Document DDbGgMdbgbggKowYOqNDXYNG4

EgiHlll02.txt 1 1 2 CAUSE NO. 01-14-0294 3 MICKELENE SENATORE, ) IN THE DISTRICT COURT OF et al., ) 4 ) MATAGORDA COUNTY, TEXAS VS. ) 5 ) 23rd JUDICIAL DISTRICT GARLOCK, INC., ) 6 et al., ) 7 CAUSE NO. 21120-BH02 8 BORIS KATZ, et al., ) IN THE DISTRICT COURT OF 9) VS . ) BRAZORIA COUNTY, TEXAS 10 GARLOCK, INC., ) ) 23rd JUDICIAL DISTRICT 11 et al., ) 12 13 14 15 415 Madison Avenue New York, New York 16 November 11, 2002 17 10:39 a.m. 18 19 20 Deposition of MATTHEW SWETONIC, held 21 at the offices of Hanly & Conroy, 22 pursuant to subpoena, before LINDA DEVECKA, 23 a Notary Public of the State of New York. 24 25 2 1 2 APPEARANCES: 3 Page 1 Egilllll02.txt 4 W. MARK LANIER, ESQ. 5 Attorney for Plaintiffs 6 6810 FM 1960 west 7 Houston, Texas 77069 8 9 DAVIS & GILBERT LLP 10 Attorneys for Matthew Swetonic 11 1740 Broadway 12 New York, New York 10019 13 BY: BRUCE M. GINSBERG, ESQ. 14 15 EVERT & WEATHERSBY, L.L.C. 16 Attorneys for Viacom 17 Post Office Box 1787 18 Athens, Georgia 30603 19 BY: WILLIAM D. HARVARD, ESQ. 20 21 GREENFIELD STEIN & SENIOR, LLP 22 Attorneys for Uni royal, Inc. 23 600 Thi rd Avenue 24 New York, New York 10016 25 BY: ANDREW I. BART, ESQ. Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 3 1 2 PORZIO, BROMBERG & NEWMAN, P.C. 3 Attorneys for a s a r c o , incorporated 4 156 West 56th Street 5 New York, New York 10019-3800 Page 2 Egilllll02.txt 6 BY: DULIE SMITH STYPINSKI, ESQ. 7 8 DeHAY & ELLISTON, L.L.P. 9 Attorneys for Exxon Mobil Corp. and Foseco 10 Bank of America Plaza 11 901 Main street, Suite 3500 12 Dallas, Texas 75202 13 BY: S. SHAYNE GARDNER, ESQ. 14 15 LEADER & BERKON LLP 16 Attorneys for E.i. Dupont 17 630 Thi rd Avenue 18 New York, New York 10017 19 BY: NICHOLE S. WILLIAMS, ESQ. 20 21 BROWN MCCARROLL, L.L.P. 22 Attorneys for Ford Motor Company 23 2001 Ross Avenue, Suite 2000 24 Dallas, Texas 75201-6929 25 BY: DOHN R. HENDERSON, ESQ. Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 4 1 2 3 4 HARRIS BEACH, LLP 5 Attorneys for General Electric 6 805 Thi rd Avenue 7 New York, New York 10022 8 BY: CYNTHIA WEISS ANTONUCCI, ESQ. Page 3 Egi1111102.txt 9 10 11 GODWIN GRUBER 12 Attorneys for Halliburton in Katz case only 13 Dallas, Texas 14 BY: WARREN WESTBERG, ESQ. 15 16 17 ALSO PRESENT: 18 19 k r i s t e n z a r n e t s k e , videographer 20 ROBERT LEONE, ESQ. 21 DR. DAVID EGILMAN 22 DARA HEGAR, ESQ. 23 CHARLES HERD, ESQ. 24 25 Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017G 5 1 2 APPEARANCES VIA TELEPHONE: 3 4 KELLY c a s h , ESQ., representing 5 General Motors 6 7 JOHN MONAHAN, ESQ., representing 8 picillo Caruso combustion Engineering 9 10 MIKE BLAKENEY, ESQ., and Page 4 Egi1111102.txt 11 STEPHANIE LUKE, ESQ., representing 12 Proko Industries and Bondex 13 14 RETT HOLIDAY, ESQ., representing 15 American Standard 16 17 CHRISTOPHER DePHILLIPS, ESQ., 18 representing a s a r c o 19 20 ben w h i t e , ESQ., representing 21 Guardii ne 22 23 ALAN WHARTON, ESQ., representing 24 Aqua Chem, Inc. 25 Elisa Dreier Reporting corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 6 1 2 APPEARANCES VIA TELEPHONE (Cont'd): 3 4 SCOTT HUMPHREY, e s q ., representing 5 BASF 6 7 k i m b e r l y St u a r t , ESQ., representing 8 crown Cork & Seal 9 10 MICHAEL SAMFORD, ESQ., representing 11 cooper industries and Beezer 12 13 KATHRYN WARD, ESQ., representing Page 5 Egilllll02.txt 14 conwed corp. 15 16 KATIE ZIVKOVIC, ESQ., representing 17 St. cobain Abrasive 18 19 TODD WEBB, ESQ., representing 20 Kimberly Clark 21 22 23 - oOo 24 25 Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 7 1 2 M A T T H E W S W E T O N I C , called as a 3 witness, having been duly sworn by a Notary 4 Public, was examined and testified as 5 fol1ows: 6 EXAMINATION BY 7 MR. LANIER: 8 Q. I've got your name down as Matthew 9 swetonic. is that right? 10 A. That's correct. 11 Q. You sign a lot ofletters "Matt." Is 12 that what you typically go by? 13 A. Yes. 14 Q. Mr. Swetonic, I met youright before 15 your deposition started. My name is Mark Lanier. page 6 Egi1111102.txt 16 I'm a lawyer. I represent some victims of 17 mesothelioma down in Texas, and I need to take 18 your deposition on some stuff. 19 I apologize to you for the late start. 20 I don't think any of it's our fault. You have 21 been sitting here patiently for an hour waiting 22 and I appreciate that. 23 I need a little bit of your background 24 for the record. It's stuff that I know but I've 25 got to have it in a testimony sense. Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 8 1 Swetoni c 2 Can you tell me where you were born? 3 A. I was born in Brooklyn, New York. 4 October 15, 1942. 5 Q. You just turned 60? 6 A. That's correct. 7 Q. You graduated from high school I guess 8 here in New York? 9 A. No. We moved to Pennsylvania about 10 1946 and I grew up in a town called Easton, 11 Pennsylvania. 12 Q. can you spell that? 13 A. E-a-s-t-o-n. That's where I went to 14 grade school and high school. 15 Q. You got out of high school I assume 16 somewhere around 1960? 17 A. 1960, correct. 18 Q. went to Princeton, I believe? Page 7 EgiH11102.txt 19 A. No. University of Pittsburgh, 20 Q. what did you get your degree in? 21 A. Writing. English writing, 22 Q. i saw it in one place as creative 23 writing. is that right? 24 A. No. well, yes, I guess so. 25 Q. That's the way you were introduced when Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 9 1 Swetoni c 2 you were giving some presentation at one of these 3 asbestos meetings in the industry. 4 Do you have any fuss with that? 5 A. No. 6 Q. You get a degree in creative writing. 7 What year was that? 8 A. 1964. 9 Q. Then you went to get another journalism 10 type degree from Columbia? 11 A. That's correct. 12 Q. when did you get that degree? 13 A. 1965. 14 Q. That's a Master's degree in writing? 15 A. A Master of Science, yes, in 16 journalism. 17 Q. Do you have any education in -- any 18 degrees I guess I should start out with, in any 19 kind of science area? 20 A. NO. Page 8 Egilllll02.txt 21 MR. GINSBERG: Mr. Swetonic, wait for 22 the question to be finished before you give 23 your answer so there's a complete record and 24 if anyone wants to give an objection, there's 25 time. Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017a 10 1 Swetoni c 2 A. If I may say, I did sort of specialize 3 in science writing in the second term of my year 4 at Columbia. 5 Q. You were in Columbia for a year? 6 A. One year. 7 Q. So you spent six months learning how to 8 write science? 9 A. No, that would be an exaggeration, we 10 were required to do a long feature piece in an 11 area in the specialty and I picked science, and I 12 actually wrote one on global cooling at that time. 13 Q. That's out of trend today, isn't it? 14 A. Yes. It was in trend in those days. 15 Q. Then we were going to freeze the world. 16 Now we are going to melt all the ice caps and 17 flood the world. 18 When we talk about your science 19 training and background, you wrote an article on 20 science when you were in Columbia? 21 A. That's correct. Also I started out in 22 engineering at the University of Pittsburgh, so I 23 had some considerable amount of science in there Page 9 Egilllll02.txt 24 before I switched into writing. 25 Q. Before you got your creative writing Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017G 11 1 Swetoni c 2 degree you were an engineering student for a 3 while; is that right? 4 A. That's right. Yes. 5 Q. How long were you an engineering major? 6 A. One year. 7 Q. Was that your first year of college? 8 A. Yes. 9 Q. That year mainly you are taking a bunch 10 of preliminary courses, aren't you; basics? 11 A. Basics in science but not in math 12 because I had taken some advanced math courses 13 when I was in high school so I was able to kind of 14 jump into a little higher course. 15 Q. Your scientific training is a piece you 16 wrote in Columbia on global cooling and an 17 advanced science or advanced math class you took 18 your first year in college at Pittsburgh, is that 19 fai r to say? 20 A. A couple of advanced math courses, yes. 21 Q. Other than college degrees, tell me 22 what kind of formal training you have in science. 