at 14 Johns-Manville that they and other industry 15 companies were sponsoring studies about asbestos? 16 A. Um-mm. Yes. 17 Q. And the idea was that the studies about 18 asbestos sponsored by the asbestos industry would be 19 published in the medical and scientific literature, 20 true? 21 MR. MODESITT: Objection. Foundation. 22 THE WITNESS: Yes. Basically, I think 23 that's true. If they're going to form the 24 basis of good public policy they have to be 25 in the literature and be peer reviewed. That SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 078:01 Q. And at the time you were involved in asbestos 02 health in the late 1960s and early 1970s, 03 Dr. Selikoff went to great lengths to publicize the 04 hazards of asbestos, true? 05 A. Yes. 06 Q. And you're aware of his study of insulators, 07 true? 08 A. Of course. 09 Q. And you read it? 10 A. I read it numerous times. 11 Q. And when you read it, you were convinced 12 these people are getting cancer from asbestos, true? 13 A. We sent a version out in our media kit. 14 Q. You were convinced these people are getting 15 cancer from asbestos, true? 16 A. T h a t 's correct. 17 Q. So, in 1966, Hill & Knowlton, Johns-Manville, 18 they knew asbestos caused cancer, true? 19 A. I c a n 't speak to what they knew. A H I can 20 tell you is what I knew when I knew it. 21 Q. When you started in the Environmental Health 22 Task Force in 1968, Johns-Manville and Hill & 23 Knowlton had in their possession at that time all of 24 the articles and studies they needed to conclude 25 asbestos causes cancer, true? Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 076 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 078 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 077:01 makes sense. 02 Q. And if you flip to the last page of this 03 document, it says, "Reference (by Dr. Irving J. 04 Selikoff) to an elevated incidence of cancer among 05 those exposed to asbestos dust is based on limited 06 reports relating to a relatively small group of 07 workers who install and/or remove a variety of 08 insulation materials, including some which contain 09 asbestos." 10 Did I read that correctly? 11 A. Um-mm. Yes. 12 Q. That's misleading in the sense that you've 13 acknowledged that Mr. Selikoff's paper and the 14 conference in 1964 confirmed that insulators working 15 with asbestos were getting cancer, including lung 16 cancer and mesothelioma, true? 17 A. When I wrote that, yes. But I wrote that in 18 1974. This is eight years prior to that. And I 19 d o n 't know -- you -- again, y o u 're asking me to 20 figure out what these people were thinking then when 21 they wrote a document long before I was ever 22 involved in the issue. 23 Q. My question is a little different. You 24 looked at Mr. -- Dr. Selikoff's papers, true? 25 A. Of course I did. SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 079:01 A. I d o n 't know that that's a fact. 02 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Objection. 03 Argumentative. 04 THE WITNESS: T h a t 's too, you know -- 05 i t 's beyond my knowledge. 06 Q. When you got there and started reading -- 07 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Excuse me, Counselor. 08 Also calls for expert opinion. Thank you. 09 Q. You got there in 1968 and started reading the 10 studies in Johns-Manville's possession, right? 11 A. Yes. Of course. I d i d n 't read 4,000 of 12 them. 13 Q. You read enough to get your -- to wrap your 14 head around the problem, right? 15 A. Right. 16 Q. And you read some studies that predated 1966, 17 didn't you? 18 A. Yes, of course. 19 Q. And those studies were in John Manville's 20 hands, right? 21 A. I assume they were. 22 Q. So Johns-Manville had before 1966 studies 23 indicating that asbestos caused cancer, true? 24 A. I would think they did, yes. 25 MR. JONES: L e t 's go off the record and Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 077 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 079 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 080:01 take a lunch break. 02 THE VIDEOGRAPHER: We are now going off 03 the record, and the time is approximately 04 12:53 p.m. 05 (Lunch recess from 12:53 to 1:51.) 06 THE VIDEOGRAPHER: We are now going back 07 on the record. The time is approximately 08 1:51 p.m. 09 BY MR. JONES: 10 Q. Mr. Swetonic, are you ready to proceed with 11 your deposition? 12 A. Surely. 13 Q. I want to talk to you a little bit about the 14 Asbestos Information Association and the goals of 15 that organization. Okay? 16 In short, the Asbestos Information 17 Association assumes whatever activities and 18 responsibilities it deems necessary to protect the 19 interests of the asbestos industry in the United 20 States as it relates to asbestos health; is that 21 true? 22 A. Basically. But what we interpret that to 23 mean is that we originally were scheduled to do 24 nothing but, you know, information, public relations 25 basically, to get the truth out about the hazards, SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 082:01 States vis--vis asbestos health? 02 A. As I said, the best way to protect that is to 03 make sure that the people who need to know and 04 understand about the basics about asbestos health 05 and also how to control it, what needs to be 06 controlled, what is safe, what is not safe, and how 07 to go about handling it in a way that would be safe 08 for people who have got products that are 09 questionable. 10 Q. Now, is it your testimony that when you and 11 the association learned of asbestos use that was not 12 safe, you would make sure the public knew about it? 13 A. Well, I think we could say that's true. The 14 one specific example that I think I wrote about in 15 my article from 20 years ago was finding out that 16 asbestos from the government stockpile was being 17 purchased and used for modeling kits for Cub Scouts 18 and Boy Scouts and that sort of thing. So we took 19 it upon ourselves to write letters to like 5,000 20 different operations suggesting that this was a 21 very, very hazardous thing to do, and quit doing it 22 immediately. So, you know, there were things like 23 that. But the basic thing about asbestos problems 24 is the vast majority of them were really confined to 25 the insulation trades and to the insulation areas, Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 080 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 082 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 081:01 and where there were none, lack of hazards of 02 asbestos to the people that needed to now about it. 03 And that required us to get into a whole bunch of 04 areas that we had not originally planned as part of 05 our domain. I talked about them in a speech that 06 was discussed in-depth in the last deposition. And 07 things like, well, the government relations thing 08 didn't really exist at that time. We got into that. 09 We got into some limited research. We got into 10 producing technical booklets to help industry 11 members, not just our own members, but other 12 companies in the industry who d i d n 't have the 13 expertise to be able to know how to abide by the 14 various occupational, OSHA standards, EPA standards, 15 whatever they may happen to be. Also, we developed 16 a handbook for employees to help them understand how 17 the OSHA standards work. So we got into employee 18 relations to that extent as well. So that's what I 19 meant by we would -- w e 'd put more on our plate than 20 we had originally, you know, planned when we started 21 out. 22 Q. But the quote from the speech was that their 23 purpose had become whatever activities and 24 responsibilities it deems necessary to protect the 25 interests of the asbestos industry in the United SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 083:01 and t h a t 's why Manville initiated that program that 02 it put in place with Selikoff at Mount Sinai to try 03 and develop techniques for handling and minimizing 04 dust exposure to the workers in that industry. 05 Q. And I will move to strike as nonresponsive. 06 MR. JONES: We're not on the phone. 07 THE VIDEOGRAPHER: The time is 08 approximately 1:56 p.m. We are going off the 09 record. 10 (Recess from 1:56 to 2:04.) 11 MR. JONES: We're going to go back on 12 the record. I think you missed two 13 questions, and I will put on the record that 14 you will reserve all objections to the two 15 questions. Let's go back on the record. 16 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Can we get a read-back 17 of the questions? 18 MR. JONES: It would take forever. 19 DEFENSE COUNSEL: I would like a 20 read-back. 21 MR. PARKER: Let's just do a read-back. 22 It will be faster. 23 MR. JONES: All right. Go ahead. We're 24 off the record. Can you do a read-back off 25 the record? Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 081 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 083 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 084:01 (Record read back.) 02 (Discussion off the record.) 03 THE VIDEOGRAPHER: The time is 04 approximately 2:04 p.m. We are back on the 05 record. 06 BY MR. JONES: 07 Q. Who were the members of the Asbestos 08 Information Association when it started? 09 A. Oh, I would have to see a list. It would be 10 on all those documents. I think there were like 11 seven, I believe. 12 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Can we move the 13 microphone a little closer to the witness? 14 We ca n 't hear the witness. 15 Q. I will ask the question again. Do you recall 16 the names of the member companies of the Asbestos 17 Information Association when it started? And if I 18 can find something that lists them, I will gladly 19 hand it to you quickly. 20 A. There would be a question and answer card 21 that we produced that's got the original list of 22 companies on it. Do you know what I 'm referring to? 23 Q. I think I do. Where is the -- 24 A. It would be in the -- 25 Q. In this thing? SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 086:01 MR. JONES: The last page, t h a t 's all 02 I 'm going to ask him about. 03 MR. GINSBERG: He needs to see what -- 04 MR. JONES: He knows what it is. 05 MR. GINSBERG: I beg your pardon. 06 MR. JONES: Go ahead. 07 MR. GINSBERG: The witness is entitled 08 to see what the document is that you are 09 handing him. 10 MR. JONES: Fair enough. 11 Q. Do you recognize that document? 12 A. Yes. 13 Q. Can you flip to that page that has the list 14 of companies? 15 A. Yes. 16 Q. Does that refresh your recollection as to 17 what companies were members when the AIA started? 18 A. Let me see. Certain-teed, Flintkote, GAF, 19 Johns-Manville, National Gypsum, Raybestos, and I 20 think there was one other. I am not sure what the 21 last one is. So there were seven, I believe. I 22 d o n 't remember what the other one is. 23 Q. Okay. Thank you. So we're missing one? 24 A. From the original list, yes. 25 Q. But that original member is probably one of Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 084 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 086 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 085:01 A. No. That came later. There's an earlier 02 document. It was a laminated card. 03 Q. I don't have a laminated card, but I will 04 hand you a document entitled "Asbestos and Health 05 Information File," dated April 1973. It's got a 06 list of companies and maybe you can tell me if you 07 remember which ones -- 08 MR. GINSBERG: First off, do you need to 09 mark this as a deposition exhibit? 10 MR. JONES: I don't need to. 11 MR. GINSBERG: Well, how are you going 12 to show it to the witness otherwise? 13 MR. JONES: I'll show him anything I 14 want, but if you want to mark it as an 15 exhibit I can. 16 MR. PARKER: I'm going to ask that 17 anything that is shown to the witness be 18 marked so that we have a record later on. 19 MR. JONES: No problem. 20 (Whereupon, Plaintiff's Deposition 21 Exhibit No. 6 was marked for 22 Identification.) 23 Q. Can you look at this -- marked as Exhibit 6. 24 Are you familiar with this document? 25 A. Sure. We distribute it. SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 087:01 the ones listed on -- 02 A. T h e y 're all listed there. 03 Q. -- on Appendix A of Exhibit 6? 04 A. The seventh one is probably one of those. 05 Q. Okay. And you would agree with me that the 06 companies listed on Appendix A of Exhibit 6 are the 07 members; of the association as of April 1973? 08 A. T h a t 's correct. 09 Q. Okay. Now, there are other organizations 10 that the AIA worked with that weren't members of the 11 association; is that true? 12 A. Yes. 13 Q. Other trade associations? 14 A. Well, I 'm not quite sure if working with them 15 is correct, but we try to coordinate and make sure 16 that whatever we did that they knew about, that sort 17 of thing. 18 Q. And vise versa, they tried to let you know 19 about the things that they were doing? 20 A. I d o n 't know if t h a t 's true. I d o n 't recall 21 getting any regular communications from the others. 22 It seemed to me it was more of a one-way street, 23 that we would go talk to them rather than they come 24 and talking to us, but I could be wrong. 25 Q. What were some of those other organizations Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 085 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 087 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 088:01 or trade associations? 02 A. Well, the only two that I can really remember 03 were the Asbestos Textile Institute and the Asbestos 04 Cement Products, whatever it was called. Those are 05 the ones I remember best of all. 06 Q. Do you recall coordinating with the Friction 07 Materials Standards Institute? 08 A. No, I d o n 't. 09 Q. Do you recall the name Ed Drislane? 10 A. No. 11 Q. James Armstrong or Jim Armstrong? 12 A. Yes, that sounds familiar, but I c a n 't place 13 it. 14 Q. Are you familiar with a company named Bendix? 15 A. Sure. 16 Q. And Bendix later became a member of the 17 Asbestos Information Association; is that true? 18 A. Are they on that list? 19 Q. Not on that one, but -- 20 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Lack of foundation. 21 Calls for speculation. 22 Q. Bendix later became a member of the 23 association, and I will show you -- 24 A. Well -25 MR. GINSBERG: Wait for there to be a SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 090:01 Q. And this is after you left, but you're listed 02 as an attendee at this particular meeting. So I 03 don't mean to represent that you were still the 04 executive secretary. After you left the 05 association, you stayed on as a role of a consultant 06 when you were employed by Hill & Knowlton; is that 07 true? 08 A. T h a t 's correct. 09 Q. And you continued to attend the meetings for 10 a while; is that true? 11 A. Well, this is -- obviously, I attended this 12 one, at least according to this I did. I d o n 't 13 really remember it, but go ahead. 14 Q. Would you agree with me that Exhibit 7 is the 15 notes or minutes from the board of directors meeting 16 of the Asbestos Information Association North 17 America dated December 6, 1973? 18 A. Well, let me -- I could go as far as to say 19 that's what it says. 20 Q. Do you have any reason to dispute that that's 21 what this is? 22 A. No. 23 Q. And it lists you asan attendee? 24 A. T h a t 's what it says, yes. 25 Q. And I think this is pretty soon after you Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 088 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 090 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 089:01 question, Mr. Swetonic. 02 Q. As you sit here you don't remember if they 03 became a member or not? 04 A. Well, I 'm just talking about when I was 05 there. 06 Q. Right. 07 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Trey, Hank Holmberg, 08 on this line of questioning could I get a 09 running objection? And I will state those 10 objections. Assumes facts, lacks foundation, 11 calls for speculation, calls for information 12 not within the personal knowledge of this 13 witness. 14 Q. I'm going to show you what I will mark as 15 Exhibit 7 to the deposition. 16 (Whereupon, Plaintiff's Deposition 17 Exhibit No. 7 was marked for 18 Identification.) 19 MR. JONES: I'm just going to ask him 20 about the second page, the sentence -- the 21 second complete paragraph. He saw it. I 22 handed it around. Thank you. 23 Q. I'm showing you what we've marked as Exhibit 24 7. Hopefully, I put a 7 on it. 25 A. Yes. SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 091:01 left. Does that sound right? 02 A. No. I t 's almost six months. 03 Q. Oh, is it? 04 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Hey, Trey, could I get 05 that running objection -- 06 MR. JONES: No. 07 DEFENSE COUNSEL: -- or do you want me 08 to state my objections to each question? 09 MR. JONES: You don't have a running 10 objection. But I would encourage you to only 11 object when the question is objectionable. 12 But if you object to every question, that's 13 your decision. 14 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Okay. Then no running 15 objection. All right. All right. 16 THE WITNESS: I left in the summer of 17 '73, and this is December, so -- 18 Q. Were you still attending meetings at this 19 time? 20 A. Frankly, if you would have asked me without 21 showing me this, I would have said no. But now that 22 I see this, obviously I attended this one. 23 Q. And if you will flip to the second page, the 24 second full paragraph for me? 25 A. The one beginning "Mr. Marsh"? Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 089 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 091 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 092:01 Q. The second full -- I 'm sorry -- "The 02 president." 03 A. Oh, okay. 04 Q. Does this document refresh your recollection 05 as to Bendix becoming a member of the Asbestos 06 Information Association shortly after you left in 07 1973? 08 A. No. 09 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Hank Holmberg. 10 Assumes facts. No foundation. Calls for 11 speculation. THE WITNESS: No, it doesn't refresh my memory. 14 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Calls for hearsay 15 information not within the personal knowledge 16 of this witness. 17 Q. Go ahead. 18 A. No, I d o n 't remember them being there because 19 I d o n 't remember being at the meeting, so. 20 Q. Okay. 21 A. But if it says they joined, they joined. 22 Q. And you don't have any reason to dispute that 23 Bendix was a member of the Asbestos Information 24 Association while you were consulting with the 25 association at the -- SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 094:01 MR. JONES: We need to keep it moving so 02 we don't have to come here another day. 03 MR. PARKER: Unfortunately, that 04 particular question raised a concern in my 05 mind. 06 MR. JONES: I don't have much to say 07 about that one. Actually, I highlighted that 08 one. Let me give you a clean copy of the 09 same thing. 10 MR. GINSBERG: Hand that back, Mr. 11 Swetonic. 12 Q. Thank you. 13 A. Okay. 14 Q. Exhibit 8 is a letter dated June 12, 1972; is 15 that true? 16 A. Correct. Yes. 17 Q. And it's on Asbestos Information Association 18 North America letterhead; is that true? 19 A. It appears that way, yes. 20 Q. And the letter was sent by you; is that true? 21 A. Um-mm. 22 Q. The signature on the third page is in fact 23 your signature; is that true? 24 A. Yes. 25 Q. The letter is to Asbestos Information Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 092 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 094 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 093:01 A. I have no reason to believe that these 02 minutes are incorrect. 03 Q. Okay. And do you see at the top on the list 04 of attendees on the front page? 05 A. Yes. 06 Q. It lists James Armstrong, Bendix Corporation? 07 A. I see that. 08 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Same objections. 