23 A. Formal? 24 Q. Yes, sir. 25 A. None. Page 10 Egilllll02.txt Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 12 1 Swetonic 2 Q. Do you have any other schooling besides 3 what you have told us about at Pittsburgh and 4 Columbi a? 5 A. No. 6 (Swetonic Exhibit 1, deposition 7 subpoena, marked for identification, as of 8 this date.) 9 Q. Sir, I have put in front of you a 10 document we have marked as Exhibit No. 1. It's 11 the legal document we had to file with the court 12 in Texas and the court here in New York to tell 13 them that we wanted to take your deposition. 14 Have you ever seen this before? 15 A. Yes. 16 Q. It's got a subpoena attached to it to 17 compel you to be here and to bring some documents. 18 Do you see that part? 19 A. Uh-huh. 20 Q. is that a "yes" answer? 21 A. Yes. 22 Q. I don't mean to be pert but "uh-huh's" 23 and "huh-uh's" read a lot alike when she types 24 them, i want to make sure anybody reading this 25 knows which one that was. Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 Page 11 Egilllll02.txt 13 1 swetoni c 2 A. I will try to be clear. 3 Q. Did you bring the documents that we 4 subpoenaed you to bring? 5 a . Such as i still had in my possession, 6 which were not very many. 7 MR. l a n i e r : No, there weren't. I was 8 surprised. 9 (Swetonic Exhibit 2-a , laminated card 10 called "Asbestos and Health Questions and 11 Answers," marked for identification, as of 12 this date.) 13 (Swetonic Exhibit 2-B, brochure 14 entitled "Asbestos in the Atmosphere, a 15 Hazard to Health?", marked for 16 identification, as of this date.) 17 (swetonic Exhibit 2-c, polyvinyl 18 chloride brochure, marked for identification, 19 as of this date.) 20 (Swetonic Exhibit 2-d , asbestos and 21 health information file, marked for 22 identification, as of this date.) 23 (swetonic Exhibit 3, Crisis Management 24 book chapter entitled "Death of the Asbestos 25 industry," marked for identification, as of Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 14 1 Swetoni c Page 12 Egi1111102.txt 2 this date.) 3 Q. I've marked the documents that you've 4 given us. They've got orange Post-It's on them. 5 I added the Post-It's so I wouldn't write on your 6 documents. 7 if you will take a moment and look at 8 these documents, tell me whether or not these are 9 the documents you brought us. 10 A. Yes. 11 Q. Let's identify them for the record so 12 that we know what we've got. 13 Exhibit 1 the court reporter already 14 noted is the deposition subpoena. I have marked 15 the documents you produced as Exhibit n o . 2, and I 16 put alphabetical letters next to them to show the 17 different documents within Exhibit 2 that you 18 produced. 19 So Exhibit 2-A, would you tell us what 20 that is, please? 21 A. This is a xerox copy of what a -- a 22 printed card, laminated card that was produced and 23 it's called "Asbestos and Health Questions and 24 Answers." And this was put out by the Asbestos 25 Information Association and it has a list of the Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 15 1 swetoni c 2 corporations that were sponsored in that 3 organization at the bottom here. 4 Q. why is it you kept that document when Page 13 Egilllll02.txt 5 you didn't keep much of anything else? 6 A, The things that I kept were basically 7 all printed materials and I just kept them as 8 examples of the work I had done when I was working 9 for the various -- for the trade association. 10 Q. This Exhibit 2-A is your work? 11 A. I'm not 100 percent sure to be 12 absolutely true whether I wrote the thing or not. 13 It was produced at that time, about the time that 14 I was working for the trade association, whether 15 I actually wrote this or not, I'm not 100 percent 16 sure. 17 Q. where did you find that before your 18 deposition? where did you have it? 19 A. Just in a pile of stuff. This thing 20 here (indicating) was a folder and it was all 21 stuck in that folder. 22 Q. You had a folder that said -- what is 23 the title on the folder? 24 A. It's this one right here (indicating). 25 Asbestos and health information file. Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 16 1 Swetonic 2 Q. That's what we've marked as Exhibit 2-D 3 as in David? 4 A. Right. 5 And this was an accordion folder and 6 these things were all just stuck inside of it. Page 14 EgiU11102.txt 7 Q. Where do you keep this folder? 8 A. I keep it at the office. 9 Q. Where is your office? 10 A. The Met Life Building. 11 Q. Do you have anything to do with Met 12 Life? 13 A. No. I work for a consulting firm. 14 Q. Exhibit 2-b , would you tell the folks 15 what that is, please? 16 A. This was a brochure and it's called 17 "Asbestos in the Atmosphere. A Hazard to Health?" 18 and it basically discusses general public exposure 19 as opposed to occupational exposure to asbestos. 20 And this was produced after the trade association 21 moved to Washington which means it was produced 22 after I left them. 23 Q. Why is it you kept that? 24 A. Because after I left the trade 25 association in 1973 they retained me in my next Elisa Dreier Reporting corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017Q 17 1 Swetoni c 2 job for approximately a year so that I could train 3 my successor, and I believe I did write this one 4 in that time period, that year period. 5 Q. I show you Exhibit No. 2-c and ask you 6 what that is, please. 7 A. This has nothing to do with asbestos 8 whatsoever. This is a brochure called "PVC," 9 meaning polyvinyl chloride, it's "Health and Page 15 Egilllll02.txt 10 Safety. Answers to ten questions most often asked 11 about polyvinyl chloride." 12 This was put out by the Society of the 13 Plastics Industry in the time frame when vinyl 14 chloride was a health issue and a health concern. 15 I see it references studies in '75 and '76 here so 16 this was obviously put out no earlier than 1976. 17 when after that, I don't know. 18 Q. I am going to show you Exhibit 2-D and 19 ask you what that is, please. 20 A. This is a copy of the folder that I 21 mentioned a few seconds ago. It's called 22 "Asbestos and Health information File." it was 23 produced in April of 1973 and this is essentially 24 what you would refer to as a media kit. 25 This was sent out to approximately Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017a 18 1 Swetonic 2 3,000 reporters, science editors, magazine 3 writers; people who basically were covering the 4 asbestos health issue, and it contained six 5 things. Five position papers: Part I, "Asbestos 6 and Health"; Part II, "What Asbestos Is"; ill, 7 "Protecting the Asbestos worker"; Part IV, 8 "Asbestos and the General Public"; and Part v, 9 "Profile of the AIA," meaning the Asbestos 10 information Association of North America; and Part 11 VI, it contains a number of medical papers. Let Page 16 Egilllll02.txt 12 me open that up as to what medical papers we sent 13 out to 3,000 reporters. 14 "Regulation of cigarette smoking to 15 risk of death of asbestos-associated disease among 16 insulation workers in the United States." 17 MR. GINSBERG: Just for a second before 18 you go on to who wrote it, I believe you 19 misread it as "regulation." It says 20 "relation." 21 A. Relation, I am sorry. 22 "Relation of cigarette smoking to the 23 risk of death of asbestos-associated disease among 24 insulation workers in the United States" by 25 E. cuyler Hammond of the American Cancer society, Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 19 1 swetoni c 2 and Dr. Irving selikoff. 3 Second one is "Mortality from Lung 4 Cancer and other Causes among workers in an 5 Asbestos Textile Factory." This is by 3.F. Knox, 6 S. Holmes, Sir Richard Doll and i.D. Hill. 7 A study called "Brake Lining 8 Decomposition Products" by Jeremiah Lynch of the 9 National Center for Urban and industrial Health, 10 which I believe was part of the Public Health 11 Servi ce. 12 "The Biological Effects of Asbestos. 13 Report Of The Advisory Committee On Asbestos 14 Cancers To The Director Of The International Page 17 Eg-iU11102.txt 15 Agency For Research On Cancer, A Division of The 16 World Health Organization." It's essentially a 17 summary of a meeting that was held in Lyon, 18 France, October 5-6, 1972, which I also attended. 19 A thing called "Biologic Effects of 20 Atmospheric Pollutants. Asbestos. The Need For 21 And Feasibility of Air pollution controls," 22 prepared by the committee on Biologic Effects of 23 Atmospheric Pollutants, Division of Medical 24 Sciences, National Research Council, National 25 Academy of Sciences, 1971." Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 20 1 Swetoni c 2 "Mortality in the Chrysotile Asbestos 3 Mines and Mills of Quebec," reprinted from the 4 Archives of Environmental Health, by Corbett 5 McDonald, et al. 6 Then the only other two things are -7 these were photographs that are included in the 8 media kit. One is of a bag house dust collection 9 system used in plants, and the other one is a 10 picture of protective safety clothing. This would 11 be asbestos covered in some sort of aluminum foil 12 on the outside. 13 And that's what was in there. 14 Q. I appreciate you being so thorough in 15 telling us what Exhibit 2-D is. why did you keep 16 it? Page 18 Egi1111102.txt 17 A. Exactly for the same reason, as an 18 example of my work product when I was working in 19 the industry. 20 Q. How do you choose which examples of 21 your work product to keep and which to destroy? 22 A. Basically these were all -- 23 MR. GINSBERG: Objection. There wasn't 24 any testimony that he destroyed anything. 25 Q. which ones you didn't keep, I assume Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 21 1 Swetonic 2 you threw them away. Didn't you? 3 A. In terms of printed documents with one 4 exception, these are the only ones that I worked 5 on. 6 Q. The lawyer brought up an interesting 7 point, though, and that is, what happened to all 8 the other stuff you did? Was it stolen or did you 9 throw it away? 10 A. No. if you take a look at the asbestos 11 situation, the trade association continued in 12 existence after I left it, so all the files, all 13 the documents, remained with the trade 14 association. 15 Q. But I read like this thing that is 16 marked Exhibit No. 3, "Death of the Asbestos 17 industry." it's got your name on it. It looks to 18 me like something you wrote. 19 A. Yes. Page 19 Egi1111102.txt 20 MR. DePHlLLlPS: objection, form. 21 A. This was a chapter that I wrote for a 22 book on crisis management on my experience in the 23 asbestos industry, it was not something I 24 produced while I was working for the asbestos 25 industry. Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 22 1 Swetoni c 2 Q. Sir, do you still have a copy of this 3 at home? 4 A. Yes, I think I do. 5 Q. Why didn't you bring this? 6 MR. GINSBERG: I believe I did not 7 think that was responsive to the subpoena, 8 Mr. Lanier. 9 Q. Sir, doesn't this reference work you 10 did while at Hill & Know!ton or while at 11 lohns-Manville? 12 MR. GINSBERG: I don't think that the 13 subpoena has any provision that reads as 14 you've just stated but if you want to go 15 through it, feel free to. You obviously have 16 a copy of the article. I don't believe there 17 was anything else that Mr. swetonic has that 18 I reviewed. It was this one item that I 19 thought was not responsive. 20 A. There was one other document -- not 21 document, printed material, that for whatever Page 20 Egilllll02.txt 22 reason I do not have a copy of, and that is -23 we also did a booklet for workers in 24 the asbestos industry kind of summarizing what the 25 1972 OSHA standards were about and what the Elisa Dreier Reporting corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 23 1 Swetoni c 2 companies were required to do to protect them in 3 terms of medical monitoring and stuff like that. 4 Q. Sir, take the document subpoena that we 5 gave you, please, and look at No. 13 on the 6 document subpoena, it's on page 3. 7 it says, "All documents regarding other 8 tobacco, chemicals or asbestos-related companies, 9 trade associations, insurers or other 10 organizations of which you are or have been 11 associated with which addressed in any way 12 tobacco, chemicals or asbestos, or tobacco, 13 chemicals or asbestos-related diseases, illnesses, 14 claims or coverage." is that basically what it 15 says? 16 A. Yes. 17 Q. Well, sir, don't you think that your 18 "Death of the Asbestos industry" is a document 19 regarding asbestos-related companies and trade 20 associations you've been a part of? 21 MR. g i n s b e r g : Mr. Lanier, as I said, 22 that was my decision not to produce it. I 23 did not read the subpoena as requiring 24 production of that. Mr. Swetonic was not Page 21 Egilllll02.txt 25 involved in that decision. Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 24 1 Swetoni c 2 MR. LANIER: Okay, well, I still get 3 to ask Mr. swetonic what his opinion is. 4 Q. Sir, don't you believe that document 5 No. 3 would be responsive to No. 13? 6 Di MR. GINSBERG: I will direct him not to 7 answer, it's protected by attorney-client 8 privilege. 9 Q. Sir, how many other documents did you 10 and your lawyer decide not to produce? 11 MR. GINSBERG: objection. Abusive. I 12 already told you this was the only document 13 that I reviewed other than those that we 14 produced. There were no other documents in 15 Mr. swetonic's files. 16 Q. sir, where do you keep all of your 17 files? 18 A. Generally at the office. 19 Q. when you write a chapterfor a book, do 20 you keep a copy of the draft that you wrote from? 21 A. Oh, no. 22 Q. You are a creative writer -- 23 A. Besides, I might point out, that was 24 done in 1993. So that's nine years ago. 25 Q. You don't keep a copy of your edits; Page 22 EgiUlll02.txt Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 25 1 Swetonic 2 you don't keep a copy of your rough drafts, you 3 don't keep a copy of your earlier papers? 4 A. No. 5 Q. Do you keep a copy of your speeches you 6 give? 7 A. I don't really give very many speeches. 8 It's just kind of a -- it's kind of an 9 off-the-cuff thing, it's mostly for PR people on 10 how you approach managing an issue. 11 Q. Sir, when you give speeches, sometimes 12 you will write your speech out word-for-word and 13 read it? 14 A. I don't. 15 Q. Have you ever? 16 A. No, I don't think so. 17 well, maybe. Maybe I did -- I have on 18 occasion. I don't do it that way any longer. 19 Q. You did back there when you were giving 20 asbestos speeches, didn't you? 21 MR. GINSBERG: There is no testimony 22 that he gave asbestos speeches, Mr. Lanier. 23 MR. LANIER: Well, everybody knows it. 24 MR. GINSBERG: if you would like to 25 give the deposition, please do. if you have Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 26 Page 23 Egilllll02.txt 1 Swetoni c 2 got a question, please limit it to proper 3 questions. 4 m r . l a n i e r : That's a proper question 5 down in Texas. I mean, heck, I could object 6 to him telling me his name is Matthew 7 Swetonic because that's based on hearsay; 8 someone had to have told him that, he didn't 9 actually do it himself, we can get that 10 nitpicky. 11 Q. Your lawyer may not know it. Didn't 12 you give a speech on asbestos, sir? 13 A. Yes, i have given a speech on asbestos. 14 Q. Okay. Now that your lawyer knows that. 15 Sir, you've given speeches on asbestos 16 where you wrote it out, didn't you? 17 m r . g i n s b e r g : objection. You've just 18 said now that he has given speeches and 19 previously you pointed out he gave a speech, 20 so could we just please play straight with 21 him. 22 MR. LANIER: This is like Clinton 23 saying, "Whatever is, is." 24 MR. g i n s b e r g : Now we are talking about 25 one of your Texas guys. Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 27 1 Swetoni c 2 MR. LANIER: Clinton is not from Texas. Page 24 Egi1111102.txt 3 MR. GINSBERG: Close enough. 