09 Q. You kept in contact -- strike that. 10 You worked with other companies in the 11 asbestos business -- let me withdraw that. 12 As you mentioned before, working with 13 regulatory agencies became a big part of what the 14 association did during your time? 15 A. During my time. Correct. 16 Q. In working with regulatory companies, one of 17 the things you had to do was coordinate your efforts 18 with members of the asbestos industry that were not 19 members of the Asbestos Information Association? 20 A. No, that's not true. 21 Q. Let me show you what we will mark as Exhibit 22 8 to the deposition. 23 (Whereupon, Plaintiff's Deposition 24 Exhibit No. 8 was marked for 25 Identification.) SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 095:01 Association I guess group. So those are the top 02 three at the top? 03 A. No. The -- 04 Q. It says AIA/NA Member Companies, and then 05 Environmental Control Subcommittee, and then Legal 06 Counsel? 07 A. Legal counsel is Bradley Walls. 08 Q. And those are groups within the AIA, groups 09 of people? 10 A. Here they are listed on the back, on the last 11 page. Those are the members at the top. 12 Q. Okay. 13 A. Environmental control committee and legal 14 counsel. 15 Q. So those are the individuals included within 16 those three groups? 17 A. Yes. 18 Q. And then it lists several other people who 19 were also getting this letter; is that true? 20 A. Yes. 21 Q. Okay. And one of those people is James 22 Armstrong; is that true? 23 A. Yes. 24 Q. And it says that Mr. Armstrong is from Bendix 25 Corporation; is that true? Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 093 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 095 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 096:01 A. T h a t 's what it says. 02 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Hank Holmberg. 03 Assumes facts. Lacks foundation. Calls for 04 speculation. Calls for hearsay information 05 not within the personal knowledge of this 06 witness. 07 Q. Do you have any reason to dispute that you 08 were sending information to Mr. Armstrong in Bendix 09 before Bendix became a member? 10 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Same objections. 11 THE WITNESS: I d o n 't know. I ca n 't 12 say. 13 Q. Well, this seems to indicate that you did? 14 A. I would grant you that, but I c a n 't say for 15 sure. 16 Q. Okay. Do you have any reason to believe that 17 you didn't send this letter? 18 A. No. 19 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Same objections. 20 Q. You don't dispute that you did? 21 A. No, I have no idea where the list came of 22 people to send it to. T h a t 's what I 'm talking to. 23 Q. Fair enough. But the letter you sent was 24 signed by you and it had Mr. Armstrong's name on it 25 when you signed it, right? SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 098:01 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Same objections. 02 THE WITNESS: Yes. 03 Q. You're just saying you don't know if it was 04 your idea or somebody else in the association? 05 A. Well, I can almost guarantee you it was not 06 my idea. Where would I come up with the names? 07 Q. I don't know. 08 A. Well, I wouldn't. 09 Q. You also coordinated with Mr. Armstrong and 10 the Bendix Company a planned campaign to put out -- 11 I 'm going to try that whole thing again. That whole 12 thing is a mess. 13 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Same objections. 14 MR. JONES: Thank you, Hank. 15 Q. You also coordinated with Bendix and 16 Mr. Armstrong at Bendix in an effort to put out some 17 publicity about asbestos and asbestos-containing 18 products in particular product areas; is that true? 19 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Same objections. Plus 20 argumentative. 21 THE WITNESS: Well, you would have to be 22 more specific because for the life of me I 23 c a n 't remember what the hell Bendix did for a 24 living. 25 Q. Brakes. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 096 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 098 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 097:01 A. That is correct. 02 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Same objections. 03 Q. And it's dated June 12, 1972; is that true? 04 A. Yes. 05 Q. And the subject of the letter, generally 06 speaking, is coordinating communication with OSHA 07 about the regulations that just went into place; is 08 that true? 09 A. Yes. 10 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Same objections. 11 Q. And it appears from your letter that you were 12 coordinating this effort with the members of the 13 association and Mr. Armstrong from Bendix, true? 14 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Same objections. 15 THE WITNESS: It would appear that we 16 were -- a number of people were invited in. 17 Who invited them, I have no idea. Not 18 necessarily me. It could have been any of 19 the members or whatever. So, I c a n 't say why 20 these people were invited and who gave me the 21 list to invite. 22 Q. Fair enough. But it is your letter that you 23 signed that invited Mr. Armstrong to the 24 association's efforts to coordinate on OSHA 25 regulations, true? SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 099:01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 A. Oh, okay. Now y o u 've enlightened me. Q. Does that sound right? A. I 'll assume y o u 're telling the truth -- Q. Pardon? A. -- because I d o n 't know. Q. Okay. MR. JONES: What exhibit are we on? (Whereupon, Plaintiff's Deposition Exhibit No. 9 was marked for Identification.) DEFENSE COUNSEL: Hey, Trey, if this is another exhibit that you are going to be asking him about my client, can you give me prior notice so that I know that you're talking about my client as opposed to somebody else? MR. JONES: I mean, you will hear from the question and then you'll know. I don't know how else to do it. DEFENSE COUNSEL: Okay. Well, then I 'll just make the objections now. And I will reserve the right to make the objections. MR. JONES: There's no question pending. DEFENSE COUNSEL: Assumes facts, and lacks foundation, calls for speculation, and Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 097 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 099 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 100:01 calls for hearsay information not within the 02 personal knowledge of this witness. 03 MR. JONES: Thank you. 04 THE WITNESS: Okay. 05 Q. Exhibit 9 is a document dated September 19, 06 1972; is that true? 07 A. Yes. 08 Q. And it's on Asbestos Information 09 Association/North America letterhead, true? 10 A. Correct. 11 Q. And that's your signature at the bottom? 12 A. Um-mm. 13 Q. This letter was sent to people listed on the 14 second page of that document, true? 15 A. Right. 16 Q. What was your answer? 17 A. Yes. At least that's what it says. 18 Q. Right. And do you have any reason to dispute 19 that this was a letter that you sent? 20 A. No, not really. Once again, I d o n 't remember 21 it, but that's a matter of time. 22 Q. The first paragraph says, "In order that the 23 Asbestos Information Association positive publicity 24 program on asbestos and asbestos-containing products 25 can be launched as soon as possible, it is essential SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 102:01 member of the association? 02 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Same objections. 03 Q. Other than the two doctors at the end? 04 A. Well, of course, Cape Asbestos is a British 05 company. Turner Brothers is a British company. 06 Turner & Newell is a British company. I d o n 't know 07 what the purpose of this Firemen's Funds Insurance 08 Company is to be honest with you. So there are a 09 few things on there that I c a n 't explain why they 10 are there. 11 Q. Do you recall the Illinois legislation 12 proposed that would ban certain asbestos products 13 and in particular would ban asbestos brakes? 14 A. No, I do not. 15 Q. One of the things that the Asbestos 16 Information Association did while you were a member 17 of that association was lobby? 18 A. Is that a question? 19 Q. Yes. 20 A. Well, it depends on how you use lobby. We 21 d i d n 't lobby Congress or anything like that. So, 22 basically, what we did is we basically worked with 23 the regulatory agencies. I d o n 't if that is defined 24 as lobbying or not. 25 Q. Well, you would have representatives, Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 100 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 102 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 101:01 that we are able to determine priority areas for our 02 initial efforts." 03 A. I d o n 't think we ever actually did anything. 04 Q. But did I read that correctly? 05 A. Yes. 06 Q. So there was a plan to do positive publicity, 07 but you don't remember that that actually happened? 08 A. No, I d o n 't believe it did. 09 Q. Okay. The idea in the next paragraph was 10 that the positive publicity would be targeted to 11 particular markets where particular asbestos 12 products were sold, true? 13 A. Yes, that is what it says. 14 Q. Okay. And this letter was also sent to James 15 Armstrong at the Bendix Corporation? 16 A. So it says, yes. 17 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Same objections. 18 Q. And do you have any reason to dispute that 19 this letter was sent to Mr. Armstrong at the Bendix 20 Corporation? 21 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Same objections. 22 THE WITNESS: No, I d o n 't. I d o n 't 23 understand why it was, but -- 24 Q. Is Mr. Armstrong the only person listed on 25 the list of recipients of this letter that is not a SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 103:01 including yourself and other members of the 02 association, go meet with regulators from, for 03 example, OSHA or the EPA or the FDA, true? 04 A. Yes, that is true. 05 Q. And, in fact, you met with all of those 06 different groups, true? 07 A. Yes, indeed, at onepoint oranother. 08 Q.You describe in your book chapter some of 09 those efforts; is that true? 10 A. Yes. 11 Q. You wrote a book chapter entitled, "Death of 12 the Asbestos Industry," true? 13 A. Um-mm. I think you need to understand what 14 that was designed to do. It was written as a 15 teaching tool for public relations courses at the 16 college level, and it was one of about 25 or so 17 similar chapters on different things that were put 18 in there. It was not meant to be any sort of 19 definitive thing, nor is it -- I d i d n 't spend a lot 20 of time on it. And 90 percent of w h a t 's in there -- 21 99 percent of w h a t 's in there was something I 22 remembered off the top of my head 20 years after the 23 fact. 24 Q. I will move to strike the nonresponsive 25 portions of the answer, and I think that's Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 101 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 103 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 104:01 everything after yes, but I'm going to look and see 02 if you actually said yes. You said "Um-mm." So I 03 am going to ask that question again. 04 MR. GINSBERG: I think the question has 05 been asked and answered. 06 Q. Well, the court reporter can't record um-mm. 07 So I am going to ask it again. 08 MR. GINSBERG: Can you ask him what he 09 meant by um-mm? 10 MR. JONES: No. I am just going to ask 11 the same question. 12 MR. GINSBERG: And he will give you the 13 complete answer. 14 MR. JONES: He can do that. 15 Q. You wrote a book chapter entitled "Death of 16 the Asbestos Industry," yes or no? 17 A. Yes. 18 (Whereupon, Plaintiff's Deposition 19 Exhibit No. 10 was marked for 20 Identification.) 21 Q. I'm showing you what has been marked as 22 Exhibit 10 to the deposition, and I showed that to 23 you a little earlier. Do you recall that document? 24 A. Yes. 25 Q. Exhibit 10 is in fact the book chapter you SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 106:01 the things that the association did to protect 02 people from hazardous asbestos products that aren't 03 true; is that correct? 04 A. No, that's not true. Everything in this 05 paper to the best of my knowledge is true. 06 Q. Okay. One of the things that you said was 07 that Dr. Selikoff asked you to help with a problem 08 about asbestos coats, true? 09 A. That's true. 10 Q. And you said that you helped Dr. Selikoff 11 with this problem, true? 12 A. I couldn't solve it, but he solved it on his 13 own. 14 Q. You did what Dr. Selikoff asked you to do. 15 Is that your testimony? 16 A. Yes, it is. 17 Q. And the issue was someone was importing 18 fabric that included asbestos because if they 19 imported the fabric without asbestos it had a high 20 tariff, if they imported it without asbestos it had 21 a -- strike that. If they imported the fabric with 22 asbestos there was virtually no tariff, and if they 23 did it without there was a high tariff, right? 24 A. That's correct. 25 Q. And the fabric was going to be used for Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 104 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 106 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 105:01 wrote entitled "Death of the Asbestos Industry," 02 true? 03 A. As we reprinted it at E. Bruce Harrison for 04 our own publicity purposes. 05 Q. And the publication date of the book this was 06 included in was 1993? Yes? 07 A. Yes. 08 Q. And what you said about asbestos was that it 09 was probably the most hazardous industrial material 10 ever unleashed on an unsuspecting world, true? 11 A. That's what I said. 12 Q. Your job at the Asbestos Information 13 Association was to make sure that these companies 14 could keep selling what you described as the most 15 hazardous industrial material ever unleashed on an 16 unsuspecting world, true? 17 A. No. Because you've got to remember that that 18 thing was written 20 years later for a purpose, 19 which I'm sure you will strike, for college students 20 as a teaching tool. It was not meant to be anything 21 more than that. And it was supposed to be written 22 so it would be interesting to college students. 23 Q. Move to strike the nonresponsive portions of 24 the answer, which is everything after "No." 25 You made some statements in this paper about SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 107:01 coats? 02 A. Yes, women's coats. 03 Q. So to get around a tariff, a guy was going to 04 import asbestos coats? 05 A. Right. 06 Q. What you wrote in your book chapter is that 07 you received a call from Dr. Selikoff and that he 08 had a problem that he hoped you could help him with, 09 right? And you said in your book chapter that you 10 did whatever he asked you to do, right? 11 A. Yeah, which was talk to the guyto no avail. 12 Q. And you said in your bookchapter that the 13 situation he described was so preposterous even I 14 had trouble believing any business persons anywhere 15 could be so ignorant of the evidence regarding the 16 health risks of asbestos, or so callous they didn't 17 care; is that true? 18 A. Yes. That's what I wrote. 19 Q. The truth is is that Mr. Selikoff asked you 20 and the association to publicly say that the 21 asbestos coats were a hazard? 22 A. No, he did not. 23 Q. I'm going to show you what we'll mark as 24 Exhibit 11 to the deposition. 25 (Whereupon, Plaintiff's Deposition Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 105 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 107 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 108:01 Exhibit No. 11 was marked for 02 Identification.) 03 A. Well, w h a t 's in here is -- 04 Q. I haven't asked you a question yet, and I 05 will ask you a question. 06 A. Fine. 07 MR. JONES: Oh, thank you. I couldn't 08 ask a question if I wanted to. 09 Q. Exhibit 11 is a letter dated May 4, 1971, 10 true? 11 A. Yes. 12 Q. And this letter is on Asbestos Information 13 Association/North America letterhead, true? 14 A. Yes. 15 Q. It's dated May 4, 1971, true? 16 A. Yes. 17 Q. And it's signed by you, true? 18 A. Yes. 19 Q. That is in fact your signature on the last 20 page of the document, true, last page of the letter? 21 A. Yes. 22 Q. Do you have any reason to dispute that's your 23 signature? 24 A. No. 25 Q. Do you have any reason to dispute that this SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 110:01 Q. Does that also refresh your recollection that 02 local , state and federal agencies were trying to ban 03 asbestos products? 04 A. No. 05 Q. Did you accidentally put that in this letter? 06 A. Well, I 'm not sure exactly what I was 07 referring to. So I c a n 't agree with it one way or 08 the other. 09 Q. But this is in a letter that you signed, 10 true? 11 A. Yes. I see that. 12 Q. Okay. Thank you. Nothing further on that. 13 MR. GINSBERG: Have you finished 14 answering the question, Mr. Swetonic? 15 A. Not really. The statement in the -- 16 Q. There's no question pending, but go ahead. 17 And I'm going to object to nonresponsive -- 18 A. Of course. 19 Q. -- but your lawyer has encouraged you to talk 20 and I guess you can talk. 21 A. The story in the magazine article, which was 22 written 23 years after this incident, reflects my 23 best recollection of what happened at the time. 24 And, indeed, I did meet with this guy and Selikoff 25 did ask me to talk to him, and I did. Whether this Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 108 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 110 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 109:01 is your letter? 02 A. No. 03 Q. In that letter in the first paragraph you 04 say, and I will quote, "As you recall from the April 05 16 AIA/NA board meeting, the Association had been 06 requested by Dr. Irving J. Selikoff to condemn the 07 use of asbestos in the manufacture of cloth for 08 women's coats." 09 Did I read that correctly? 10 A. Um-mm. 11 Q. And, in fact, the association refused 12 Dr. Selikoff's request and would not condemn the use 13 of asbestos coats, true? 14 A. T h a t 'swhat it says. 15 Q. In the second numbered section on page 1 you 16 said, "To condemn the use of the cloth on the basis 17 of its being a health hazard would be even worse, 18 for it would place the AIA/NA in the position of 19 giving tacit approval to the contention that even 20 slight exposure to asbestos can be hazardous. This, 21 of course, completely undercut our current efforts 22 to defeat local, state and federal moves to ban 23 asbestos-containing products." 24 Did I read that correctly? 25 A. Yes. SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 111:01 part of it was also true, I have no idea. I assume 02 it is, but w h a t 's in the article is true as well. 03 Q. Move to strike as nonresponsive. 04 MR. JONES: Can I see -- gentlemen, can 05 I see this one? 06 Q. I show you what I will mark as Exhibit 12 to 07 the deposition. 08 (Whereupon, Plaintiff's Deposition 09 Exhibit No. 12 was marked for 10 Identification.) 11 Q. I'm not going to ask you about the 12 attachments. Exhibit 12 is a letter dated June 18, 13 1971, true? 14 A. Yes. 15 Q. And it's on Asbestos Information 16 Association/North America letterhead, true? 17 A. Yes. 18 Q. The third page of the letter has a signature. 19 Whose signature is that? 20 A. Mine, in my Johns-Manville position. 21 Q. It's on Asbestos Information Association -- 22 A. I understand that. 23 Q. You've got to let me finish my question. 24 This letter is on Asbestos Information Association 25 letterhead, true? Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 109 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 111 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 112:01 A. Well, you asked me first if it was my 02 signature, and I said as coordinator of special 03 projects, which was my title at Johns-Manville. 04 Q. I asked you was it your signature? 05 A. Yes, and Isaid -- 06 Q. And so this is my question. Is that your 07 signature on the third page? 08 A. Yes. 09 Q. And is thisAsbestos Information Association 10 letterhead? 