4 MR. LANIER: I believe his wife is a 5 senator from your state, not mine. 6 Q. I am going to give you a copy of an 7 exhibit we are going to call Swetonic Exhibit 8 No. 4. 9 (Swetonic Exhibit 4, ATI meeting 10 minutes and speaker introduction page, marked 11 for identification, as of this date.) 12 Q. The first page of it is just minutes 13 from an ATI meeting. The second page is an 14 introduction about the speaker, and I would like 15 for you to start on page 2. 16 MR. GINSBERG: Let's give the witness a 17 minute just to look at the entire document, 18 please. 19 MR. LANIER: You look at it. When you 20 are ready to answer questions, you tell me. 21 (Witness reviewed document.) 22 MR. LANIER: That last page is just an 23 affidavit proving up the speech, it's part 24 of the Asbestos Textile Institute minutes, 25 it's not part of the speech. Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 28 1 Swetoni c 2 Q. Now that you have had a chance to read 3 the speech, I would like to ask you a couple of 4 questions about it. 5 if you will look initially at page 2, Page 25 Egilllll02.txt 6 which is the "About the Speaker" page, you see 7 that? 8 A. Yes. 9 Q. It calls you a speaker, doesn't it? 10 A. where does it say that? 11 Q. It says "About the speaker." 12 A. Yes, okay. 13 Q. And the name of the speaker is 14 Matthew M. Swetonic, right? 15 A. Yes. 16 Q. So you do give speeches, don't you? 17 MR. GINSBERG: Objection. Again, we 18 have been through this before, it's abusive, 19 it's a statement. You didn't ask who wrote 20 this page and it's entitled "About the 21 Speaker." 22 MR. l a n i e r : Yes, sir. 23 Q. Aren't you the speaker? 24 A. Yes. At this speech, yes. 25 Q. This is a speech you gave, isn't it? Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 29 1 swetoni c 2 A. A speech. 3 Q. if you look at the next page, you will 4 see it even says, "A Presentation Before the 5 Asbestos Textile Institute"; right? 6 A. I'm not disagreeing with that. 7 Q. Your lawyer said there wasn't any Page 26 Egilllll02.txt 8 evidence you ever gave any speeches. 9 m r . g i n s b e r g : Objection. Now you are 10 mischaracterizing what I said, so move on, 11 Mr. Lanier. Please. 12 Q. Sir, you have given asbestos speeches 13 before, haven't you? 14 A. I have given one at least that I 15 remember, and that's this one. 16 Q. You presented in front of the 17 government in hearings over a 30-day period in 18 St. Louis and New York -19 A. That's not speeches. Those aren't 20 speeches. 21 Q. You didn't say anything? 22 A. I spoke at the OSHA hearing. 23 Q. Yes. 24 A. But that's not a speech. 25 Q. what do you think it is? Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 30 1 swetoni c 2 A. It's a presentation to a regulatory 3 agency. That's not a speech. 4 Q. You made a speech to the regulatory 5 agency. 6 A. Maybe you refer to those as speeches in 7 Texas, we don't here in the North or in 8 Washi ngton. 9 Q. What makes a speech a speech? 10 A. A speech is to a group of people who Page 27 Egilllll02.txt 11 are assembled there for some reason. 12 A presentation on your industry's 13 position to a regulatory agency is simply that; 14 it's a presentation to the regulatory agency. 15 Q. Was your presentation written or was it 16 given in the form of speech? 17 A. it was written. 18 I am sorry, it was two things, one, 19 we had to submit our position in advance of the 20 hearing and then we summarized it at the hearing. 21 Q. So, in other words, you did give a 22 presentation in the form of speech at the hearing 23 as well as in the form of writing; is that fair to 24 say? 25 A. Yes. Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 31 1 Swetoni c 2 Q. You gave a presentation to a group that 3 was in a speech form but you don't want to call it 4 a speech, and in addition to that, you gave a 5 presentation to this group in a speech form that 6 you do call a speech? 7 a . Yes. 8 Q. The presentation you gave to this group 9 in a speech form that you are willing to call a 10 speech, it's in writing also, isn't it? 11 A . It iS . 12 Q. Why didn't you keep a copy of that? Page 28 EgiU11102.txt 13 A. I have no idea. Probably -14 As i said, the things I kept were all 15 printed documents. I have no idea why I kept it. 16 it just stayed in the files. It wasn't a thing 17 that was in that folder. 18 Q. Did you throw it away or what did you 19 do with it? 20 A. No. It probably remained with the 21 trade association. 22 Q. You think your original speech paper 23 that you had, you gave it to them after you read 24 it? 25 A. To these people (indicating)? Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 32 1 Swetoni c 2 Q. Yes. 3 A. I have no idea whether they asked for a 4 copy or not. 5 Q. I am going to ask you some meat 6 information type stuff on that article later but 7 right now I am still trying to get at what 8 documents you brought and what you haven't. 9 Are you telling me that all of the 10 documents you brought, 2-a , 2-B, 2-C, 2-D, were 11 just documents in one folder, one expandable 12 folder? 13 A. Yes. 14 Q. why did that expandable folder -- let 15 me get these straight for you. Page 29 EgiU11102.txt 16 Why did that expandable folder have a 17 polyvinyl chloride document in it? 18 A. Because that was the one document -19 when I say "document," in terms of a pamphlet that 20 I produced for those people when I was working on 21 that particular thing. 22 Q. So you have a folder that has got not 23 only three asbestos articles but it has got a 24 polyvinyl chloride article in it? 25 A. It's not an article. It's a question Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017G 33 1 Swetonic 2 and answer folder, yes. As I recall, that's the 3 only thing in a booklet form that we ever did for 4 SPI on that issue. 5 Q. Some background information on you, 6 please. 7 Can you tell me how your health is? 8 A. Fine, i have high blood pressure which 9 I take medication for. 10 Q. You are not onany kind ofmedication 11 that would influence your memory or your ability 12 to testify here? 13 A. NO. 14 Q. I would like your jobhistory starting 15 out with I guess when you got out of Columbia. 16 A . Okay. 17 I went to work for Johns-Manville Page 30 Egi1111102.txt 18 Corporation, at first I think like an assistant 19 editor of their employee publication. Then I 20 became editor that -- I don't know, within a year 21 or so. Then finally they approached me in 1968, I 22 believe sometime, I'm not sure exactly when, and 23 said because of that small background on science 24 writing at Columbia, would I be interested in 25 getting involved in the asbestos health issue Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 34 1 Swetonic 2 which they were just really starting to look at 3 from a communications standpoint, so I said, 4 "Yes, I think that would be interesting." 5 So I worked with them on that issue 6 through the end of 1971 when Manville moved all 7 its operations to Denver, Colorado. We were 8 originally here in New York City. 9 Then I took over as executive 10 secretary, I guess it is, not executive director, 11 of the Asbestos information Association, North 12 America, which had been founded essentially 13 through -- primarily through the instigation and 14 urging of Johns-Manvi11e , I think at the end of 15 1970. Somewhere in that general ballpark. 16 Then I stayed with the trade 17 association from that January through August of 18 1973, when I left to go to Hill & Know!ton, and I 19 stayed at Hill & Know!ton until January of 1991. 20 Left there to join a company called E. Bruce Page 31 EgiUlll02.txt 21 Harrison. I stayed there until October of 1994 22 and then joined the Dilenschneider group where I 23 work today in October of '94. 24 Q. Have you kept track of any of your 25 other documents for work you have done on behalf Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 35 1 Swetonic 2 of the Chemical Manufacturers Association? 3 A. Never worked for them. 4 Q. Never did any CMA work? 5 A. No. 6 Q. Did you ever do any work for tobacco? 