11 A. Yes. 12 Q. Okay. And in this document -- well, let me 13 just ask you this. Part of your job at the AIA was 14 to convince people that things like asbestos brakes 15 and asbestos floor tiles and ceiling tiles were safe 16 products, true? 17 A. We certainly looked -- I d o n 't think we ever 18 really looked at brake linings to any large extent 19 except in their end use. 20 Q. Can you look at the third paragraph -- pardon 21 me -- the third page, next to last paragraph, in the 22 middle, second part of the sentence says, "Should 23 the American public come to accept the proposition 24 that a certain coat" -- 25 A. I 'm sorry. I 'm looking at the wrong place I SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 114:01 going to spread to a ban of other things? 02 A. Basically, yes. 03 Q. You knew that the asbestos coats were a 04 health hazard? 05 A. Nonsense. They were no such thing. 06 Q. Let me show you what we will mark as Exhibit 07 13. 08 (Whereupon, Plaintiff's Deposition 09 Exhibit No. 13 was marked for 10 Identification.) 11 MR. JONES: That's this one. Oh, I got 12 them all back. June 21, '71 is Exhibit 13. 13 Q. Are you ready? 14 A. Yes. 15 Q. I'm sorry. Exhibit 13 is a memo marked 16 "Confidential" at the top, dated June 21, 1971, 17 true? 18 A. Um-mm. Yes. 19 Q. And it's signed on the second page, true? 20 A. Yes. 21 Q. Whose signature is that? 22 A. It looks like mine. 23 Q. Do you have any reason to dispute that you 24 wrote this memorandum? 25 A. Probably not. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 112 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 114 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 113:01 guess. Where? You said the third page? 02 Q. The third page, right above your signature. 03 A. Oh, okay. 04 Q. Midway through the last big paragraph. You 05 said in this letter, "Should the American public 06 come to accept the proposition that a certain coat 07 in their closet is capable of giving them cancer, 08 then our job of convincing people that 09 asbestos-containing brake linings or roofing 10 shingles are perfectly safe will become all that 11 much harder, if not impossible." True? 12 A. I 'm just using that as an example. 13 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Same objections. 14 Assumes facts. Lack of foundation. Calls 15 for speculation. Calls for information not 16 within the personal knowledge of this 17 witness. 18 Q. That's what you said in this letter, true? 19 A. Yes. And I just said that what I -- I just 20 pulled that out of left field as two examples -- 21 Q. And this is why -- 22 A. -- not that we were doing anything on those 23 products. 24 Q. This is why you couldn't condemn the use of 25 the asbestos coats because you were worried it was SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 115:01 Q. What does that mean? 02 A. No. 03 Q. You do not dispute that you wrote this memo, 04 true? 05 A. Yes. 06 Q. On the back page you refer to a gentleman 07 named Sid. Who is Sid? 08 A. Sid Speil. He was a researcher at Manville's 09 research center at -- it was attached to the 10 Manville plant in New Jersey. 11 Q. Now, this is a memo you wrote after you 12 received test results dealing with the coats, true? 13 A. Yes. 14 Q. They did some tests on the asbestos coats 15 where they brushed them with a brush, true? 16 A. Um-mm. 17 Q. "Yes"? 18 A. Well, according to this -- now, they -- it 19 looks like they did like a wear test where the women 20 took the coats off 125 times in a six-month period. 21 T h a t 's basically what they did. 22 Q. After you reviewed the test results where 23 they tried to determine if normal use of the 24 asbestos coats would cause a hazard, you determined 25 that they would cause a hazard, true? Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 113 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 115 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 116:01 A. No. T h a t 's not what it says. What it says 02 is Sid and I both agree on the basis of the results 03 so far, we cannot argue very effectively it is not a 04 health hazard. T h a t 's not the same thing. 05 Q. But let me read the exact thing. 06 A. T h a t 's what I just read. 07 Q. "Sid and I both agree that on the basis of 08 the results thus far, we cannot argue very 09 effectively that the coat is not a health hazard." 10 Did I read that correctly? 11 A. T h a t 's what I just read. I would still 12 believe on the basis of this, as I remembered it, 13 that it would not be a health hazard, but i t 's just 14 an inappropriate use of asbestos. That was one of 15 the things that we objected to in so many situations 16 where it should not be used. 17 Q. Move to strike as nonresponsive. 18 A. Of course. 19 Q. And, in fact, in your paper you described 20 such a use of asbestos where you ignore the, quote 21 health risks of asbestos as preposterous, true? 22 A. Well, you have to show me where that is. 23 Q. Page 11. 24 A. I d o n 't have it here. Somebody took it. 25 Q. You have the exhibits now I believe. SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 | 118:01 A. T h a t 's what I said. 02 Q. Okay. Now, despite the health hazards of 03 this use of asbestos and that it was inappropriate 04 use -- 05 A. I - 06 Q. You've got to let me finish my question. Can 07 you agree to let me finish my question? 08 A. If you let me finish my answers. 09 MR. GINSBERG: I think that sounds like 10 a very fair deal, Mr. Jones. L e t 's hear your 11 question. Nice performance. 12 A. Go ahead. 13 Q. Okay. Despite what you described as a 14 preposterous proposition, which is using asbestos 15 fibers in women's coats, you objected to a ban of 16 the use of asbestos coats, true? 17 MR. PARKER: Objection. Argumentative. 18 And misstates his testimony. 19 THE WITNESS: I d o n 't think we said 20 that. I think what we said is we would not 21 support something like that because we d i d n 't 22 believe that the amount of asbestos coming 23 over there could constitute a health hazard 24 over the long run. 25 Q. You did not support a ban of that use either, Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 116 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 118 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 117:01 A. I think they were passed down. 02 MR. JONES: I need the -- you guys have 03 the exhibits, the article? 04 MR. GINSBERG: They may be here. Which 05 exhibit number? 06 MR. JONES: The Death of the Asbestos 07 Industry. 08 MR. MODESITT: Exhibit 10. They are in 09 order. 10 THE WITNESS: What are we talking about? 11 Q. Page 11. 12 A. Hang on. 13 Q. Top left. 14 A. Just a second. Okay. 15 Q. When describing the situation of someone 16 selling asbestos women's coats you said, "The 17 situation he described was so preposterous even I 18 had trouble believing any businesspersons anywhere 19 could be so ignorant of the evidence regarding the 20 health risks of asbestos, or so callous they didn't 21 care." 22 Did I read that correctly? 23 A. Yes. 24 Q. And that's what you said in this chapter, 25 right? SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 119:01 true? 02 A. I would have to go back and see what you were 03 passing out before. 04 Q. I show you what has been marked as Exhibit 14 05 which your attorney has reviewed. 06 (Whereupon, Plaintiff's Deposition 07 Exhibit No. 14 was marked for 08 Identification.) 09 MR. PARKER: Can you identify 14 for the 10 record? 11 MR. JONES: April 11, '72. 12 A. Okay. 13 Q. Exhibit 14 is a letter dated April 11, 1972, 14 true? 15 A. Um-mm. 16 Q. It's on -- that's a "yes"? 17 A. Yes. 18 Q. It's on Asbestos Information 19 Association/North America letterhead, true? 20 A. Yes. 21 Q. And it's signed by you, true? 22 A. Yes. 23 Q. You sent this letter, true? 24 A. Yes. 25 Q. This letter is to the Hearing Clerk, Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 117 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 119 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 120:01 Department of Health, Education and Welfare, true? 02 A. Yes. 03 Q. This letter relates to the proposed ban of 04 the import of asbestos women's coats, true? 05 A. I gather. 06 Q. You objected to the conclusion of the 07 Department of Health, Education and Welfare that 08 those coats "presented an unwarranted hazard of 09 toxicity," true? 10 A. Repeat that again, please? 11 Q. You objected to the conclusion of the 12 Department of Health, Education and Welfare that the 13 women's coats "presented an unwarranted hazard of 14 toxicity," true? 15 A. What I was referring to in this was a letter 16 or an opinion put together by I guess an ad hoc, and 17 FDA ad hoc committee under the chair of Dr. George 18 W. Wright in which he said the "inappropriate use of 19 asbestos fiber, one in which none of the special 20 properties of the fiber which contribute to the 21 welfare of the public are utilized. We would 22 like" -- "like to point out, for the record" -- this 23 is not my quote -- "that the use of asbestos in such 24 garments presented" -- does not -- that that 25 "presented an unwarranted hazard of toxicity does SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 I 122:01 A. Yes, he was. 02 Q. Dr. Wright was, in fact, a paid consultant of 03 Johns-Manville at the time he was on this committee, 04 true? 05 A. He was paid very much to tell us the truth 06 about what was going on, what were the health 07 hazards of asbestos and what w e r e n 't. 08 Q. I will move to strike as nonresponsive. 09 Dr. Wright was a paid consultant of 10 Johns-Manville at the time he was on this FDA 11 committee, true? 12 A. Yes. 13 MR. GINSBERG: Objection. Asked and 14 answered. Argumentative. 15 Q. What was your answer? 16 A. I said yes. 17 Q. In fact, the Asbestos Information Association 18 had other consultants who were medical doctors, 19 true? 20 A. The only one I can remember is Hans Weill at 21 Tulane. 22 Q. There was also a Dr. Kotin? 23 A. Dr. Kotin? 24 Q. K-O-T-I-N. 25 A. Oh, Kotin. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 120 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 122 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 121:01 not represent the position of the Committee as 02 expressed in Dr. Wright's letter. In the letter, 03 Dr. Wright was most careful to point out that the 04 'test were deliberately designed to be many orders 05 of magnitude more severe in terms of applying energy 06 to the garments than would be expected in ordinary 07 usage by the public,' and that 'a buildup of 08 airborne fibers was encouraged.' Despite this 09 testing procedure, the levels were low by comparison 10 with safe occupation levels, and there was 'a wide 11 margin of safety.'" 12 Q. Now, that's Dr. Wright's words that you were 13 quoting in the letter, true? 14 A. No. That is the FDA ad hoc committee's. 15 Q. You said Dr. Wright was careful to point out, 16 true? 17 A. Yes, because he was chairman of the ad hoc 18 committee that FDA put together. 19 Q. And Dr. Wright was not a disinterested 20 scientist when it came to issues of asbestos, true? 21 A. They selected him to be chairman of this 22 committee. 23 Q. My question is Dr. Wright was not a 24 disinterested scientist when it came to issues of 25 asbestos, true? SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 123:01 Q. Kotin. 02 A. I d o n 't think he was ours. I think he was 03 Manville's. 04 Q. And paid consultants of the Asbestos 05 Information Association or other asbestos companies 06 got on to government regulatory boards, true? 07 A. Okay. Let me point out something to you. 08 Paul Kotin was the first director of the National 09 Institute of Environmental Health Sciences. Now, 10 Johns-Manville retained him after he retired from 11 there because of his credibility and credentials. 12 So if you want to crap all over Paul Kotin, you go 13 ahead, but I think y o u 're treading on dangerous 14 ground by doing that in terms of your credibility in 15 front of any scientific group. 16 Q. Move to strike as nonresponsive. 17 A. Of course. 18 Q. The Asbestos Information Association made 19 sure that its paid consultants got on to the boards 20 of regulatory bodies, true? 21 A. No. We had nothing to do with that. 22 Q. You never recommended that people who 23 consulted with the asbestos industry and with the 24 information association specifically, you never 25 recommended them for positions on boards? Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 121 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 123 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 124:01 A. Not that I recall. 02 Q. Okay. 03 A. Undoubtedly, y o u 've got a document. 04 Q. That's been the theme. 05 A. Yes, I know. 06 MR. JONES: You can change it. 07 THE VIDEOGRAPHER: This is the end of 08 tape number two of the videotaped deposition 09 of Mr. Matthew Swetonic. The time is 10 approximately 3:05 p.m., and we are now going 11 off the record. 12 (Recess from 3:05 to 3:17.) 13 THE VIDEOGRAPHER: This is tape number 14 three of the videotaped deposition of 15 Mr. Matthew Swetonic. The time is 16 approximately 3:17 p.m., and we are now back 17 on the record. 18 By MR. JONES: 19 Q. You describe Dr. Wright in your book chapter 20 as "practically a full-time consultant" of 21 Johns-Manville, true? 22 A. Where is that? 23 Q. Page 5, the paragraph on the right about 24 midway, bottom paragraph midway. 25 A. T h a t 's my recollection that he was around a SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 126:01 lot of meetings at the Environmental Health Task 02 Force at Johns-Manville? 03 A. No. I was not on the task force. He was 04 around a lot. I got to know him. 05 Q. Well, you were on the public relations 06 subcommittee of the task force, true? 07 A. Yes. 08 Q. You weren't on his committee, but you were on 09 the task force, right? 10 A. I was on a subcommittee of the task force, 11 yes. 12 Q. And the total Environmental Health Task Force 13 looks like it numbers more than 30 people; is that 14 right? I didn't count them, but it's a lot. 15 A. Well, the policy committee is what counted. 16 And then there were these subcommittees. You had 1, 17 2, 3, 4 -- 4 subcommittees. So, whatever. 18 Q. So Dr. Wright was on the committee that 19 counted, the policy committee? 20 A. Yes. 21 Q. And, in fact, your association and you 22 recommended that Dr. Wright be put on an OSHA 23 asbestos advisory committee in 1973? 24 A. If you say so. You would have to show it to 25 me again -- Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 124 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 126 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 125:01 lot. 02 Q. And, in fact, when you joined the 03 Environmental Health Task Force at Johns-Manville, 04 it was just being reorganized, true? 05 A. I d o n 't know. 06 Q. And Dr. Wright was on the policy committee of 07 Johns-Manville's Environmental Health Task Force, 08 true? 09 A. You would have to show me something, but I 10 guess you will. But, I mean, probably. I know he 11 would be at those meetings. 12 MR. GINSBERG: Do you want to have that 13 marked before we hand it to Mr. Swetonic? 14 MR. JONES: Of course. 15 (Whereupon, Plaintiff's Deposition 16 Exhibit No. 15 was marked for 17 Identification.) 18 A. Okay. I agree he was on the committee. 19 MR. GINSBERG: Wait for there to be a 20 question. 21 Q. You agree that Dr. Wright was on 22 Johns-Manville's Environmental Health Task Force 23 Policy Committee? 24 A. Yes. 25 Q. And I think you said before you saw him at a SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 127:01 Q. Okay. 02 A. -- because I d o n 't remember it. 03 Q. Well, you remember Dr. Wright was on 04 committees? 05 A. Yes. 06 Q. Okay. And you don't remember one way or the 07 other if you and the association recommended he be 08 appointed to committees? 09 A. No. 10 (Whereupon, Plaintiff's Deposition 11 Exhibit No. 16 was marked for 12 Identification.) 13 Q. I'm showing you what's been marked as 14 Exhibit 16. 15 A. I actually remember this. 16 Q. What's the date of that letter? 17 A. April 10, '73. 18 Q. And that's a letter on Asbestos Information 19 Association letterhead? 20 A. Yes. 21 Q. And that's describing your efforts to get 22 some industry representatives on an OSHA asbestos 23 committee, true? 24 A. We were asked to recommend people. 25 Q. Okay. And that's your letter acknowledging Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 125 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 127 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 128:01 that you recommended industry people to get on OSHA 02 asbestos advisory committee, right? 03 A. Right. 04 Q. And you also recommended Dr. Wright be added 05 to the committee, true? 06 A. Well, to a committee. I 'm not sure which 07 committee it is. 08 Q. To the medical advisorycommittee? 09 A. Yes, right. 10 Q. Okay. And, in fact, that was because you 11 believed that perhaps someone who worked with 12 Dr. Selikoff would be appointed to the committee? 13 A. No. It says here that if Selikoff is 14 appointed then we recommended that Wright be 15 appointed as well. 16 Q. And then you said in your letter that you 17 would agree that a neutral member could be the third 18 member, true? 19 A. Yes. 20 Q. You viewed Dr. Selikoff as being on the other 21 side, right? 22 A. Yes. 23 Q. You viewed Dr. Wright as being on your side, 24 right? 25 A. T h a t 's right. SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 130:01 you saw it this was a dangerous practice, true? 02 A. Well, no. What I said was it was a visual 03 demonstration, a public relations nightmare, we 04 would face if we lent our support to asbestos 05 sprayers. It was more the appearance of a problem 06 that prompted concerns. And if you look at some of 07 the documents that were coming out at that time from 08 International Agency for Research on Cancer, the 09 World Health Organization and the Academy of 10 Sciences, they're saying if you find uses of 11 asbestos that are leading to a potential buildup of 12 asbestos in the atmosphere we should control them 13 and get them out of the way, and basically that's 14 kind of where we stood as well. But not that there 15 was a demonstrable health hazard at the time. 16 Q. What you said was that -- 17 A. It was more precautionary. 18 Q. What you said was that when you actually saw 19 this spray asbestos stuff, and you quote -- your 20 quote was "showering down on people," right? Right? 21 A. It might be a quote, yes. 22 Q. And when you saw that, youtold them we can't 23 support you, we can't help you fight the ban, true? 24 A. Yes. 25 Q. That's not what you did, is it? Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 128 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 130 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 129:01 Q. Do you have your book chapter handy? 02 A. Yes. 03 Q. Another thing that you talked about in your 04 book chapter was sprayed asbestos. Do you recall 05 that? 06 A. Yes. 07 Q. And in your book chapter -- 08 A. Which page is that, please? 09 Q. Page 10. 10 A. Yes. 11 Q. In your book chapter you describe personally 12 seeing right here in New York City people spraying 13 asbestos on the steel beams as fireproofing, true? 14 A. Yes. Well, actually I -- I 'm not sure 15 anymore since I reread this whether I saw it or 16 whether I saw motion pictures of it, you know. 17 Q. You either saw it with your own two eyes or 18 you saw a video of it? 19 A. Right. Yes. 20 Q. Okay. And at the time you saw it you knew 21 that there was an effort to ban sprayed asbestos, 22 true? 23 A. Yes. 24 Q. And what you said in your paper was that -- 25 in your book chapter was that you knew as soon as SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 131:01 A. What do you mean that's not what we did? 02 Q. In fact, you and the Asbestos Information 03 Association fought any attempt by any city or state 04 government to ban spray asbestos, true? 05 A. I doubt that strongly. Here we go. 06 Q. And, in fact, you were personally against a 07 ban of spray asbestos, true? 08 A. No, I w a s n 't. 09 Q. I'm going to show you what I will mark as 10 Exhibit 17 to the deposition. 11 (Whereupon, Plaintiff's Deposition 12 Exhibit No. 17 was marked for 13 Identification.) 14 Q. Are you ready, Mr. Swetonic? 15 A. No. 16 Q. Okay. Ready? 17 A. Yes. 18 Q. This memorandum is entitled "Re: Update on 19 Philadelphia Spray Situation," true? 20 A. Yes. 21 Q. And it's dated August 17, 1970, true? 22 A. Right. 23 Q. It's to W. P. Raines and there's several 24 other people looks like at Johns-Manville and one at 25 Hill & Knowlton cc'd, true? Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 129 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 131 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 132:01 A. Right. 02 Q. And the letter is from you, true? 03 A. Yes. 04 Q. It says "Matt Swetonic" at the end, true? 05 A. Yes. 06 Q. Do you have any reason to dispute that you 07 sent this memorandum? 08 A. No, because I remember going down to the 09 ad hoc hearing. 10 Q. And the first thing you say in your 11 memorandum is, and I'll quote, "Things have taken a 12 decided turn for the worse in the spray situation in 13 Philadelphia." 14 Did I read that correctly? 15 A. Um-mm. 16 Q. Is that a "yes"? 17 A. Yes. 18 Q. The last sentence of that paragraph or next 19 to last sentence reads as follows, "I must report, 20 unfortunately, that this statement no longer holds 21 water, and that it appears almost certain that the 22 city will indeed ban the use of asbestos fiber in 23 spray compounds, starting in July 1971." 24 Did I read that correctly? 25 A. Yes. SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 134:01 March 5, 1971, true? 02 A. Yes. 03 Q. And it's a memo written by you, true? 04 A. I guess I was there. I will take a quick 05 look at the end. Yes. 06 Q. Okay. In this memo you describe what you saw 07 at a City of Boston air pollution meeting dealing 08 with spray asbestos and a proposed ban, true? 09 A. Correct. 10 Q. In that meeting you report on page 3 that a 11 Dr. Johnson of the Harvard Medical School 12 Environmental Health Section was in support of a 13 ban, true? 14 A. Um-mm. 15 Q. And his opinion was that mesothelioma can 16 occur at very low levels of exposure, true? 17 A. T h a t 's his opinion. 18 Q. Okay. On the next page Dr. Raymond Murphy, 19 also from Harvard, also favored the ban, true? 20 A. Right. 21 Q. Howard Bradley of the Health and Hygiene 22 Section of the Massachusetts Department of Labor 23 favored a ban, true? 24 A. Okay. 25 Q. Is that true? Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 132 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 134 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 133:01 Q. I'm going to show you what we will mark as 02 Exhibit 18 to the deposition. 03 A. I think I have a need to point something out, 04 and that is that -- 05 Q. There's no question pending, but I can't stop 06 you from talking. 07 A. Good. That our position on these things 08 evolved over time. What we thought was the right 09 thing to do in 1970 we thought was not the right 10 thing to do in 1971. So, regardless of what this 11 says, we were not unsupportive of bans by 1972. 12 Q. I move to strike as nonresponsive. 13 Let me show you what I will mark as Exhibit 14 18. You have seen that. 15 (Whereupon, Plaintiff's Deposition 16 Exhibit No. 18 was marked for 17 Identification.) 18 MR. JONES: Can you hand counsel for Mr. 19 Swetonic Exhibit 19 please. And if you can 20 show him 20. 21 (Whereupon, Plaintiff's Deposition 22 Exhibit No. 19 was marked for 23 Identification.) 24 A. Okay. 25 Q. What I've handed you is a memo dated Friday, SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 135:01 A. Yes. 02 Q. Dr. Elkins, a director of the Occupational 03 Safety and Health Division of the Massachusetts 04 State Department of Labor favored the ban in Boston 05 and also a state-wide ban, true? 06 A. Yes. 07 Q. The Asbestos Information Association had 08 representatives there, one of which at least 09 testified, true? 10 A. Yes. 11 Q. And the position of the Asbestos Information 12 Association was that sprayed asbestos should not be 13 banned, it should be regulated, true? 14 A. Yes. And I might point out that the 15 representative from Dr. Selikoff's operation 16 testified to exactly the same thing. 17 Q. I will move to strike as nonresponsive. 18 A. I t 's responsive as hell. 19 Q. In fact, in 1971, the Asbestos Information 20 Association was sending representatives to cities 21 all across the country who were attempting to ban 22 spray asbestos and they testified against such a 23 ban, true? 24 A. Apparently. 25 Q. And, in fact, in 1973 after EPA asbestos Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 133 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 135 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 136:01 regulations came out about asbestos pollution, you 02 urged the association to go to all those cities that 03 did ban spray asbestos and reverse that ban and 04 convert them to regulations on the process, true? 05 A. No, not true. 06 Q. Let me show you what we have marked as 07 Exhibit 20 to the deposition. 08 (Whereupon, Plaintiff's Deposition 09 Exhibit No. 20 was marked for 10 Identification.) 11 MR. JONES: I showed you that earlier. 12 You can look again. 13 Q. Are you ready? 14 A. Yes. 15 Q. The document I've handed you, which is 16 attached as Exhibit 20, is entitled "Minutes of 17 Board of Directors Meeting" dated May 10, 1973, 18 true? 19 A. Um-mm. Yes. 20 Q. And at the top it says "Asbestos Information 21 Association/North America," true? 22 A. Yes. 23 Q. It lists you as being an attendee at the 24 meeting, true? 25 A. True. SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 138:01 was not asbestos spraying as we all know it. They 02 were petitioned by W.R. Grace, who had a product 03 with one percent asbestos contamination in it, to 04 continue spraying, and for whatever reason EPA went 05 along with W.R. Grace. So there was not 06 uncontrolled asbestos spraying. One percent was an 07 allowable level. And, basically, in the long run 08 that drove W.R. Grace into bankruptcy because they 09 got sued on the production of that at their mine in 10 Libby, Montana. So we were not saying that they 11 should go back to spraying asbestos. We were saying 12 they should not screw around with the EPA 13 regulations and adopt them in toto. T h a t 's what 14 went on. 15 Q. Move to strike as nonresponsive. 16 A. But of course. 17 Q. I want to talk to you a little bit about your 18 efforts to influence OSHA regulations on behalf of 19 the Asbestos Information Association. 20 A. Sure. 21 Q. You would agree with me that the association 22 did attempt to influence OSHA regulations? 23 A. Yes. 24 Q. You testified before Congress -- 25 A. No. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 136 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 138 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 137:01 Q. You were there as your role -- in your role 02 as executive secretary of the association, true? 03 A. Correct. 04 Q. And in thisdocument on page 4there's a 05 heading on Petitions on Spraying, true? 06 A. Correct. 07 Q. And in it it says,"Mr. Swetonicrecommended 08 that the AIA/NA petition each city and state which 09 has a universal ban on asbestos spraying to change 10 their standards to conform with the EPA 11 regulations." 12 Did I read that correctly? 13 A. You read it, but you read it out of context, 14 and I will explain what the context is. 15 Q. I didn't ask, but you may. Actually, I'm not 16 saying you may. And when you do, I'm going to 17 object that it's nonresponsive, but I can't stop 18 you. I am not going to tackle you. 19 A. What this says in here is that the EPA 20 regulations had come out, and what the industry did 21 not want, as is in the case of so many EPA 22 regulations, that every state in the union has its 23 own set of regulations. They wanted one uniform set 24 of regulations that would apply in all states. 25 Now, the spraying that was allowed under EPA SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 139:01 Q. -- in an effort -- 02 A. I did not testify in front of Congress. 03 Q. No. I'm sorry. I misspoke. 04 You testified before OSHA? 05 A. At their rule-making hearing, yes, along with 06 a lot of other people. 07 Q. Your testimony before OSHA was that meeting 08 OSHA standards as proposed would cost the industry 09 200 million dollars? 10 A. I have no copies of my testimony anymore. So 11 if t h a t 's what I said, t h a t 's what I said. 12 Q. I have a copy of your testimony. 13 A. I 'm sure. 14 Q. Your testimony begins on 178, and then I'm 15 going to ask you about your testimony on page 184. 16 A. Did you say 184? 17 Q. Can you flip to 178 and just confirm that 18 that is your testimony before OSHA? 19 A. Yes. 20 Q. And I'm going to ask you about a statement on 21 page 184, the second full paragraph beginning at 22 line 12. 23 A. That is the middle of the paragraph. 24 Q. True. Read the whole thing if you need it 25 for context, but that's the statement. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 137 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 139 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 | 140:01 A. Okay. 02 MR. GINSBERG: Wait for a question. 03 THE WITNESS: Sure. 04 Q. Does this refresh your recollection that you 05 testified before OSHA that meeting the proposed two 06 fiber standard would cost the industry in the 07 vicinity of 200 million dollars? 08 A. If that's what it says that's what I must 09 have said. 10 Q. That's what it says, right? 11 A. Yes. 12 Q. Okay. And that's in 1972 dollars, right? 13 A. Yes. 14 Q. And I looked it up. They've got a website 15 where you can do the time value of money thing, and 16 it came up to more than a billion dollars in 2012. 17 Does that sound about right? 18 MR. GINSBERG: I didn't hear you. You 19 said more than a billion? 20 MR. JONES: More than a billion with a 21 B. 22 MR. GINSBERG: Two hundred thousand 23 dollars -- 24 MR. JONES: Two hundred million. I 5 Q. Does that sound about right, 200 million in SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 142:01 meeting these OSHA regulations would make asbestos 02 products more expensive than their non-asbestos 03 competitors? 04 A. That would make sense. 05 Q. And that also would mean asbestos products 06 would no longer be on the market. They would lose 07 competitively to non-asbestos alternatives, true? 08 A. I suspect that would be in some cases. But 09 the cases would be primarily where fiber levels at 10 the plant level or on the installation side were so 11 high that they would be very difficult to bring 12 down. It certainly w ouldn't apply in most asbestos 13 products where the fiber is locked in with cements 14 or binders or whatever. Products which in any cases 15 already were discontinued anyway. 16 Q. The impact of the regulations according to 17 your testimony was that there would be less asbestos 18 products sold on the market, true? 19 A. Yes. 20 Q. And you thought that was a bad thing, true? 21 A. Well, yes, I did. 22 MR. MODESITT: For the purpose of 23 clarification, could you indicate the time 24 I 25 when this statement was given? MR. JONES: The document, this is Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 140 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 142 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 141:01 1972 would be about a billion today? 02 A. Sure. 03 Q. Okay. Now, your testimony before OSHA was 04 that the cost of meeting that standard would make 05 asbestos products no longer profitable. 06 A. Okay. Where do I say that? 07 Q. You said that on page 185, lines 5 through 08 10. While I 've marked this as an exhibit, I didn't 09 officially say -- I 'm marking this as Exhibit 21. 10 Give me one second. I 'm sorry. Thank you. 11 (Whereupon, Plaintiff's Deposition 12 Exhibit No. 21 was marked for 13 Identification.) 14 Q. Go ahead. 15 A. It said where the cost involved would make a 16 particular product line either no longer profitable 17 or no longer competitive on the open market against 18 non-asbestos-containing products of the same type. 19 Okay. So, that's a reasonable statement of fact I 20 would think. 21 Q. These costs would make some asbestos products 22 not profitable and, therefore, they would come off 23 the market? 24 A. Yes. 25 Q. You also testified that the added cost of SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 143:01 Exhibit 21, is dated March 15, 1972. I t 's 02 entitled "Official Report of Proceedings 03 Before the U.S. Department of Labor in the 04 Matter of Standard for Exposure to Asbestos 05 Dust, Proposed Rule Making,Public Hearing." 06 Is that what you meant? 07 MR. MODESITT: Yes. 08 MR. JONES: Sorry I d i d n 't do that 09 before. 10 Q. The reason you were involved in asbestos in 11 the beginning, as we talked about briefly before, 12 was there were reports in the media which you felt 13 were unfair describing the hazards of asbestos, 14 true? 15 A. Well, they got me involved, and then I 16 started looking at them and looking at the research. 17 The big question was not so much whether, for 18 example, Selikoff's people who were having a 19 terrible health experience, the question was whether 20 that was reflective of the conditions throughout the 21 asbestos industry, particularly in the products 22 industry. And we felt that while something 23 obviously needed to be done with Selikoff's 24 situation, that the rest of the industry was being 25 tarnished with that same brush in the media that it Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 141 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 143 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 144:01 was all the same, and that guys making floor tile 02 were dying of the same diseases and the same rates 03 as Irving's people were, and that just w a s n 't true. 04 So that was part of the task. 05 Q. Move to strike the nonresponsive portions. 06 For a while, particularly in New York, there 07 was a lot of press about asbestos? 08 A. Yes. 09 Q. And the press wasn't that asbestos was a good 10 thing, right? 11 A. T h a t 's true. 12 Q. That negative press about asbestos was bad 13 for the members of the Asbestos Information 14 Association, true? 15 A. Yes. 16 Q. It was bad for business, wasn't it? 17 A. I suppose it had the potential to become bad 18 for business. 19 Q. You and the association and many other 20 asbestos companies who testified before OSHA didn't 21 want the public to think any time they're around 22 asbestos they were at risk of getting cancer, true? 23 MR. MODESITT: Objection. Foundation. 24 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Objection. Lack of 25 foundation. Calls for speculation. SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 146:01 that included the word cancer? 02 A. No, we were not opposed to blanket warnings. 03 We were opposed to warnings on products where it was 04 unnecessary to warn anyone. 05 Q. In your opinion, according to your testimony 06 before Congress, including a warning that 07 included -- strike that. 08 In your opinion, and as you testified before 09 Congress, a warning that included the word cancer 10 would spell the demise of any product sold directly 11 to the consumer market, true? 12 A. That would be right because those products 13 are not hazardous and do not cause cancer just 14 because they contain asbestos. 15 Q. The reason it would be the demise of products 16 sold to consumers is because consumers aren't going 17 to buy products where it says on the product it 18 could cause cancer, true? 19 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Objection. Lack of 20 foundation. 21 MR. MODESITT: It calls for speculation. 22 Improper question. Go ahead. 23 THE WITNESS: But if the products d o n 't 24 cause cancer then why should they have a 25 label that says they do. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 144 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 146 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 145:01 THE WITNESS: Give me the question 02 again? 03 Q. Okay. Public acceptance of the idea that 04 asbestos caused cancer would be bad for the sale of 05 asbestos products to consumers, true? 06 A. Not necessarily because the evidence was such 07 that, in fact rather overwhelming, that end products 08 that consumers would buy were not a hazard to them, 09 but that message was not getting out. So that was 10 part of our mandate was to see what we could do to 11 make sure that the people who were concerned 12 understood that for 99 percent, maybe that's 13 probably too high, but for 90 percent of the 14 products there were no problems. 15 Q. Your association was against the inclusion of 16 a warning on asbestos products that included the 17 word cancer, true? 18 A. We were opposed to warning on products that 19 where the fibers were locked in and could not be 20 easily released. That would be -- for example, 21 somebody had the nonsensical suggestion of putting a 22 skull and crossbones on the back of every piece of 23 floor tile. Well, of course, we were opposed to 24 that. 25 Q. In particular you were opposed to a warning SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 147:01 Q. Move to strike as nonresponsive. 02 The reason you were concerned about a warning 03 that said cancer was because you knew nobody is 04 going to buy a product that has a cancer warning on 05 it, right? 06 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Assumes facts. 07 MR. GINSBERG: It's been asked and 08 answered, Mr. Jones. 09 THE WITNESS: Yes, I 've answered it 10 seven ways, and I 'm not going to change my 11 answer. It applied -- our position applied 12 to end products where the asbestos was locked 13 in with various things that would keep it 14 from escaping and would be non-friable 15 products. And there's absolutely no reason 16 why products like that should say cancer or 17 even dangerous because they were not. 18 Q. You testified that -- well, you're not a 19 medical doctor, true? 20 A. No. 21 Q. You're not a scientist, true? 22 A. No. But my testimony was all -- 23 Q. You were a public relations representative 24 for the Asbestos Information Association, true? 25 A. T h a t 's right. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 145 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 147 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 148:01 Q. Okay. 02 A. But my testimony was based on information and 03 such that I got from lots of scientists and people 04 that I worked with. 05 Q. And your testimony on behalf of the Asbestos 06 Information Association in your role of a public 07 relations expert was, and I will quote, "such a 08 label would surely spell the demise of a number of 09 major product lines of the industry, including vinyl 10 asbestos floor tile, asbestos pipe and any other 11 product that is sold directly to the consumer 12 market. In addition, there is no doubt that our 13 competitors will attempt to take advantage of the 14 situation by encouraging the public to avoid 15 asbestos-containing products because of the 16 potential health hazards implied in the warning 17 label even though to the customer no such hazard 18 exists"? 19 A. T h a t 's what I just said. 20 Q. Did I read that correctly? 21 A. T h a t 's what I said. 22 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Somebody needs to 23 check their phone. There is some typing 24 interfering with hearing the testimony. 