7 A. Yes. 8 Q. Who did you do work for in tobacco? 9 A. R.J. Reynolds. 10 Q. When was that? 11 A. I did some work in the early '80s. 12 '83, '84. And then a lot more extensively after 13 1987. 14 Q. Up to when? 15 A. About eight years ago. 16 Q. '94? 17 A. '94, yes. 18 Q. Any other tobacco work other than 19 R.3. Reynolds for those time periods? 20 A. No. 21 Q. '83, '84 would have been while you were 22 at Hill & Know!ton? Page 32 EgiU11102.txt 23 A. Yes. 24 Q. '87 through '94 would have been Hill & 25 Know!ton and Harrison? Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, ny 100170 36 1 Swetoni c 2 A. Correct. 3 Q. You quit working on RJR and tobacco 4 issues when you went to Dilenschneider? 5 A. That's correct. 6 Q. Did you do any lead paint work? 7 A. I am doing lead paint work right now. 8 Q. Did you follow the Rhode Island trial? 9 A. Yes. 10 Q. Did you have any communications with 11 the Wall street Journal about that trial? 12 A. NO. 13 Q. Communications with any of the people 14 that work or write for the wall Street Journal? 15 A. Actually we got a call from a reporter 16 at the Wall Street Journal wanting to know who to 17 talk to about the trial, and we passed him on to 18 the public relations firm that is representing the 19 industry. 20 Q. Did you do any work for the saccharine 21 industry? 22 A. We did. 23 Q. When was that? 24 A. Whenever that issue came up. I don't 25 remember. In the '70s sometime. Page 33 Egilllll02.txt Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 37 1 Swetoni c 2 Q. Do you remember who you were working 3 for at the time? 4 A. The fi rst company that hi red us was the 5 Sweet'N Low people, and then after that we ended 6 up working for essentially the soft drink 7 industry. 8 Q. This was while you were with Hill & 9 Knowlton? 10 A. That's correct. 11 Q. Other than Hill & Knowlton, did you do 12 saccharine work? 13 A. No. 14 Q. How about dioxin? 15 A. Yes. 16 Q. who did you do work for in dioxin? 17 A. Dow Chemical. 18 Q. when was this? 19 A. 1983, I believe. 20 Q. while you were at Hill & Knowlton? 21 A. Correct. 22 Q. what kind of work did you do for Dow 23 Chemical on dioxin? 24 A. well, basically, we had been following 25 the dioxin issue for quite a while because we -- Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 Page 34 Egilllll02.txt 38 1 Swetoni c 2 not me personally -- had done some work with the 3 saveso explosion in Italy. So we had considerable 4 background files on dioxin, you know, health 5 studies and such. 6 And Dow Chemical approached us and 7 said, "we think we need some serious help on this 8 thing because we think the science basically is on 9 our side and that's not getting out very well." 10 So we worked with them in that regard, we wrote a 11 health background paper for them, for example, and 12 we were to take the doctors from their science 13 labs out there and take them out around the 14 country to talk about the issue. 15 Q. A lot of people may not have even heard 16 of dioxin, is there another name that we can give 17 to that that a lot of people may realize what we 18 are talking about? 19 A. Sure. Agent Orange. 20 Q. Agent Orange? 21 A. Right. 22 Q. You were one of the guys hired in a PR 23 sense to try to make it look like Agent Orange 24 isn't bad or something? 25 MR. GINSBERG: Objection. Abusive and Elisa Dreier Reporting corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 39 1 Swetoni c Page 35 Egilllll02.txt 2 not what he testified to. 3 MR. LANIER: I am asking him. 4 Q. is that true? 5 A. The science behind -- that was 6 available and is still available on Agent orange 7 indicated it was not a serious problem in Vietnam. 8 Q. Have you seen the science on the other 9 side that indicates it was a serious problem? 10 A. such science as there was on the other 11 side was purely speculative. 12 Q. Now you are a creative writing talking 13 to me. You don't have a science background, 14 right? 15 A. Sufficient to be able to -- after 16 spending 35 years looking at material like that, I 17 can take a look at it and see what makes sense and 18 what doesn't make sense. 19 Q. So you are sufficiently qualified to 20 say that the medical doctors and scientists who 21 have done studies are just wrong? 22 A. No, I'm not qualified scientifically to 23 say that but I can look at a paper that somebody's 24 produced that is published in a journal and say, 25 "Gee, that makes sense" or "There are parts of it Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 40 1 swetoni c 2 that don't make sense." 3 Q. Did you do the same thing for tobacco? Page 36 Egilllll02.txt 4 MR. GINSBERG: Objection. Can you be 5 more specific in terms of what specific 6 assignment you are talking about? 7 Q. Did you look at all those studies that 8 said tobacco hurts people and write them off as 9 being no good, back when you were doing work for 10 RJR? 11 A. Didn't deal with that part of the 12 issue. IB Q. what did you do for r d r ? 14 a . Three or four different things. We put 15 together a communications plan for a trial that 16 was about to start in California. That was in 17 the -18 Q. I am sorry to interrupt you. I 19 apologize. 20 RDR, we haven't told everybody, I think 21 most people know, but that's R.J. Reynolds, the 22 tobacco company. Right? 23 A. Yes. 24 Q. what cigarettes do they put out so 25 people know who we are talking about? Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 41 1 Swetoni c 2 MR. GINSBERG: objection. You're just 3 asking for his general knowledge as a member 4 of the public as opposed to any particular 5 brand or whatever that he had any 6 professional work related to? is that what Page 37 Egi1111102.txt 7 you want, Mr. Lanier? 8 MR. LANIER: Under the Texas rules you 9 are not allowed to do any of that stuff. I 10 am just asking him a question. If he can't 11 answer, he can say, "I can't answer that, I 12 don't know." But I suspect since he was 13 doing their PR work for nearly a decade, he 14 knows which brands they had. 15 MR. GINSBERG: Let me correct the 16 record on that as well with regard to the 17 Texas rules. 18 This deposition may be governed in 19 Texas by its rules as to how he can use it, 20 but we have got a New York witness sitting 21 here in New York protected by New York rules. 22 MR. LANIER: Okay. I will try and give 23 deference to you with your New York rules, 24 but I think this witness can probably answer 25 that question. Elisa Dreier Reporting corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 42 1 Swetonic 2 MR. GINSBERG: You would like this 3 witness to testify as an expert in terms of 4 marketing of Reynolds products that are on 5 the market? 6 MR. LANIER: I am trying to establish 7 this witness's background, experience, what 8 he has done, what he had not done, how he has Page 38 Egilllll02.txt 9 done it. I want to see if there's a common 10 link between the way it's been done in 11 asbestos and the way it's been done in 12 tobacco and other chemicals. A lot of 13 information I want to ask him. 14 MR. GINSBERG: Then ask the question in 15 terms of any rjr product that he did work 16 related to as opposed to his knowledge of 17 what products rjr makes. 18 Q. was RIR your client? 19 A. Yes. 20 Q. Do you know what they made? 21 A. Of course. 22 Q. What was the major tobacco brand that 23 they made when they were your client? 24 A. Winstons and Salem, Camel. I think 25 those are three. I guess they had some others Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 43 1 Swetoni c 2 that I am not aware of. I think Vantage but I'm 3 not sure. 4 Q. when you were doing work for the 5 company that makes Winstons and Salems and camels, 6 what kind of work were you doing for them? 7 A. It had nothing to do with any of those 8 specific products. As I was trying to explain to 9 you before, the first thing we did -- one thing we 10 did was put together a communications plan for 11 dealing with a lawsuit that was about to start in Page 39 Egilllll02.txt 12 California. That was sometime in the early '80s. 13 I couldn't tell you exactly when that was. 14 Q. That lawsuit didn't have anything to do 15 with Winstons, salems or Camels? 