25 THE WITNESS: I just said it differently SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 150:01 Q. And you told us? 02 A. Yes. 03 Q. Now, you thought that a warning on every 04 asbestos product that included asbestos more than 5 05 percent and included the word cancer -- 06 A. No, t h a t 's not what it says. 07 Q. I'm asking your opinion. You thought that a 08 warning on every asbestos product where the asbestos 09 percentage was greater than 5 and where that warning 10 included the word cancer would mean the demise of 11 all consumer products, asbestos products? 12 A. Yes. And I said it was illogical to require 13 that. 14 Q. And you thought that was a bad thing for 15 there to be less sales of asbestos products to 16 consumers, you thought that was a bad thing? 17 A. Well, asbestos, you know, lends some 18 qualities to products like, for example, the fact 19 that your house w o n 't burn down. So, if the stuff 20 that's in there protecting your house is safe and 21 safer than anything else you can put in there, why 22 the hell w ouldn't you want it in your house. Q. Your testimony was that people would still buy things to stop your house from burning down, only they wouldn't be asbestos, true? Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 148 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 150 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 149:01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 than that, but that's basically what I said. Q. That was in fact your testimony, true? MR. MODESITT: Excuse me. I'm going to object to the characterization of the testimony. He also testified beginning at line 24 on page 186 he said -- MR. JONES: You can ask -- MR. MODESITT: I am going to put this on the record, Trey. MR. JONES: I put in the whole thing on the record. MR. MODESITT: You cannot tell a witness that he testified A, B and C when you know he also said D, E and F. That is unfair. It is not proper. It's not proper examination. MR. JONES: It is not -- you can do your examination when I'm done. I've handed the witness the entire transcript. Now -- MR. GINSBERG: Let's take a moment so that the witness can read the surrounding testimony. MR. JONES: All right. THE WITNESS: Yes. I go on -- indeed, I go on to explain where the logic of that comes from. SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 151:01 A. And they wouldn't be as effective. 02 Q. That's not in your testimony? 03 A. Well, it should be. 04 Q. Okay. But it wasn't. What you did say is -- 05 A. Well, t h a t 's because I d i d n 't get a grilling 06 like this from the people at OSHA. 07 Q. And maybe you should have. 08 A. I d o n 't think so. They understood what I was 09 talking about. 10 Q. And the people at OSHA basically followed 11 everything the industry suggested, true? 12 A. Because it was reasonable. 13 Q. True? 14 A. Yes. 15 Q. And you and the industry were against 16 warnings because they were bad for business, true? 17 A. Oh God, how many times do we have to answer 18 this. The answer is no. You c a n 't say warnings 19 blanket. We were not opposed to warnings on cement, 20 on asbestos products where it was friable. In fact, 21 I say in here that the industry had voluntarily gone 22 out and done that already. 23 Q. The industry had not put the word cancer on 24 it? 25 A. They d o n 't need to. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 149 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 151 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 152:01 Q. Because the word cancer would be bad for 02 sales? 03 A. It would not be bad for sales of consumer 04 products. 05 Q. You knew at the time you testified that the 06 general public was not aware of the hazards of 07 asbestos, true? 08 A. Generally speaking, yes. 09 Q. You knew that in order for the general public 10 to be aware of the hazards of asbestos they would 11 need a warning, true? 12 A. Well, no. You d o n 't warn where products are 13 not hazardous. 14 Q. Who decides if a product is hazardous or not, 15 you? 16 A. No. The government could do that. And 17 that's what they eventually ended up deciding. 18 Q. Okay. You think that the company decides 19 whether or not it's hazardous? 20 A. No. What I said was that the companies 21 voluntarily put stuff on things warning people not 22 to inhale the dust and be careful of doing this and 23 be careful of doing that. 24 Q. Your influence on OSHA was so great that you 25 told OSHA which products needed a warning, true? SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 154:01 think you need to be a little bit more specific 02 than that. 03 Q. In general, you said in your speech there's a 04 lot of stories out here that say that asbestos kills 05 people, right? 06 A. Well, I would have to think exactly what I 07 was referring to on that, but -- 08 Q. You knew the press -- 09 MR. PARKER: I object. That does 10 mischaracterize the June '73 statements. If 11 that's what you're referring to? 12 MR. JONES: That is what I 'm referring 13 to. 14 MR. PARKER: Well, I think that 15 mischaracterizes the -- 16 Q. You knew throughout the '70s, and I think you 17 wrote in an assessment of the public relations 18 situation when you left, that in general press about 19 asbestos is bad for the industry, true? 20 A. Yes. 21 Q. That's the bad news, true? 22 A. Right. 23 Q. And then you said, and I will quote, and "Now 24 having heard the bad side of the public relations 25 problem, it's time for some good news." You said Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 152 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 154 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 153:01 A. We didn't tell OSHA anything. We may have 02 recommended to OSHA or something. We did not have 03 an adversarial position with OSHA because most of 04 the people in OSHA at that time had a long history 05 of industrial health experience and were fully 06 familiar with what needed to be done and what made 07 no sense. 08 Q. You celebrated the fact that the general 09 public didn't know that asbestos was hazardous, 10 true? 11 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Argumentative. 12 THE WITNESS: I know what y o u 're 13 referring to. You d o n 't have to dig it out. 14 What I said was the public -- the good news 15 was that the public did not realize -- did 16 not believe that asbestos was hazardous, 17 which was good because it w a s n 't for the 18 majority of people in the general public, if 19 any, and, therefore, we did not have to shift 20 our focus from being concerned about the 21 occupational setting to being concerned about 22 the general public. 23 Q. The bad news was that there were reports out 24 in the media that asbestos hurt people, right? 25 A. Well, that's a very general statement. I SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 155:01 that, right? 02 A. Yes. 03 Q. And then you said, and I will quote, "And the 04 good news is that despite all the negative articles 05 on asbestos health that have appeared in the press 06 over the past half dozen years, very few people have 07 been paying attention." Is that what you said? 08 A. T h a t 's what I said. And I followed it up by 09 saying that t h a t 's good because the general public 10 is, for the most part, under no -- there is no 11 threat from asbestos, and that is the considered 12 opinion of government bodies both here and in Europe 13 and, therefore -- in fact, I think the other part of 14 that survey found that 80 percent of the people who 15 are aware of the health problems of asbestos felt 16 they were occupational in nature, and that's a good 17 number too. 18 Q. The OSHA regulations were influenced by 19 industry and your association, true? 20 A. Yes. 21 Q. And theBritishgovernmentregulations were 22 influenced by the asbestos information council that 23 you modeled your association after, true? 24 A. Sure. 25 Q. You then said,and I willquote -- Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 153 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 155 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 156:01 MR. PARKER:Excuse me a second, 02 Counsel. Is this marked as an exhibit, 03 whatever you're reading from? 04 MR. JONES: Yes. 05 MR. PARKER:What exhibit is it, please, 06 for the record? 07 MR. JONES: It's going to be Exhibit 22. 08 I'm sorry. It's not an exhibit. It is now, 09 Exhibit 22. 10 (Whereupon, Plaintiff's Deposition 11 Exhibit No. 22 was marked for 12 Identification.) 13 MR. PARKER: Can you identify it for the 14 record, please? 15 MR. JONES: A Presentation Before the 16 Asbestos TextileInstitute, June 7, '73, 17 speech by Mr. Swetonicentitled "Why 18 Asbestos?" 19 MR. PARKER: Thank you. 20 MR. JONES: Sure. 21 BY MR. JONES: 22 Q. You said -- well, this speech was given after 23 you did a public study or a public survey to find 24 out what people knew about asbestos, right? 25 A. T h a t 's correct, yes. SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 158:01 the deposition. 02 (Whereupon, Plaintiff's Deposition 03 Exhibit No. 23 was marked for 04 Identification.) 05 MR. MODESITT: This is from where? 06 MR. JONES: AIA and FMSI. It's attached 07 to an FMSI memo also. 08 MR. MODESITT: You're saying it is an 09 AIA document or is not an AIA document? 10 MR. JONES: Yes, it is an AIA document. 11 THE WITNESS: It doesn't say that, 12 but -- 13 Q. It doesn't. That's true. 14 A. Okay. 15 Q. You see what I marked as Exhibit 23? 16 A. Yes. 17 Q. What is Exhibit 23? 18 A. Well, it appears to be a comparison of the 19 industry position, some sort of advisory committee, 20 which I 'm not familiar with. 21 Q. It says "NIOSH." It's hard to read though. 22 A. Yeah, I know. I 'm not familiar with their 23 recommendations at all. And the final OSHA 24 standard -- I would be more interested in knowing 25 what the OSHA proposal was in the emergency Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 156 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 158 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 157:01 Q. And you found out that consumers weren't 02 aware that asbestos was a hazard, true? 03 A. No. I found out they were not -- yes. 04 Basically that they were not aware that asbestos in 05 general was a hazard. 06 Q. And then you said, and I will quote, "These 07 results should be reassuring to those industry 08 customers who fear that the general public will stop 09 buying their products because they contain 10 asbestos," true? 11 A. True. 12 Q. And, in fact, you celebrated, you and the 13 other members of your association celebrated when 14 OSHA was passed because they did almost everything 15 you wanted them to do, true? 16 A. I know that's what I said in there. I know 17 what I said in there, but I c a n 't be specific as to 18 what those line items were. However, we did do a 19 booklet called "Protecting the Asbestos Worker," and 20 I think the line items are included in that, and it 21 was things like recordkeeping and respirator use and 22 use of clean clothes and showers and all sorts of 23 stuff like that, and yearly exams, a bunch of stuff 24 like that, so. 25 Q. I show you what I will mark as Exhibit 23 to SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 159:01 standard. I d o n 't know what that is. 02 Q. Do you recognize this document? 03 A. No. 04 Q. Do you disagree with the portions where it's 05 marked "Industry Position"? 06 MR. MODESITT: I'm going to object to 07 the phrase industry as a broad phrase. You 08 can ask him about -- 09 MR. JONES: It says "industry." 10 MR. MODESITT: I am talking about if he 11 wants to talk about the industry associated 12 with AIA, that's one thing. That's my 13 objection. 14 MR. GINSBERG: I object to the form. 15 It's not clear what you say -- does he object 16 to the whatever the -- could you repeat the 17 question? 18 MR. JONES: I don't even remember what I 19 said. 20 MR. GINSBERG: It wasn't clear what he 21 was being asked to agree or not agree. 22 THE WITNESS: Well, did we agree that 23 this was the industry position? 24 MR. GINSBERG: You are asking whether 25 the AIA agreed with that? Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 157 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 159 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 160:01 MR. JONES: It says "Industry Position." 02 Sure. 03 Q. Is that the position -- what's marked in this 04 document Exhibit 23 as "Industry Position," were 05 those the positions of the AIA on these various 06 items? 07 A. I couldn't say for all of them to be honest 08 with you. 09 Q. Which ones would you exclude because you 10 don't know if that was the position or not? 11 A. Well, basically, a lot of the housekeeping 12 stuff, the monitoring what the frequency should be 13 on protective clothing -- what the hell is this? I 14 don't know what waste disposal means. Frequency of 15 medical exams -- I just don't know. 16 Q. The top two are -- 17 A. Yes. 18 Q. -- Numerical Standard andLabeling. You 19 agree those were the AIA positions? 20 A. Yes, that's correct. 21 Q. Your coordinated effort to save the asbestos 22 industry was successful, wasn't it? 23 A. Temporarily. 24 Q. Your public relations effortswere successful 25 in getting the word out for the asbestos industry? SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 162:01 correct position then, yes, we were. 02 Q. Workers actually sued the government? 03 A. Yes, they did. 04 Q. Because of the OSHA regulations, true? 05 A. AFL-CIO, a union or somebody did, yes. 06 Q. They felt that the regulations were so in 07 favor of the asbestos industry that they brought 08 suit, right? 09 A. Yes, they did. 10 Q. And -- 11 A. And they lost. 12 Q. The Asbestos Information Association -- okay. 13 I'm glad you -- well, actually I'm not glad. 14 You were successful in defeating the lawsuit 15 of the workers against OSHA; is that true? 16 A. We had nothing to do with it. We submitted 17 an amicus curiae brief, but we were not a party to 18 the suit. It was the IUD of the AFL-CIO against the 19 Secretary of Labor. 20 Q. You admitted that it was a unique position 21 for an industry to find itself supporting 22 regulations against it? 23 A. Yes, that's correct. Q. When you left, the industry got the OSHA and EPA standards they wanted, true? Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 160 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 162 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 161:01 A. Not necessarily really. Still a majority of 02 stories that appeared were very negative. 03 Q. Your effort -- 04 A. We really didn't do a very good job on that 05 in all honesty. 06 Q. Your effort to influence government 07 regulators was successful, true? 08 A. Taken as a whole, it worked out pretty well. 09 Q. Your effort to present favorable science to 10 the government regulators was successful, true? 11 MR. MODESITT: I'm going to object to 12 the form and the use of the word your without 13 further definition. 14 THE WITNESS: I object to the word 15 favorable. What we tried to do was present 16 the scientific facts as they were as opposed 17 to what people imagined them to be. And if 18 you want an example of that, I would be happy 19 to give it to you. 20 Q. You were successful in presenting the 21 industry's position on the science, true? 22 MR. MODESITT: Object to form. 23 THE WITNESS: The industry's position 24 happened to be the correct one. So if you 25 want to be successful in presenting the SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 163:01 A. Well, by and large. I think the EPA 02 recognized what basically ended up, almost all the 03 scientific community believed that asbestos in the 04 general was not a serious threat to the general 05 public except for the household and possibly 06 neighborhood exposures for certain types of 07 asbestos, but that caution would tell you to make 08 sure that if you've got a source of exposure to the 09 public that's easily controlled, or in the case of 10 sprayed asbestos banned, that you do that. 11 Q. When you left the asbestos industry in 1973, 12 you said, and I'll quote, "The horizon frankly 13 looked pretty cheery"? 14 A. I would say that was true. That is one of 15 the reasons I left. I kind of figured hell I've 16 done my job. I can move on to other stuff. 17 Q. And by doing your job, that meant the 18 asbestos industry could continue selling asbestos 19 products, true? 20 A. Those products that were safe to be sold, 21 yes. They pulled the plug on certain products, 22 Manville did, on all the friable asbestos 23 insulation. They just went out of the business. I 24 don't know if other manufacturers did or not. I 25 can't speak for them. But Manville did, and, of Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 161 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 163 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 164:01 course, spraying was a 15,000 ton business that went 02 down the tubes. So, there were certain uses that 03 were no longer in play. 04 Q. You've testified that around the time you 05 were leaving and during some of the time you were 06 consulting for the association the focus moved to 07 litigation, true? 08 A. I think the focus moved to litigation rather 09 later than that. Now, again, I 'm speaking of the 10 litigation that -- like this. T h a t 's the one I 'm 11 referring to. And I know you have showed us that 12 document before, which I had not remembered, but it 13 was certainly not a focus of the trade association. 14 In later years, I occasionally talked to people 15 because I tried to get business for them on behalf 16 of Hill & Knowlton, and they said every dime is 17 goinginto fighting the litigation. 18 Q. So the -- 19 A. So there was no way they were evergoing to 20 hire us again. 21 Q. The Asbestos Information Association became a 22 group geared toward fighting asbestos lawsuits? 23 A. T h a t 's my understanding. I mean, I couldn't 24 give you the specifics at all about it, but -- 25 MR. MODESITT: Object to foundation. SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 166:01 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Counsel, can you get a 02 little closer to the phone? I'm having a 03 little difficulty hearing your questions. 04 Thanks. 05 MR. MODESITT: Is this better? 06 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Yes. Thank you. 07 BY MR. MODESITT: 08 Q. Mr. Swetonic, I'm not sure the record is very 09 clear on a few items particularly your education and 10 background. So what I would first like to ask you, 11 if you don't mind, is what was your date of birth? 12 A. October 15, 1942. 13 Q. So if you were born in 1942 and presented and 14 gave a presentation in March of 1972 on the OSHA 15 regulations, you were a spanking 30-year-old; is 16 that correct? 17 A. Yes. Actually not quite. 18 Q. Not quite a 30-year-old? 19 A. Yes. 20 Q. At the time you appeared for OSHA, had you 21 been an elected public official? 22 A. No. 23 Q. Did you have any particular political 24 influence of which you were aware? 25 A. No. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 164 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 166 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 165:01 THE WITNESS: -- but that's basically 02 what I was told. 03 MR. MODESITT: Object to hearsay. 04 MR. JONES: I 'll pass the witness. 05 MR. GINSBERG: L e t 's take a break. 06 THE VIDEOGRAPHER: This is the end of 07 tape number three of the videotaped 08 deposition of Mr. Matthew Swetonic. The time 09 is approximately 4:17 p.m. We are now going 10 off the record. 11 (Recess from 4:17 to 4:27.) 12 THE VIDEOGRAPHER: This is tape number 13 four of the videotaped deposition of 14 Mr. Matthew Swetonic. The time is 15 approximately 4:27 p.m., and we are now back 16 on the record. 17 18 EXAMINATION 19 BY MR. MODESITT: 20 Q. Mr. Swetonic, my name is Ray Modesitt, and 21 I'm here representing Dana and Pneumo Abex, LLC. 22 For your benefit, Dana manufactured automobile 23 gasket materials and Abex manufactured and sold 24 automobile friction products for brake lining 25 materials. SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 167:01 Q. So you simply appeared there and presented 02 the position of the AIA/North America? 03 A. Right, a part of it. 04 Q. A part of it.Okay. 05 Many of the question which were asked of you 06 had contained within it the phrase of industry or 07 the phrase your or you with regard to positions 08 taken. Were you referring to with regard to those 09 type of questions either you, your or industry or 10 companies such as when you worked at Johns-Manville 11 it would be Johns-Manville? 12 A. Correct. 13 Q. And when you worked at the AIA it would be 14 only those companies whom were members of the AIA? 15 A. That would be -- 16 MR. JONES: I 'll object as compound. 17 Vague and ambiguous. 18 THE WITNESS: That would be correct. 19 BY MR. MODESITT: 20 Q. Now, I believe you had indicated that the AIA 21 was formed in late -- November -- or maybe you 22 didn't. Was the AIA formed in November of 1970? 23 A. Well, it was late 1970. T h a t 's about the 24 best I can do for you on that. 25 Q. And I believe that in one of the Exhibits -- Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 165 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 167 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 168:01 Exhibit No. 3, dated October 16, 1970, there is a 02 specific reference that the first meeting of the 03 AIA/NA is planned for early November. So that would 04 be 1970? 05 A. Well, I knew it was 1970. Late in the year. 06 Q. And in the first paragraph is noted general 07 discussions of progress in the formation of the 08 Asbestos Information Committee/North America was 09 under consideration? 10 A. Well, what happened was Clint Burnett, who 11 was chairman of Johns-Manville at the time, at the 12 prodding primarily of the British industry was 13 talked into getting all the companies together, at 14 least representative of the major companies, to try 15 and form this group. And as I think I 've indicated 16 in some of my publications, I wrote the presentation 17 for that. I did not give it. I think Jack Solon 18 did, to try to induce them, convince them it would 19 be in their best interest to join and so the 20 industry would speak with one voice as opposed to 21 individual companies. 22 Q. So was it then like the November time frame 23 of 1970 when the AIA was formed or was it later? 24 A. Well, no. I 'm thinking that that 25 presentation took place earlier than November, and SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 170:01 A. Yes. 02 Q. You furthered your English writing skills? 03 A. Well, I furthered my journalism skills. 04 Q. Journalism. While you were in college, 05 undergraduate or seeking a master's degree -- did 06 you receive a master's? 07 A. Yes. 08 Q. Did you at any time apply to either a public 09 health school or a medical school? 10 A. No. 11 Q. Did you ever attend classes in a medical 12 school or a public health school? 13 A. No. 14 Q. Did you consider yourself a doctor in any 15 way? 16 A. No. I considered myself as the years wore on 17 a public relations executive or a public relations 18 practitioner who understood science pretty well and 19 was able to communicate on it pretty decently. 20 Q. You have not authored any scientific 21 publications on asbestos and its disease potential? 22 A. No. 23 Q. Have you ever spoken to any scientific body 24 and given data on asbestos disease? 25 A. No. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 168 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 170 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 169:01 that then they went home and thought about it and 02 maybe at that point came back in November and said 03 okay w e 'll do it. 04 Q. And at that point in time you were employed 05 by Johns-Manville? 06 A. T h a t 's correct. 07 Q. Where did you go to college? 08 A. University of Pittsburgh forundergraduate 09 degree, and Columbia University here for my graduate 10 degree. 11 Q. What did you study at University of 12 Pittsburgh? 13 A. Well, it was -- my degree was in English, 14 writing, but I used to refer to it as creative 15 writing, but really I sort of majored in the school 16 newspaper. I was editor. 17 Q. You were editor of the university college 18 newspaper? 19 A. Yes. 20 Q. And you then went to Columbia? 21 A. T h a t 's correct. 22 Q. And that was a one-year program? 23 A. I think i t 's up to a year and half now, but 24 it was one year then. 25 Q. When you went it was one year? SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 171:01 Q. Have you ever personally been part of any 02 scientific group that did original research on 03 asbestos and disease? 04 A. No. 05 Q. When you went to Johns-Manville, you went 06 there as an assistant editor of the company's 07 magazine? 08 A. T h a t 's correct. Employee magazine. 09 Q. And you did that for roughly two years? 10 A. Yes, roughly. 11 Q. And then around roughly 1968 -- I'm sorry -- 12 1967 you became the actual editor? 13 A. Right. Yes. 14 Q. And then about a year later or some time in 15 1968 you moved on to the special projects in public 16 relations regarding asbestos and health? 17 A. Yes. Specifically, actually, that took 18 effect January 1 of '68, according to a clipping 19 that I found in my mother's effects after she passed 20 away. 21 Q. And how long did you remain at Johns-Manville 22 before Manville moved to Denver and you moved into 23 the AIA employment as executive secretary? 24 A. I took over being paid by AIA/NA effective 25 January 1, 1972. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 169 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 171 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 172:01 Q. And how long did you stay at AIA at that 02 point in time? 03 A. Until I left there to go to Hill & Knowlton 04 ins -- well, it was the summer anyway of '73, maybe 05 July, August. I 'm not really sure which date. 06 Q. I believe on at least one other occasion you 07 had indicated it was August of '73. Does that sound 08 right to you? 09 A. Yes. Some time in the summer. 10 Q. Did you move directly from the executive 11 secretarial position of AIA in 1973 to an employment 12 situation with Hill & Knowlton? 13 A. Yes. 14 MR. PARKER: Object. I think you meant 15 '72? 16 MR. MODESITT: No. I meant '73. 17 THE WITNESS: Yes. 18 BY MR. MODESITT : 19 Q. When you did that, did you continue to have 20 any relationship with AIA? 21 A. Yes. They retained Hill & Knowlton to enable 22 me to help train my successor, which was a fellow 23 named Bob Mereness. John Marsh, who was president 24 of the trade association at the time, convinced the 25 membership that they ought to move to Washington. SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 174:01 A. Yes. 02 Q. In other words, Hill & Knowlton's 03 relationship with AIA ceased in summer of '74? 04 A. Yes. Correct. 05 Q. And, likewise, did your association cease in 06 '74 with AIA? 07 A. Yes. 08 Q. Did your -- your relationship with 09 Johns-Manville, had it already ceased? 10 A.Oh, yes. Yes. 11 Q. When was the last time you did any consulting 12 or any kind of PR-type work with Johns-Manville? 13 A. Well, let me say this. That Johns-Manville 14 became a client of Hill & Knowlton later on, but of 15 the Chicago office. And I was not involved in any 16 of those activities, and I d o n 't really know exactly 17 what they did for them. I d o n 't think they were 18 doing health-related work for them. But I know when 19 Manville declared Chapter 11, that the press 20 conference was held in Hill & Knowlton's offices in 21 New York. And the president, then president of 22 Manville, who I think had been chief patent counsel 23 or something at the time, who I knew and I c a n 't 24 remember his name, and he came into my office 25 because I was on that same floor. And I hadn't seen Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 172 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 174 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 173:01 We were in New York, of course, at that time. And 02 that they ought to find an executive director, as 03 they changed the title, who would have trade 04 association experience as opposed to asbestos 05 industry experience. And I think, frankly, that did 06 not turn out as well for them as they had hoped. 07 Q. And how long -- okay. So was that when you 08 were there or when you were at Hill & Knowlton? 09 A. When I was at Hill & Knowlton. 10 Q. How long after you went to Hill & Knowlton 11 did you have any consulting or assisting 12 relationship to the AIA at that point? 13 A. Roughly a year. 14 Q. So would that take you some time to the 15 summer of 1974? 16 A. Yes, somewhere in that ballpark. Jack Solon 17 was the one who came in and said we would like 18 to re up with Hill & Knowlton so we can have Matt 19 work with Bob to, you know, teach him the ropes as 20 to what the job is about, and what is going on, and 21 what he needs to know. And he said when we -- and 22 he told Hill & Knowlton he said when we are 23 satisfied that h e 's up to speed, then w e 're going to 24 terminate the thing. So it was anticipated. 25 Q. And did that happen? SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 175:01 him in -- 02 Q. Did you have anything to do with that at all? 03 A. No. No. 04 Q. So your relationship had ceased completely -- 05 A. Yes. 06 Q. -- long before that? 07 A. Yes. 08 Q. And is it a fair statement to say that your 09 relationship with any asbestos ceased by the summer 10 of 1974? 11 A. No, t h a t 's not true. 12 Q. Okay. 13 A. Occasionally things would come up where I 14 would be asked to, you know, lend a hand. Somewhere 15 in the early '80s we were contacted by a fellow in 16 our Chicago office. I was contacted. And his 17 client was U.S. Gypsum, and they were part of a 18 group, and I could not possibly tell you who it was. 19 They had this fancy brochure on asbestos in schools, 20 and they wanted me to do an update on that. And so 21 I did. And, apparently, they never used it for 22 whatever reason. 23 And then I can remember a couple of times 24 where buildings were under renovation here in the 25 city that somehow we had a client relationship with, Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 173 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 175 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 176:01 and they would bring me down there to talk about -- 02 and see what the situation was with ripping out 03 insulations and stuff like that. 04 Q. Let me rephrase my question, if I might then. 05 Is it fair to say that by summer of 1974 your 06 relationship had completely ended with regard to 07 AIA? 08 A. Oh, absolutely. Yes. 09 Q. And prior to that summer of 1974, your 10 relationship with Johns-Manville had completely 11 ended relating to asbestos? 12 A. T h a t 's correct. 13 Q. So we have a time frame for you that ceases 14 in the summer of '74 and goes backward to around 15 1968 on the issues of health and asbestos? 16 A. T h a t 's correct, yes. 17 Q. Either with Manville itself or with AIA? 18 A. T h a t 's right. 19 Q. During this time frame 1968 to 1974, is it a 20 fair assumption on my part that you were unfamiliar 21 with and did not do any work for or in conjunction 22 with any individuals from either Abex Corporation or 23 Dana Corporation? 24 A. No, I had no dealings with them. 25 Q. Is it also a fair assumption on my part that SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 178:01 the decomposition of brake products. 02 BY MR. MODESITT: 03 Q. Was that Jeremiah Lynch's report in 1968? 04 A. Exactly. Yes. '68, yes. That was included 05 in our packet that we sent out to the media in April 06 of '73. 07 Q. Is it a fair assumption on my part that 08 nothing that -- that the AIA while you were there 09 did not do anything regarding whether or not there 10 was or was not any adverse health effects regarding 11 automotive friction materials? 12 A. Specifically, no. 13 Q. Am I correct you didn't do anything? 14 A. No. 15 Q. Yes, I'm correct or no I'm not? 16 A. Yes, y o u 're correct. 17 Q. Okay. Likewise, is it a fair assumption on 18 my part that the AIA did not do anything at all with 19 relation to whether or not there was any adverse 20 effects on automotive gasket materials? 21 A. No, nothing that I know of. 22 Q. And we were presented here today with a 23 rather large stack of documents, letters, et cetera, 24 that, many of which that you apparently are shown to 25 have attended, some of which you have signed, and Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 176 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 178 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 177:01 anything you did with AIA did not involve automotive 02 gasket materials nor automotive friction materials? 03 MR. JONES: Can I get that question read 04 back? Oh, I'm sorry. Misstates his prior 05 testimony. Go ahead. 06 THE WITNESS: With regard to that, your 07 question, we had -- we d i d n 't do anything 08 specific with that, but the brake lining 09 issue had come up in terms of -- actually, 10 the Connecticut Turnpike -- whether there 11 were levels of fibers being released as cars 12 were going through the turnstiles that would 13 have created a health hazard for the guys 14 collecting the tolls. 15 BY MR. MODESITT: 16 Q. And are you familiar that Selikoff's group 17 actually studied that? 18 A. No, I d o n 't think I am. 19 Q. You're not familiar with the results that 20 showed that there was no impact on the general 21 public resulting from the Connecticut tollbooths? 22 MR. JONES: Objection. Assumes facts 23 not in evidence. Lacks foundation. 24 THE WITNESS: The only thing that we 25 did, we included in our media kit a paper on SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 179:01 some of which either predated or post-dated your 02 tenure. So what I'd like to do is very briefly go 03 through some of these to see if I am correct on my 04 assumptions. 05 Exhibit Number 1 was a 2011 report on 06 carcinogens. Do you remember being shown that? 07 A. Yes. 08 Q. Had you seen that before? 09 A. No. 10 Q. And I presume you don't know what was or was 11 not known to be a carcinogen in 1968 through 1974? 12 A. Well, we probably did have a pretty good idea 13 of that. I think -- 14 Q. Were you shown one today? 15 MR. JONES: Don't interrupt the 16 witness's answer, please. 17 THE WITNESS: That was not -- there were 18 generally considered to be as I recall about 19 27 carcinogens in those days. Fourteen were 20 covered by OSHA in a series of standards, and 21 asbestos was always one of them. But I d o n 't 22 remember whose list that was, but that was 23 the only one that I 'm somewhat familiar with. 24 BY MR. MODESITT: 25 Q. Okay. Exhibit No. 2 was a document relative Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 177 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 179 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 180:01 to the Asbestos Cement Products Association. Do you 02 remember that? 03 MR. JONES: Can the witness look at the 04 exhibits? 05 MR. MODESITT: Yes. Do you have the 06 other stack? 07 MR. JONES: Well, I've got mine that are 08 highlighted and colored and I've got pictures 09 of them. 10 MR. MODESITT: You didn't bring copies 11 for everybody? 12 MR. JONES: No. No, I didn't. I had to 13 come here on an airplane. 14 MR. MODESITT: Why am I surprised? 15 MR. JONES: I know. I know. 16 BY MR. MODESITT: 17 Q. I want you to go to page 2 on that, which is 18 the front part identifying the Asbestos Cement 19 Products Organization. 20 A. Yes. 21 Q. Looking at the persons -- look on page 1 22 there. Does that list a group of companies? 23 A. It lists some companies, yes. 24 Q. Do you see either Dana or Abex listed on 25 those? SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 182:01 Q. Thank you. 02 MR. JONES: I don't think I saw Abex or 03 Dana in any of these. If I am not wrong, we 04 can stipulate. 05 MR. MODESITT: I would like it done my 06 way. 07 MR. JONES: Okay. 08 THE WITNESS: Maybe I could just have 09 them here and run through them myself? 10 BY MR. MODESITT: 11 Q. No. With all due respect, I've been doing 12 this many years. We are going to do it my way. 13 I'm going to show you No. 4 and, Mr. 14 Swetonic, what I'd like to ask you is this is an AIA 15 document dated in 1974. My first question is that 16 document post-dates when you were actually at the 17 AIA, but seems to include what is noted to be some 18 paper that you presented? 19 A. Yes. You know, as I said, I continued to 20 consult with them and, obviously, Mereness, who is 21 the new executive director in this case, had asked 22 me to write this, and obviously I did this. And I 23 also did one other document I think on atmospheric 24 asbestos. Those are the only two things I remember 25 writing. I d o n 't -- Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 180 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 182 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 181:01 A. No. 02 Q. And, in fact, Asbestos Cement Products 03 Association only included companies that made 04 asbestos cement products; isn't that correct? 05 A. I 'll take your word for it. I am looking at 06 the list. I 'm not really sure what some of these 07 people meant. 08 Q. Would you consider a brake friction material 09 an asbestos cement product? 10 A. No. 11 Q. Would you consider an asbestos head gasket 12 for an automobile an asbestos cement product? 13 A. No. 14 Q. I'm going to hand you Exhibit No. 3, and I 15 want you to look at the first paragraph where it 16 refers to companies being asked to join this 17 association in the first paragraph. Read who those 18 companies were. 19 A. "Other companies being asked to join: 20 Raybestos Manhattan, Flintkote, National Gypsum, 21 Philip Carey, and Ruberoid." 22 Q. Is there anything in there that would even be 23 suggestive that either Dana or Abex Corporation were 24 invited to attend any meetings to join the AIA? 25 A. No. SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 183:01 Q. To your knowledge, was that attachment there 02 ever distributed to companies outside of the AIA in 03 1974? 04 A. I have no idea what happened to it. 05 Q. You don't have any idea whether it was -- was 06 it ever published? 07 A. No. It wouldn't be published. 08 Q. As far as you know, if someone, if an 09 individual company was not a member of the AIA, 10 would it be your best estimate that it would not 11 have received a copy of that? 12 MR. JONES: Lacks foundation. Calls for 13 speculation. 14 THE WITNESS: I cannot tell you. I 15 cannot say because that's obviously not a 16 finished product because i t 's supposed to go 17 to a whole bunch of other people.And what 18 they may have do with it, I have no way of 19 judging. If they had a friend that called 20 them up and said I 'd like a copy, maybe they 21 gave it to him. I d o n 't know. 22 Q. You don't have any information that you can 23 share as to who actually got that? 24 A. No. No, I do not. 25 Q. The statement of 1966, Plaintiff Exhibit Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 181 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 183 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 184:01 No. 5, this was -- was that an internal 02 Johns-Manville document to the best of your 03 knowledge? 04 A. I have no knowledge of this at all. I 05 testified to that effect. This is before my 06 involvement. And all I was really asked to do was 07 look at the names. 08 Q. Are those all Johns-Manville personnel? 09 A. Well, I could not identify some of them in 10 all honesty. But I 'm assuming they were because the 11 only person here who has a different company beside 12 his name is a fellow from Illinois. So I would 13 assume they are Manville people. 14 Q. Would it seem reasonable to you that if this 15 were a Johns-Manville document it would remain 16 within the confines of the signatories and the 17 copied persons? 18 A. Reasonable. 