16 A. I don't know specifically which it had 17 to do with because we never went forward and 18 actually handled it. 19 Q. what kind of lawsuit was it? 20 A. Cancer. 21 Q. From smoking? 22 A. Yes. 23 Q. You think they got it from something 24 other than Winstons, Salems andCamels. 25 MR. GINSBERG: Objection. I am Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 44 1 Swetoni c 2 familiar with the Texas objection for abusive 3 questioning and that I can instruct him not 4 to answer, if you are going to continue with 5 these kinds of questions, there's going to be 6 a lot of instructions not to answer. 7 MR. LANIER: That's fine. But be 8 careful. You reap what you sow. 9 Q. Sir, when you were putting together a 10 communications plan for the lawsuit, what does 11 that mean? 12 A. well, in this particular case as I 13 recall -- again, it's at least 20 years ago -- the Page 40 Egilllll02.txt 14 company's largest concern was -- I think the 15 plaintiff's attorney in that case was Belli -- 16 what is his first name? 17 MR. LANIER: Melvin. 18 A. Melvin Belli. I believe that's 19 correct. 20 And that they figured that he would be 21 trying the case on the courthouse steps as was his 22 wont and that sort of thing. So they wanted to 23 have a little plan in place to kind of address 24 that tactic. 25 Q. Did you put such communication plan Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017G 45 1 Swetoni c 2 together? 3 A. Yes. 4 Q. What was your plan? 5 A. I don't remember. 6 Q. what other work have you done for the 7 tobacco companies? 8 A. We helped to introducetheir 9 unsuccessful smokeless cigarette, Premiere. 10 Q. when was this work done? 11 A. It started in '87, and the product was 12 pulled from the market I believe in early '89. 13 Q. what work did you do to try and help 14 introduce Premiere cigarettes? 15 A. we put together the entire press 16 conference that started it out, put together some Page 41 EgiU11102.txt 17 materials that talked about the underlying science 18 and how the new cigarette works, so to speak; then 19 when it came under attack, which was considerable, 20 did our best to help defend it by getting people 21 from the company to sit down with media in various 22 locations and such. 23 Q. what other work have you done for 24 tobacco? 25 A. I did work on environmental tobacco Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 46 1 Swetonic 2 smoke. 3 Q. Explain to me what that is. 4 A. Well, it's the -- either the smoke that 5 comes off the end of a burning cigarette or the 6 exhaled smoke that a smoker exhales. 7 Q. in a confined room like this conference 8 room or courtroom? 9 A. wherever. 10 Q. what kind of work did you do on that? 11 A. Once again, we put together, for 12 example, a slide presentation on the health 13 effects or lack thereof of environmental tobacco 14 smoke and put out what we call a media tour where 15 we try to get media to sit down and listen to what 16 we had to say; particularly in cities where there 17 was efforts to ban smoking in bars and other 18 places of public accommodation. Page 42 Egilllll02.txt Q. when you say you put together a slide presentation on the health effects, who did you 21 put that together for? 22 A. R.J. Reynolds. I mean working with 23 them. 24 Q. who was the slide presentation targeted 25 to? Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 47 1 Swetoni c 2 A. Journalists. 3 Q. To journalists, why journalists? 4 A. So that they could report in their 5 papers, that hopefully they would conclude -- we 6 did a lot of editorial boards, too. That they 7 would conclude that it was unnecessary in that 8 city or state or whatever to ban smoking in public 9 buildings. 10 Q. You say you did a lot of work with 11 editorial boards. What is that? 12 A. Essentially every newspaper has what 13 they call an editorial board which would be some 14 of the editors who write editorials and then just 15 others who are part of this board, and they make 16 the decisions on what is covered editorially in 17 the paper and what bent any particular editorial 18 is going to take, and then they write it, if they 19 are in charge of that part of the newspaper. 20 Q. You worked aggressively at trying to 21 get newspapers and the journalists and the editors Page 43 Egi1111102.txt 22 who do the editorial work to try and say that 23 "Hey, smoke is fine in public places"? 24 MR. GINSBERG: objection. It's a 25 mischaracterization of his testimony. Elisa Dreier Reporting corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 48 1 Swetonic 2 A. we presented the material to them on 3 that issue. 4 Q. which position did you take, that it 5 was good or bad? 6 A. That it was not bad. 7 Q. Secondhand smoke doesn't hurt you? 8 a . Yes. 9 Q. You know that'swrong, don't you? 10 MR. GINSBERG: Objection. 11 Q. Go ahead. You are under oath. You 12 know secondhand smoke can hurt you, don't you? 13 A. I think if you look at the medical 14 data, sir, on that issue, you will find that the 15 vast majority of the papers that are of any 16 decency whatsoever in terms of their statistical 17 strength and all this kind of stuff, say it ain't. 18 Q. They say secondhandsmokedoesn't hurt 19 you? 20 A. Yes. 21 Q. is this more of what you can do as a 22 trained creative writer/journalist turned 23 scientist stuff, where you can look at these Page 44 EgiU11102.txt 24 studies and you can make that determination? 25 MR. GINSBERG: Objection. Abusive. Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 49 1 Swetoni c 2 A. You work with -- PR does not operate by 3 itself, okay. 4 Q. That's what this is, by the way, PR, 5 isn't it? 6 A. This is public relations, yes. That's 7 the type of work that I have been doing for the 8 last umpteen years. 9 You work with, you know, scientists at 10 the companies you are working for, medical 11 experts, outside/inside medical experts, to try 12 and make sure that what you are helping them put 13 together into simpler terms in the English 14 language so that most people can understand what 15 you are trying to say is accurate. I mean, you 16 don't just go out on your own and do it. 17 Q. You don't think there's a problem with 18 secondhand smoke? 19 A. Based on what I have read and my 20 conversations with scientists basically working 21 for the tobacco industry admittedly, the answer is 22 no, I don't think so. 23 Q. Are you married? 24 A. Yes. 25 Q. what is your wife'sname? Page 45 Egilllll02.txt Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017G 50 1 Swetonic 2 A. Ruth. 3 Q. Do you know a Diane Swetonic? 4 A. Yes. 5 Q. who is that? 6 A. That's my first wife. 7 Q. she worked for Lorrilard, didn't she? 8 A. Yes. 9 Q. That's another tobacco company,isn't 10 11 A. She actually worked for Philip Morris 12 as well. 13 Q. That's the Marlboro Man, isn't it? 14 A. Yes. 15 Q. Lorrilard is like Kent and things like 16 that? 17 A. I don't remember. 18 Q. You wouldn't have anytrouble taking 19 one of your grandkids into a room with a bunch of 20 secondhand smoke and just let them sit there and 21 breathe it all the time because you don't think 22 there's a problem with that? 23 A. What does this have to do with 24 anythi ng? 25 Q. A lot. Number one, credibility. Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D Page 46 51 Egilllll02.txt 1 Swetoni c 2 A. well, I don't have grandchildren. My 3 wife doesn't like me to smoke in the house except 4 for one or two rooms. Not because of that, just 5 because she doesn't like the smell. 6 Basically I have testified what I said. 7 My personal opinion is secondhand smoke is not a 8 big problem. 9 Q. You probably don't think chrysotile 10 asbestos can hurt you either, am I right? 11 A. No, that's not true. 12 Q. You believe chrysotile asbestos can 13 cause mesothelioma? 