19 MR. JONES: Move to strike as 20 speculative. 21 MR. MODESITT: If that's true, we can 22 strike the last three hours. 23 BY MR. MODESITT: Q. Exhibit No. 6 is an April 1973 AIA document which has an Appendix A, and that shows a membership SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 186:01 A. Secretary. 02 Q. Or executive secretary? 03 A. Yes. 04 Q. You would know who got the minutes, wouldn't 05 you? 06 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Counsel, your voice is 07 fading away and it's difficult to hear the 08 questions. Thanks. 09 THE WITNESS: I would suspect that, 10 yeah, because we probably distributed 11 ourselves, but I d o n 't have a list. 12 MR. JONES: Move to strike as 13 speculative. 14 BY MR. MODESITT: 15 Q. Where they show various members present, if a 16 company were not present and were not a member of 17 the AIA, is it a fair assumption that that company 18 would not have received the AIA board of directors 19 minutes? 20 A. Yes. 21 Q. There are other documents such as Plaintiff's 22 Exhibits Number 7, 8 and 9 which appear to be 23 documents of AIA meetings or internal memorandums 24 and they have copies shown on them. If a company is 25 not shown to have been carbon copied on them, is it Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 184 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 186 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 185:01 list, does it not? 02 A. Yes. 03 Q. Does that membership list include either Abex 04 Corporation or Dana? 05 A. No, it does not. 06 Q. And that's when you were still at the AIA? 07 A. Yes. 08 Q. And while you were there, so long as you 09 know, neither Dana nor Abex Corporation belonged to 10 the AIA when you were there? 11 A. T h a t 's correct. 12 Q. Board of directors minutes of the AIA, were 13 they disseminated outside of the AIA? 14 A. Not that I know of. 15 Q. So -- 16 MR. JONES: Object to lacks foundation. 17 I belatedly object. Lacks foundation. Calls 18 for speculation. Go ahead. Sorry. 19 MR. MODESITT: Sure. 20 BY MR. MODESITT: 21 Q. While you were there, you attended all the 22 board of directors meetings, didn't you? 23 A. Yes. 24 Q. And, in fact, you were the executive 25 director? SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 187:01 a fair assumption that other companies not shown to 02 have received a copy actually did not get a copy? 03 MR. JONES: Lacks foundation. Calls for 04 speculation. 05 BY MR. MODESITT: 06 Q. Is that correct? 07 A. What the companies have gone and did with 08 them I have no idea. 09 Q. But they would not have been sent them from 10 your office? 11 A. No, they would not. 12 MR. JONES: Same objections. Move to 13 strike on the same grounds. 14 BY MR. MODESITT: 15 Q. You were shown what was referred to as 16 Plaintiff's Exhibit No. 10 being a chapter in a book 17 that you wrote? 18 A. Yes. 19 Q. And in spite of your efforts,the counsel for 20 plaintiff moved to strike some of your responses. 21 So let me see if I can't rephrase a question that 22 you can describe to the jury what you were doing. 23 First of all, what year was that written? 24 A. '72 or '73. It waspublished in '73. 25 Q. The book? Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 185 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 187 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 188:01 A. Yes. 02 Q. And what was the purpose for having -- 03 MR. JONES: I think you add 20 years to 04 that. I don't mean to interrupt you. You 05 said "'73." 06 THE WITNESS: Oh, sorry. '93. 07 BY MR. MODESITT: 08 Q. Let me reask that. What year was the book 09 written? 10 A. The book was published in '93. I probably 11 wrote the chapter in '92. 12 Q. In 1992, did you hold any position with any 13 organization, trade group, or manufacturing company 14 involved in asbestos? 15 A. No. 16 Q. When you wrote this, did you write this with 17 the approval of any asbestos manufacturing 18 companies? 19 A. No, I never showed it to any. 20 Q. What was the purpose that you wrote your 21 book? 22 A. I didn't write the book. It was a 23 compilation of chapters of case histories basically 24 on crisis management, and it was intended as a 25 teaching tool for professors of public relations to SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 190:01 about it. 02 Q. There were several exhibits that were 03 discussed with counsel for plaintiff that had to do 04 with asbestos contained in fabric from an Italian 05 manufacturer? 06 A. Yes. 07 Q. To your knowledge, was any of this material 08 shared with people outside of the AIA? 09 A. Not to my knowledge. I mean, who would be 10 interested? 11 Q. Likewise, there were several exhibits that 12 had to do with spray asbestos. Do you remember 13 those? 14 A. Yes. 15 Q. And do you remember when Dr. Selikoff gave 16 testimony before the New York City Council? 17 A. To be honest with you, no, I do not. 18 Q. Do you know what his position was on spray 19 asbestos? 20 A. Based on what the report says on the Boston 21 testimony where Nicholson testified up there, that 22 Selikoff's position was pretty much what ours was at 23 that time. 24 Q. Which was that? 25 MR. JONES: Hold on a second. I'll move Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 188 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 190 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 189:01 teach their students in college on crisis management 02 skills and issues. 03 Q. Did you do any additional research when you 04 wrote your chapter? 05 A. No. The only two things I was unaware of was 06 when the start of the OSHA hearings were, and I was 07 able to check that out because at that point I had a 08 copy of a book by Paul Brodeur where he was 09 chronicling that, and I couldn't remember the name 10 of the group that Hill & Knowlton had formed with 11 Dr. Selikoff. And I got ahold of the guy, the 12 engineer, who had been assigned to work with 13 Selikoff, and he was able to give me the name and 14 roughly the time that that started, but that is -- 15 outside of that, everything was either off the top 16 of my head or based on what a handful of, you know, 17 published documents I had. 18 Q. Okay. What you wrote in this chapter then, 19 is it a fair assumption that it had not been 20 reviewed by -- A, it had not been peer reviewed, and 21 B, had not been reviewed by any of the companies for 22 whom you had earlier worked? 23 A. Well, it wouldn't be peer reviewed. It 24 w a s n 't a scientific paper. So, no, nobody reviewed 25 it actually. The editor reviewed it, but that's SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 191:01 to strike as hearsay and lacking foundation 02 and as speculative. Go ahead. 03 THE WITNESS: No. I t 's contained in 04 there. 05 MR. JONES: No, I 'm just -- t h a t 's an 06 objection. You d o n 't have to chat with me. 07 A. Okay. That they did not believe in bans and 08 they wanted to control it. That was their position 09 at that time. 10 MR. JONES: And I will move to strike 11 this answer onthe same grounds. 12 BY MR. MODESITT: 13 Q. And that is actually reflected in the very 14 exhibit that Mr. Jones put in evidence here or had 15 you review? 16 A. Yes. 17 Q. It was referenced some time during your 18 direct examination about a proposal in the State of 19 Illinois to ban brake linings. Do you remember that 20 reference? 21 A. Yes. I think I replied that I knew nothing 22 about that or remember nothing about it in any case. 23 Q. Do you have any recollection of the testimony 24 before the Illinois Pollution Control Board on the 25 issue of brake linings and a proposed ban? Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 189 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 191 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 192:01 A. By who? 02 Q. By various members of industry and scientists 03 from various places. 04 A. No. 05 Q. Do you know that the Illinois Pollution 06 Control Board rejected the idea of banning brakes? 07 A. No. As I said, I 'm just not familiar with 08 the issue at all in Illinois. 09 Q. You were asked questions about whether 10 various people from industry were on governmental 11 committees. Do you recall that? 12 A. Advisory committees, yes. 13 Q. Are you aware that various members of the 14 Mount Sinai group with Dr. Selikoff were also on 15 these various governmental committees? 16 A. Sure. 17 Q. You were asked about the fact that I believe 18 it was Dr. Wright that was employed by 19 Johns-Manville. Do you recall that? 20 A. He was a consultant, yes. 21 Q. Are you familiar with the fact that 22 Dr. Selikoff and his group received monthly 23 contributions of $50,000 or more from the Asbestos 24 Workers Union throughout the late 1960s all way into 25 the late 1970s? SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 194:01 THE WITNESS: Selikoff and Wright both 02 sat on the same committees. They sat on the 03 committee of the Academy of Sciences that did 04 the atmospheric asbestos paper. They sat on 05 the epidemiology committee of the 06 International Agency for Research on Cancer 07 of the World Health Organization committee 08 that drafted their position on ambient air 09 concentrations. So, you know, they were both 10 highly regarded and both, you know, 11 participated in these sorts of things. 12 BY MR. MODESITT: 13 Q. Now, you had presented the position of the 14 AIA at this March 15, 1972 hearing in what I will 15 generally refer to as the Goldberg hearings, did you 16 not? 17 A. Which one? Oh, yes. 18 Q. The OSHA hearings? 19 A. Yes. 20 Q. Have you heard of them -- have you heard the 21 phrase "the Goldberg hearings"? 22 A. No. 23 Q. Arthur Goldberg was the presiding officer at 24 all of these OSHA hearings. 25 At any rate, you appeared there on March 15, Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 192 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 194 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 193:01 A. No. 02 MR. JONES: Assumes facts not in 03 evidence. 04 THE WITNESS: No, I was not familiar 05 with that. 06 BY MR. MODESITT: 07 Q. I will ask you to assume that as a fact that 08 his group did in fact beginning in the mid-1960s did 09 receive allocations from the International Asbestos 10 Workers Union. With that being an assumed fact, 11 does that taint their research or does it merely 12 mean that they are consultants for labor? 13 MR. JONES: Same objections. 14 THE WITNESS: In all honesty, I would 15 say the latter. I find nothing, you know, 16 untoward about it. 17 BY MR. MODESITT: 18 Q. So, the fact that Dr. Wright was proposed as 19 a consultant on a governmental committee and also 20 was a consultant for Johns-Manville would not 21 necessarily taint what he had to offer, would it? 22 MR. JONES: Lacks foundation. 23 THE WITNESS: Selikoff - 24 MR. JONES: Assumes facts not in 25 evidence. And calls for speculation. SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 195:01 1972, shortly before you became 30 years old? 02 A. More than shortly. 03 Q. Okay. Now, you were asked questions about 04 labeling. Do you recall that? 05 A. Um-mm. 06 Q. Did you also in your statement refer to what 07 the advisory committee recommended on the labeling? 08 A. I believe I did. 09 Q. And the advisory committee was the NIOSH 10 committee that promulgated the criteria document, 11 was it not? 12 A. Yes, it would have been. 13 Q. And on that committee there were several 14 people in science, including Dr. Selikoff; isn't 15 that correct? 16 A. I believe so, yes. 17 Q. And isn't it true that even the advisory 18 committee of NIOSH only recommended labeling if the 19 products would release asbestos fiber in hazardous 20 quantities during handling and application? 21 MR. JONES: Lacks foundation. Calls for 22 speculation. Assumes facts not in evidence. 23 THE WITNESS: I 'm not sure. I believe 24 that's correct. 25 MR. JONES: Move to strike as Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 193 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 195 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 196:01 speculative. Lack of foundation. 02 BY MR. MODESITT: 03 Q. We can fix all of that. The very statement 04 you presented at that time, you based that upon what 05 you had read and been presented? 06 A. Of course. 07 Q. I want you to look at page 188 of your 08 statement and ask you to tell the jury what the 09 advisory committee recommended on the labeling? 10 MR. JONES: Object. Calls for hearsay. 11 Assumes facts not in evidence. Lack of 12 foundation. Calls for speculation. 13 MR. MODESITT: In response to that, 14 counsel has already utilized the -- 15 MR. JONES: What page is that? 16 MR. MODESITT: Page 188. 17 THE WITNESS: "For this reason, it is 18 only logical that the Advisory Committee 19 recommended labeling system be discarded in 20 favor of a system which only requires 21 labeling on those products which readily 22 releases asbestos fiber in hazardous quantity 23 during handling or application." 24 MR. JONES: Move to strike for the same 25 reasons. SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 198:01 asking your questions, and we won't bicker. 02 MR. MODESITT: You're doing exactly what 03 you just accusing me of doing. 04 MR. JONES: So go ahead. 05 MR. MODESITT: Let's both -- maybe we 06 can both do a better job. 07 MR. JONES: All right. 08 BY MR. MODESITT: 09 Q. Mr. Swetonic, Exhibit No. -- Plaintiff's No. 10 21 included pages 178 through 192 inclusive. 11 MR. MODESITT: Ms. Reporter, I'm going 12 to mark just those pages. 13 MR. JONES: What are we up to? 14 MR. MODESITT: I'm going to mark this as 15 Exhibit 24 only because it's substantially 16 shorter than the entire proceeding. 17 (Whereupon, Plaintiff's Deposition 18 Exhibit No. 24 was marked for 19 Identification.) 20 BY MR. MODESITT: 21 Q. I'm going to ask you is this limited just to 22 your presentation before Arthur Goldberg? 23 A. Yes. 24 Q. And what you just read to the jury was a 25 portion from page 188 of the very presentation which Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 196 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 198 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 197:01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 MR. MODESITT: I 'm dumbfounded at your motion. MR. JONES: I can explain it to you if y o u 'd like me. MR. MODESITT: T h a t 's all right. You can explain it to the Court. MR. JONES: I t 's not hearsay when i t 's his statement, but that's law school stuff. We can talk about that later. Go ahead. MR. MODESITT: Counselor, it is his statement. You brought up that he made this statement -- MR. JONES: You are trying to get the hearsay statement of NIOSH through him. T h a t 's hearsay. MR. MODESITT: NIOSH is a governmental publication. MR. JONES: Look up the book. MR. MODESITT: We will take that up later. Q. Mr. Swetonic -- MR. JONES: And I don't need you to make comments every time I make an objection. This is the like the fourth time. I will make my objection. You can go and keep SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 199:01 you yourself made on behalf of the AIA at the 02 Goldberg hearing? 03 A. T h a t 's correct. 04 Q. Exhibit No. 23 was presented to you as a 05 comparison of various positions. Do you recall 06 that? 07 A. Yes. 08 Q. The first column is the AIA position? 09 A. Well, it says "Industry Position." 10 Q. And who would that industry be since -- this 11 was represented to be a document of the AIA. 12 Assuming that -- if we assume for the moment that is 13 correct, would the industry being referred to, would 14 that be those companies who were members of the AIA 15 in March of 1972? 16 A. Yes. 17 Q. Now, I want to look at number 1, the 18 Numerical Standard. 19 Well, first of all, do you recall that the 20 emergency standard on asbestos fibers of December 21 1971 was 12 fibers per cc? 22 A. Yes. 23 Q. And the standard that became effective June 24 7, 1972 went to five? 25 A. Correct. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 197 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 199 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 200:01 Q. And the automatic reduction would go to 2 02 fibers in 1976? 03 A. Yes. 04 Q. Now, the industry didn't want it to go to 2, 05 did they? 06 A. No. 07 Q. So, in fact, the industry lost the most 08 important thing they were arguing for, and that was 09 only the 5 fiber standard? 10 A. Yes. 11 Q. Now, do you know whether there were other 12 manufacturers of asbestos products who did not 13 oppose the 2 fiber standard? Do you know whether 14 that's true or not true? 15 A. I d o n 't know. 16 Q. All you know is what the AIA and its members 17 wanted to do? 18 A. Yes. 19 Q. Okay. Fair enough. 20 Prior to coming here today, Mr. Swetonic, did 21 you make any concerted effort to research what you 22 had done from 1968 to 1974 regarding asbestos and 23 health? 24 A. No. Only so much as documents that I had in 25 my possession and that I had submitted for the last SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 202:01 (Discussion off the record.) 02 BY MR. PARKER: 03 Q. Sir, good afternoon. My name is James 04 Parker. The company I represent is Toyota Motor 05 Sales. 06 A. Okay. 07 Q. I'm going to ask you one broad question to 08 start with. You were just asked by Mr. Modesitt if 09 you saw the names Dana or Abex in connection with 10 any of these exhibits, and you said that you had 11 not? 12 A. Right. 13 Q. Would the same answer be true for Toyota 14 Motor Sales? 15 A. Yes, it would. 16 Q. And Toyota Motor Sales has never been a part 17 of the AIA, correct? 18 A. No. 19 Q. All right. You indicated to us that you 20 started helping Johns-Manville with its asbestos 21 public health issues effective January 1, 1968? 22 A. Yes. 23 Q. I'm going to show you an exhibit which I've 24 marked -- 25 MR. GINSBERG: Hold for just a second, Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 200 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 202 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 | 201:01 deposition in 2002. 02 Q. And since 2002 you've not provided any 03 testimony regarding asbestos? 04 A. No. 05 Q. And had no reason to look at anything? 06 A. No. 07 Q. Is that correct? 08 A. T h a t 's correct. 09 Q. Have you ever had any instances of consulting 10 with or having to do with any asbestos or health 11 concerns with either Dana or with Abex Corporation? 12 A. No. 13 MR. MODESITT: I think that's all. 14 Thank you very much. 15 16 EXAMINATION 17 BY MR. PARKER: 18 Q. Sir, I've got about 10 minutes of questions. 19 Can you go another 10 minutes or so? 20 A. I guess. I 'm getting worn out. 21 Q. Do you want to take a break? 22 A. No. Let 1s get it over with. 23 MR. PARKER: What was our last exhibit 24 number? 25 MR. JONES: We were at 25 I feel like. SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 203:01 please. Two people called in that they were 02 dropped from the call and they are dialing 03 back in. So what do you need to do? 04 (Discussion off the record.) 05 THE VIDEOGRAPHER: Going off the record 06 at 5:18. 07 (Recess from 5:18 to 5:26.) 08 THE VIDEOGRAPHER: We are now going back 09 on the record. The time is approximately 10 5:26 p.m. 11 (Whereupon, Plaintiff's Deposition 12 Exhibits Nos. 25, 26 and 27 were marked 13 for Identification.) 14 BY MR. PARKER: 15 Q. All right. Mr. Swetonic, we've had a short 16 technological break. And during that time I handed 17 you the three exhibits I want to show you, which 18 have been marked as 25, 26 and 27. 19 Let me start with Exhibit 25. This is a 20 document dated January 18, 1968. It's entitled 21 "Statement on Asbestos and Human Health," and at the 22 top it indicates it's a "President's Bulletin." 23 Have you had a chance to review this 24 document? 