14 A. I don't think so. 15 Q. You don't think it can? 16 A. n o . I don't think -- I think the 17 evidence is pretty strong chrysotile by itself is 18 not a cause of mesothelioma. That crocidolite and 19 amosite, absolutely, but chrysotile alone or in 20 combination with amosite or crocidolite certainly 21 can. And I think if you have looked at any of the 22 materials I have written over the years, you will 23 find out that's been consistent for the last 30 24 years. 25 Q. You have done work for asbestos and you Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 52 1 Swetoni c 2 don't think chrysotile asbestos causes meso, fair Page 47 Egilllll02.txt 3 to say? 4 A. I would say that it is far, far, far 5 less likely to cause it to either crocidolite or 6 amosite, if it causes it at all. 7 Q. You've done work for Agent Orange and 8 you don't think Agent Orange hurt anybody, right? 9 A. I think most people don't believe it 10 hurt anybody. 11 Q. Including you? 12 A. including me. 13 Q. You have done work for tobacco and you 14 don't think secondhand tobacco smoke hurts 15 anybody, right? 16 A. Correct. I don't think it's proven, 17 let's put it that way. 18 Q. You've done work for the saccharine 19 industry and you don't think saccharine hurts 20 anybody, right? 21 A. I didn't say that. You didn't ask me 22 that question. 23 Q. Do you think saccharine hurts people? 24 A. Probably not. 25 Q. I was guessing. That's a pretty good Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 53 1 Swetoni c 2 guess, wasn't it. 3 What industries have you done work for 4 where you are convinced they are out there killing page 48 5 people? Egilllll02.txt 6 A. That's a way of asking it. 7 Lead, for example. 8 Q. You do work for the lead paint 9 industries and yet you think that lead paint is a 10 problem that's hurting people? 11 A. It can if it's not maintained. Don't 12 forget, it's not been produced in this country for 13 almost 25 years. So if you maintain it, keep it 14 covered up, it's not a problem. But if you let it 15 chip and things and kids eat it, sure it's going 16 to be a problem. Everybody understands that. 17 Q. Not even you can deny that one, right? 18 A. Didn't try to, nor does the industry 19 deny it. 20 Q. Let's talk about asbestos for a little 21 bit. 22 I left out vinyl chloride. You have 23 done work for the vinyl chloride industry? 24 A. Yes. 25 Q. You think under the t l v probably vinyl Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 54 1 Swetonic 2 chloride doesn't hurt anybody; is that right? 3 A. Certainly we know it caused liver 4 angiosarcoma in the people who worked in cleaning 5 out the reactors; there is no question about that. 6 It turned out not to kill as many as a lot of 7 people had feared they were going to find out it Page 49 EgiU11102.txt 8 did; that the number of deaths from that were 9 relatively small. 10 Of course no death is unimportant, but 11 the numbers compared to what -- the epidemic that 12 people were predicting in 1974 just never 13 materialized, so hopefully the standards that 14 were put in effect will get the job done or have 15 gotten the job done. It's been a long time, we 16 should have known by now. I don't know. 17 Q. Are you still doing any of that work? 18 A. NO. 19 Q. Did you ever look to see whether or not 20 it caused brain cancers, neoblastoma multiformis? 21 A. No. The only thing in the time that I 22 was working on it that I recall problems with was 23 simply angiosarcoma of the liver. 24 Q. True or false: Asbestos is probably 25 the most hazardous material the industrial world Elisa Dreier Reporting corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 55 1 Swetoni c 2 has ever unleashed on an unsuspecting public. 3 A. Close. 4 Q. where was I wrong? 5 A. I'm not sure, is thatin my article? 6 Q. That's on page 2 ofyour article, top 7 paragraph. It says, "Asbestos, probably the most 8 hazardous industrial material ever unleashed on an 9 unsuspecting world. I know, I was there." You Page 50 10 see that? Egilllll02.txt 11 A. Yes. If I said it, then obviously 12 that's pretty much what I believe. 13 Q. when do you think the industry knew 14 that asbestos was even remotely as hazardous as it 15 turned out to be? 16 MR. HENDERSON: Objection to form. 17 MR. LANIER: You can go ahead and 18 answer it. They just don't like my question. 19 A. I have no way of knowing. All I know 20 is when I became aware of it. 21 Q. when did you become aware of it? 22 A. When I was asked to take on that 23 responsibility in 1968. And one of the first 24 things as I point out in my article that I did was 25 try and learn everything I could about this thing. Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 56 1 Swetonic 2 Q. I have seen a lot of your speeches. I 3 have seen your big speech and I have seen your 4 other testimonies and presentations verbally to 5 different people. I have seen your writings. 6 I have never seen you at any time when 7 you were working for the asbestos industry make 8 such a blunt statement that asbestos is probably 9 the most hazardous industrial material ever 10 unleashed on an unsuspecting world. Am I just 11 reading the wrong presentations and speeches or 12 did you say that back then? Page 51 Egilllll02.txt 13 A. No. I think we admitted certainly to 14 the hazards of asbestos, maybe not in as flowery 15 terms. 16 Q. in fact, it looks to me as I read your 17 stuff like you kept trying to tell everybody and 18 convince everybody it was okay. 19 A. No, such, sir. Not at all. 20 Q. Go back to your OSHA hearings, you 21 were at those OSHA hearings trying to convince 22 OSHA not to adopt as strict a standard as they 23 eventually wound up adopting, right? 24 A. That's correct. I can't remember 25 specifically how I said or what I said but our Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 57 1 Swetoni c 2 position was, just to make for the record, when 3 they put the emergency temporary standard in, the 4 asbestos exposure level was 12. So they 5 immediately reduced it to 5, and then in six 6 months they wanted to reduce it to 2. 7 Basically what we said, "We think 5 is 8 not going to be particularly hazardous but if you 9 are going to go to 2, then give us some time, for IO Lord's sake, because six weeks ago it was at 12." 11 So that's what we were asking for, was some time. 12 Q. You wanted four years, didn't you? 13 A. I don't remember, to be honest with 14 you. Page 52 Egilllll02.txt Q. Do you have any clue how many more 16 people died because of that four years? 17 A. it was our belief that people were not 18 going to be dying. 19 Q. Sir, your industry understood that five 20 wasn't a safe protection against mesothelioma, 21 didn't they? 22 A. I don't think so. as you well know 23 that there are mesothelioma cases that occurred in 24 neighborhoods and households, in fact, one of our 25 industrial -- top industrial hygiene people at Elisa Dreier Reporting corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 58 1 Swetoni c 2 Manville, his wife died from mesothelioma, so I 3 take it very seriously. Personally. I was at her 4 funeral. He was one of my closest friends. 5 Q. what year was that? 6 A. Late maybe 1970. I'm not sure. '70, 7 '71. I'm not sure exactly. 8 So, yes, it's a serious problem. 9 Q. When you say "our" position, who is the 10 "our" in your sentence? 11 A. The Asbestos Information Association 12 and its members. 13 Q. who started the Asbestos information 14 Association? 15 A. Essentially Manville did. They called 16 in a bunch of companies in the asbestos industry 17 and they said, "Gentlemen, we need to speak with Page 53 Egilllll02.txt 18 one voice on this issue, and it's a serious issue 19 and we need to both do something about it and to 20 speak out where it's right and correct things when 21 they are wrong." 22 Q. whose idea was it at Manville? 