25 A. I have looked at it. Weirdly enough, I am Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 201 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 203 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 204:01 not familiar with this. Of course, this was the 02 month that I started working on the issue, but I 'm 03 sure I saw this at some point in time, but I am not 04 familiar with it in all honesty. 05 Q. You started officially with your job helping 06 Johns-Manville with its PR issues and with asbestos 07 health on January 1 -- 08 A. T h a t 's correct. 09 Q. -- 1968. This document is two, three weeks 10 later. 11 A. Yeah, I know. Obviously, I did not write 12 this. 13 Q. Well, were you aware that the president of 14 Johns-Manville wanted to issue a basic statement 15 that could be used to answer questions and inquiries 16 from people? 17 A. If I was, I have forgotten it by now. 18 Q. Does this strike you asanything unusual? 19 A. No. 20 Q. And you will see that in the third paragraph 21 there that this document was run past various 22 departments within JM, including the Environmental 23 Control, the Industrial Relations and the Public 24 Relations Departments? 25 MR. JONES: Lacks foundation. Assumes SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 206:01 A. I see. 02 Q. -- "Industrial Relations and Public Relations 03 Departments." That would be what normally would 04 happen with a document like this? 05 MR. JONES: Lacks foundation. Calls for 06 speculation. 07 THE WITNESS: That is correct. That is 08 how we would have approved documents. 09 BY MR. PARKER: 10 Q. In addition to those departments, this 11 indicates that it was also reviewed and approved by 12 George Wright, the -- JM's medical consultant at the 13 time, right? 14 A. T h a t 's what it says, yes. 15 Q. And we heard about George Wright earlier 16 today? 17 A. Right. 18 Q. The memo here -- well, first of all, this is 19 from C.B. Burnett? 20 A. He was chairman, president and chairman. 21 Q. The president and chairman is indicating here 22 that the attachment to this bulletin is something 23 that could be used as needed by himself, by various 24 vice presidents, including the vice president and 25 general counsel, by the environmental control and Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 204 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 206 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 205:01 facts not in evidence. And calls for 02 speculation. 03 BY MR. PARKER: 04 Q. Sir? 05 A. Yes, I see that. But as I said, I 'm not 06 familiar with the document. 07 Q. Would the normal process for a document like 08 this is to have had it approved and/or prepared by 09 the Environmental Control, Industrial Relations and 10 PR departments? 11 MR. JONES: Lacks foundation. Calls for 12 speculation. Assumes facts not in evidence. 13 THE WITNESS: I would think that some of 14 these people here would not have been 15 involved later on. Vice president for 16 finance, controller, I d o n 't know what 17 involvement they would be having. 18 MR. JONES: Move to strike on the same 19 grounds. 20 BY MR. PARKER: 21 Q. Let me just back you up to the paragraph 22 ahead of that. That's what I 'm focused on. 23 A. Oh, I 'm sorry. 24 Q. It states, "It -- meaning this document -- 25 "was prepared by our Environmental Control" -- SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 207:01 public relations departments, right? 02 MR. JONES: If you'll just give me a 03 running -- just to this line about this 04 document, speculation and foundation, I won't 05 interrupt any more. 06 MR. PARKER: That's fine. For this 07 document. 08 MR. JONES: For this document. 09 BY MR. PARKER: 10 Q. Go ahead, sir. 11 A. Yes, that makes sense. 12 Q. And the idea here was that this document 13 could be used to respond to inquiries that JM might 14 get from people outside the company? 15 MR. JONES: Those same objections, and 16 assume facts not in evidence. 17 THE WITNESS: T h a t 's correct. 18 BY MR. PARKER: 19 Q. W e 'll just try to go a little slower and let 20 him object. 21 A. Okay. 22 Q. Those inquiries would be coming from 23 stockholders, financial analysts, public officials, 24 and the press, right? 25 A. T h a t 's what it says. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 205 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 207 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 208:01 Q. And this is nothing unusual? 02 A. No, I wouldn't think so. Youwould want to 03 have something to do that. 04 Q. And the bulletin has attached to it the 05 document that the president and chairman wanted to 06 use, and it's the next page on here, and it's 07 entitled "Asbestos and Human Health"? 08 A. Yes. 09 Q. And then I just want to return you to the 10 next page. And you will see there's a heading there 11 that says "No Risk Shown For General Public"? 12 A. Yes. 13 Q. I'm just going to read the second sentence in 14 that paragraph. "There is no scientific evidence 15 that anyone has ever contracted any disease from 16 exposure to the wearing or weathering of brake 17 linings, floor tile, roofing or other products 18 containing asbestos." 19 Did I read it correctly? 20 A. Yes. 21 Q. To your understanding, was that JM's 22 position? 23 A. Yes.Absolutely. 24 Q.Did that position change at any time in the 25 1970s to your knowledge? SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 210:01 A. No. That's what I meant I wrote. 02 Q. And that's what I wanted to clear up. What 03 you authored is the attachment to this memo? 04 A. That's correct. 05 Q. And that attachment -- 06 A. I did not know that they sent it out to all 07 JM employees. It was not intended for them when we 08 wrote it. 09 Q. Who was it intended for? 10 A. It was intended for general public. It was 11 intended for media. It's not the sort -- this was a 12 laminated card originally, and it's not the sort of 13 thing that I would do anymore in my business. I 14 don't like fancy stuff that kind of locks you into 15 positions where if the facts change, you say well we 16 spent $20,000 on the damned thing we're not going to 17 change it now. So, you know, as my years went on in 18 the business, I leaned more toward everything was 19 work in progress that we could change. And 20 computers helped that obviously. We could change as 21 new facts came in or new research or whatever. So I 22 would always -- you know, I would never do this sort 23 of thing again. 24 Q. Well, what I want to focus on is the contents 25 as opposed to the presentation. And let me -- and Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 208 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 210 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 209:01 A. I don't believe so. 02 Q. All right. Sir, I'd like you to take a look 03 at the next exhibit, Exhibit 26. It's entitled 04 "Executive Bulletin." It appears to have been 05 issued October 29, 1971. And it is -- 06 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Excuse me. I 07 apologize for interrupting. This is Hank 08 Holmberg. We were cut off, and my best 09 estimate was about 20 minutes, and I'm just 10 rejoining at this time. I think everybody on 11 the phone was cut off until now. 12 MR. PARKER: We are aware, Hank. We're 13 finishing up the deposition. Why don't we 14 discuss any issues you might have in the next 15 five to ten minutes. Okay? 16 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Yes. 17 BY MR. PARKER: 18 Q. All right. Going back a moment, sir, again 19 this is an Executive Bulletin. It appears to be 20 dated October 29, 1971, and it is addressed to "All 21 JM employees." Have you seen this document before? 22 A. Yes. I probably wrote it or most of it. 23 Q. Well, the first thing is that what appears to 24 be the Executive Bulletin, and then behind it is a 25 document entitled "Asbestos and Health" -- SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 211:01 it sounds like your intent when you drafted the 02 laminated card was it would be available to the 03 public; is that right? 04 A. It would beavailable asneeded for the 05 public, for the media, for anybody. 06 Q. All right. And unknown to you, apparently, 07 JM elected to circulate it among its employees? 08 A. Yes. 09 Q. And I justwant toturn you tothe, I guess 10 what amounts to the second question on this, which 11 is, "Do brake linings emit much asbestos into the 12 air?" 13 A. Right. 14 Q. And the answer that you wrote was, "A United 15 States Public Health Service study shows that only a 16 tiny fraction of the asbestos in brake linings is 17 released to the air in its original form when brakes 18 are applied. The rest is converted into 19 fosterite -- a non-fibrous inert material -- by the 20 heat of friction." 21 MR. JONES: To the extent this is 22 seeking his opinion, lacks foundation. Calls 23 for speculation. 24 MR. PARKER: First let me ask a 25 question. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 209 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 211 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 212:01 MR. JONES: I'm sorry. 02 MR. PARKER: Let me ask a question. 03 Q. Did you write that? 04 A. Yes. 05 Q. Did I read it accurately? 06 A. Yes. 07 Q. Do you know what US Public Health Service 08 study you were referring to? 09 A. Yes. I t 's probably -- I guess it would be in 10 there. It was -- somebody here mentioned it -- by 11 Jeremiah Lynch. 12 Q. Based on Dr. Lynch's work? 13 A. Yes. T h a t 's what it is. And, in fact, in 14 the media kit that we put out in April of 1973 we 15 actually included the whole study, the whole 16 Jeremiah Lynch study. 17 MR. JONES: Move to strike. Lacks 18 foundation. And speculative. Go ahead. 19 BY MR. PARKER: 20 Q. You made that available to the public? 21 A. No. That went to the media. We went to send 22 it out to roughly 3,000 media outlets, science 23 writers, you know, journalists covering the issue. 24 T h a t 's a lot. 25 Q. If a company that was in some way concerned SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 214:01 simple thing that says basically what the OSHA 02 standards said. And that was made available to all 03 the companies, and I d o n 't know how many of them, 04 but Manville certainly did. They published that 05 under their own letterhead and gave that to all 06 their employees who were exposed to asbestos or 07 worked with asbestos stuff. I know some of the 08 other companies did. Raybestos did. I am not quite 09 sure who else. So this would have been an advanced 10 step in that direction. 11 Q. To your knowledge, was this draft or further 12 draft ever adopted and used? 13 A. I will be honest with you, I d o n 't know. I 14 d o n 't remember. 15 Q. Have you seen a booklet such as what you 16 should know about asbestos out there? 17 A. No, not like this. 18 Q. So you don't know if -- 19 A. This was -- this was specifically designed 20 the way I wrote it for employees. To the best of my 21 knowledge it was never at least printed in my time 22 there. 23 Q. Do you know if the AIA ever took any action 24 based on your October 24th letter? 25 A. I d o n 't remember. Not that I recall, let me Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 212 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 214 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 213:01 or interested in the asbestos health issue had 02 contacted Johns-Manville in 1968, 1971, 1972, when 03 you were there, these are the materials that would 04 have been provided in response to their questions? 05 A. I suspect so. 06 Q. Sir, finally, I want to refer you to Exhibit 07 27, the last one I will discuss with you. This is a 08 memo or I guess a letter dated October 24, 1972. It 09 is on AIA/North America letterhead, and this is 10 authored by you? 11 A. Yes. 12 Q. And attached to it is a draft or I think what 13 you called a first draft of what would amount to an 14 employee safety and health guide? 15 A. Right. 16 Q. And the intent here, as I understand it, was 17 you were urging the members of the AIA to start 18 educating their employees through safety and health 19 guides like the one you drafted here? 20 A. That is correct. 21 Q. You believed that the employees already had 22 some knowledge about the potential hazards of 23 asbestos? 24 A. Yes. We had designed through the AIA, which 25 I d o n 't have copies of anymore, a kind of a very SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 215:01 put it that way, in my time there. 02 MR. PARKER: Sir, thank you. T h a t 's the 03 questions that I had. I appreciate your 04 time. 05 THE WITNESS: Sure. 06 MR. JONES: Just a very brief redirect. 07 MR. SLAUGHTER: I 've got about two 08 questions. 09 MR. JONES: Oh, I 'm sorry. Go ahead. 10 I 'm sorry. 11 12 EXAMINATION 13 BY MR. SLAUGHTER: 14 Q. Mr. Swetonic, my name is Ed Slaughter. I 15 represent the John Crane Company. 16 A. Okay. 17 Q. If we went back through all the documents, 18 you wouldn't find the name John Crane in any of the 19 documents that we looked at today, would you? 20 A. No. 21 Q. You've never done any work for John Crane 22 Company? 23 A. No, I have not. 24 Q. John Crane Company was never a member of the 25 AIA? Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 213 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 215 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 216:01 A. They would not qualify, nor would Toyota. 02 The charter of the AIA said you had to be a 03 manufacturer of asbestos products, containing 04 products, not a user, and end user. So you would 05 not be allowed to be a member. 06 MR. SLAUGHTER: Thank you, sir. 07 08 EXAMINATION 09 BY MR. JONES: 10 Q. Well, if John Crane manufactured an asbestos 11 product then they would qualify? 12 A. Yes. 13 Q. And does your -- 14 DEFENSE COUNSEL: Can I ask a couple of 15 questions? 16 MR. JONES: Yeah. I've got one more. 17 MR. PARKER: Which exhibit was this one? 18 MR. JONES: The Executive Bulletin 19 attaching the -- 20 MR. PARKER: 25. I think I wrote it on 21 the bottom there. 22 MR. JONES: Yeah. 26. I'm sorry. 23 BY MR. JONES: 24 Q. Exhibit 26, you were asked before as to 25 whether or not the association did any work on SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 218:01 A. Correct. 02 Q. And Nissan was not a member of your 03 association, correct? 04 A. That is correct. 05 Q. Of the AIA? 06 A. Not while I was there. 07 Q. Okay. Thank you, sir. 08 MR. EBERLEIN: That's all I have. 09 10 EXAMINATION 11 BY MR. MARTINOVICH: 12 Q. Mr. Swetonic, my name is Edward Martinovich. 13 I have some similar questions. I will try to be 14 brief. I presume you've heard of the Ford Motor 15 Company, right? 16 A. Yes. 17 Q. Do you have any knowledge that Ford was ever 18 a member of the AIA at any point? 19 A. No. 20 Q. And do you have any knowledge whether Ford 21 ever attended any meetings or conferences by the 22 AIA? 23 A. No knowledge. 24 Q. Do you have any knowledge that Ford ever 25 received any written materials from the AIA? Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 216 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 218 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 217:01 friction materials, brakes, and you said not that 02 you recall. Does this refresh your recollection 03 that there were some writings that dealt with 04 potential hazards from brakes? 05 A. T h a t 's just the one, yeah. 06 MR. JONES: T h a t 's all. 07 MR. PARKER: Does anybody on the phone 08 have questions? 09 MR. EBERLEIN: Yes, I do. Thank you. 10 MR. PARKER: Give us your name. 11 MR. EBERLEIN: John Eberlein, 12 E-B-E-R-L-E-I-N. 13 14 EXAMINATION 15 BY MR. EBERLEIN: 16 Q. Good afternoon, sir. 17 A. Yes. 18 Q. Sir, I want to ask a similar question. If 19 you were to go through all of those documents that 20 you have testified about, you would find the word 21 Datsun, correct? 22 A. No. For the same reason I just gave these 23 gentlemen. 24 Q. And similarly, sir, you would not find the 25 word Nissan, correct? SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 219:01 A. No knowledge. 02 Q. Do you have any knowledge that Ford ever 03 asked the AIA to act on its behalf? 04 A. No knowledge of that either. 05 Q. Do you know if the AIA ever actually acted on 06 Ford's behalf? 07 A. Not that I know of. 08 Q. Thank you very much, sir. 09 10 EXAMINATION 11 BY MR. EBERLEIN: 12 Q. Sir, you have no information that the AIA 13 ever provided any written materials to Nissan, 14 correct? 15 A. T h a t 's correct. 16 MR. EBERLEIN: Thank you. 17 MR. PARKER: I think that, if Mr. Jones 18 agrees, that this concludes the deposition. 19 MR. JONES: It does. 20 MR. PARKER: Do we need to do a 21 stipulation because this is Southern 22 California? 23 MR. JONES: The parties -- l et's go off 24 the video record. 25 MR. HOLMBERG: This is Hank Holmberg. Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 217 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 219 of 224 220:01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 We were cut off and missed 20 minutes of the testimony. So I am going to reserve the right to depose on that material after having an opportunity to review it and determine whether I need to do so. Thanks. MR. JONES: Feel free to question him about the other five or six hours, if you have any questions. MR. HOLMBERG: No. I t 's just the 20 minutes that I missed that I 'm concerned about. Thanks. MR. JONES: All right. W e 're going to go off the record and conclude the deposition. I t 's concluded. L e t 's go off the video record. (Discussion off the record.) THE VIDEOGRAPHER: This concludes the videotaped deposition of Mr. Matthew Swetonic consisting of four number of tapes. The time is approximately 4 -- excuse me -- 5:43 p.m., and we are now off the record. MR. JONES: The parties stipulate that the court reporter can be relieved of her duties under the code concerning the custody of the original transcript. The custody of SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 222:01 ERRATA 02 03 04 I wish to make the following changes, for the 05 following reasons: 06 07 PAGE LINE 08 CHANGE: 09 REASON: 10 CHANGE: 11 REASON: 12 CHANGE: 13 REASON: 14 CHANGE: 15 REASON: 16 CHANGE: 17 REASON: 18 CHANGE: 19 REASON: 20 21 22 MATTHEW M. SWETONIC DATE 23 24 25 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 220 of 224 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 222 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 01 the original transcript will be maintained by 02 The Lanier Law Firm. In the event the 03 original is unavailable, a certified copy 04 thereof can be used with the same force and 05 effect. So stipulated? 06 MR. PARKER: So stipulated. 07 (Whereupon, the deposition was 08 concluded at 5:44 p.m.) 09 10 - - 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 221 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 223:01 A C KN OW L ED G EM EN T 02 03 STATE OF NEW YORK) :ss 04 COUNTY OF NEW YORK) 05 06 07 I, MATTHEW M. SWETONIC, the witness 08 herein, having read the foregoing testimony of the 09 pages of this deposition, do hereby certify it to be 10 a true and correct transcript, subject to the 11 corrections, if any, shown on the attached page. 12 13 14 15 MATTHEW M. SWETONIC 16 17 18 Sworn and subscribed to before 19 me, this day 20 of , 2012. 21 22 23 Notary Public 24 25 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 223 of 224 SWETONIC, MATTHEW 3/22/12 VOL 1 224:01 CERT IFICATE 02 03 I, JEANNETTE McCORMICK, a Certified 04 Shorthand Reporter and Notary Public, certify that 05 the foregoing is a true and accurate Computerized 06 Transcript of the Deposition within. 07 08 I further certify that I am neither 09 attorney, of counsel for, nor related to or employed 10 by any of the parties to the action in which the 11 Depositions are taken, and further that I am not a 12 relative or employee of any attorney or counsel 13 employed in this case, nor am I financially 14 interested in the action. 15 16 17 18 19 JEANNETTE McCORMICK, C.S.R. Firm No. Dallas: 69 Houston: 373 20 1-888-656-DEPO 21 22 23 24 25 Created with TranscriptPad for iPad 11/25/14 Page 224 of 224