23 A. Basically Manville I think was sort of 24 convinced of it by Hill & Know!ton. The British 25 industry had hired Hill & Knowlton in the u.K. to Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017a 59 1 Swetoni c 2 put together something -- I can't remember what it 3 was called, Asbestos Information Council or some 4 such thing, and then they -- and used that as a 5 spokesman. The British companies felt that the 6 United States, we were not doing a very good job 7 of, you know, trying to explain the asbestos 8 health situation so that people understood it in a 9 more balanced viewpoint. 10 So they pressed Manville to do it, and 11 so it was set up. And I guess Hill & Knowlton 12 really didn't press it; it was the British 13 industry really. They pressed it to do it and 14 Hill & Knowlton helped set it up. 15 Q. Hill & Knowlton is a PRfirm, isn't it? 16 A. Yes. 17 Q. It's the same PR firm you went to work 18 for after you did your asbestos work,isn't it? 19 A. That's correct. Page 54 Egilllll02.txt 20 Q. So the PR firm, Hill & Knowlton, comes 21 to DM and gives DM this idea of how to start an 22 Asbestos information Association? 23 A. Yes. 24 Q. If there's information that needs to be 25 put out, why can't DM just put it out? Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 60 1 swetoni c 2 A. You're kind of missing the point of why 3 you do that sort of thing, why you do a trade 4 association. And that is in a case like this, it 5 involves health and safety issues, what you are 6 trying to do is say -- 7 What we are saying here represents the 8 viewpoint of everybody, and that we are all behind 9 this. But equally as important, and this is just 10 strictly from a PR standpoint, is Manville was the 11 only one speaking out. Okay? 12 And they were getting hammered in the 13 press as a company, even though they had a really 14 good operations in place to protect their workers, 15 so it's also a way just to kind of get your name 16 out of the newspapers and put somebody else's, 17 meaning the trade association. 18 Q. That's why Manville could afford to pay 19 for the trade association the first year? 20 A. Well, they were by far the largest 21 asbestos producer. 22 Q. in the U.S.? Page 55 Egilllll02.txt 23 A. In the U.S., yes. 24 Q. Manville sets up the trade 25 organization, calls everybody in to it and says -- Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017Q 61 1 Swetoni c 2 A. They call people in, and they said -- 3 we said, "we think we ought to do it." it wasn't 4 set up. We were making a recommendation to these 5 companies that they ought to do this. 6 Q. I thought Manville paid for the whole 7 thing the first year. 8 A. Yes. But if you don't have any members 9 that doesn't mean anything. The you just got a, 10 you know, a shell. 11 Q. A shell that is allowed to put out 12 material that keeps lohns-Manville's name out of 13 the papers, I guess? 14 A. To the extent that -- I mean, Manville 15 was obviously a sponsor of it. It's on that card 16 I showed you. Nobody was trying to hide this. 17 Q. But it doesn't say that Manville made 18 this so that the word could get out and it 19 wouldn't have Manvilie's name on it because 20 Manville is getting hammered from all the PR. 21 A. There's nothing wrong with that. 22 Q. In fact, that's something that's been 23 done many times, I guess, hasn't it? 24 A. That's right. A lot of trade Page 56 Egilllll02.txt 25 associations exist in that fashion. Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 62 1 Swetonic 2 Q. You-all even did that on tobacco as far 3 as the secondhand smoke, didn't you? 4 A. No. 5 Q. You didn't set up a TE -- no. What's 6 it called? It's got initials. TIEQ? 7 A. What is that? 8 Q. it doesn't even ring a bell with you, 9 does it? 10 A. NO. 11 Q. It stands for the Total indoor 12 Environmental Quality Coalition. 13 A. No, never heard of it. 14 Q. Did you not know you were a staff 15 member in 1993? 16 A. What? 17 Q. I thought I had you down as a staff 18 member in 1993. It was part of the National 19 Environmental Development Association. 20 A. oh. is that what they called that 21 thing? 22 Q. Yes. Did you know you were a staff 23 member of that? 24 A. The trade group was run by the E. Bruce 25 Harrison Company. I had forgotten what it was Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 Page 57 EgiU11102.txt 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 63 1 Swetonic 2 cal 1ed. 3 Q. Yes. It's another one of those groups 4 you-all set up so that you-all could put out PR 5 material and not have it shown as readily that 6 it's just tobacco putting it out? 7 A. That's not true. There were a lot of 8 other companies involved in that. 9 MR. LANIER: This is a good breaking 10 point to take a restroom break, we have been 11 going for a while and we have been in here 12 for a while. So let's take about a 13 ten-minute break so everybody can stretch. 14 (Recess.) 15 Q. Sir, while you were at Manville did you 16 have any interactions with any other asbestos 17 companies? 18 A. Only through the trade association. 19 Q. That's the AIA? 20 A. Yes. 21 Q. Before that period of time did you have 22 any interaction with any of the other asbestos 23 companies? 24 A. No, not to my recollection. 25 Q. How did you find out that the AIA was Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 64 Page 58 Egilllll02.txt 1 Swetoni c 2 going to be started? 3 A. I assume that Jack Solon, who was the 4 head of advertising and public relations, told us 5 that the pressure from the British to form 6 something like that made sense to the president of 7 the company and that they were going to try and 8 set that up. 9 Q. Did you have any role in the AlA's 10 formation? 11 A. only to the extent that I wrote a slide 12 presentation or I think it was a slide 13 presentation for Jack Solon to give to the 14 potential members, these other asbestos companies. 15 Q. who determined what companies were 16 potential members? 17 A. That I don't know. 18 Q. What went together in the slide 19 presentation? 20 A. well, the basic part of it was to 21 basically say that this is a very serious health 22 problem and that we have got to join together to 23 address it through communications in terms of 24 making sure the people who are concerned about it 25 understand exactly what its nature is, the extent Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017G 65 1 Swetonic 2 to which it is a problem, that sort of thing. 3 Q. in fact, the Asbestos information Page 59 EgiH11102.txt 4 Association was more targeted to protect industry, 5 wasn't it? 6 A. It was to provide the ability to get 7 information out on the science. 8 Q. On industry's view of the science, 9 right? 10 A. Yes. 11 Q. I mean, you-all didn't start publishing 12 Selikoff's works, did you? 13 A. We sent it out as you saw from the 14 material. 15 Q. Not all of it. 16 A. Of course not. it was voluminous. But 17 he only really followed basically that same group 18 of insulation workers and he just pretty much 19 updated that. That's why the one on smoking was 20 particularly interesting. 21 Q. But you-all vehemently opposed some of 22 what Selikoff said, didn't you? 23 A. what we opposed was this, and let me 24 explain it to you. His people that he studied had 25 an intolerable health record. Mesothelioma, lung Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 66 1 Swetoni c 2 cancer, asbestosis; clearly a major disaster in 3 terms of health for those people. 4 The problem that we had with what 5 Selikoff was saying was that he was essentially Page 60 Egilllll02.txt 6 saying to the public that that health record was 7 exactly the same across the board in the industry, 8 and that we did not agree with. 9 Let me just give you an example of why 10 there was a difference. One, I have been on work 11 sites watching his men work on putting insulations 12 up, never tearing them out, but putting them up. 13 It was notoriously dusty. And basically outside 14 of, you know, using some sort of a respirator, 15 there was no mechanical means on those work sites 16 to reduce exposure. 17 If you are in a plant or a mine, you 18 have bag houses, you have all sorts of things that 19 you can have in place. I think there's a picture 20 of a bag house in the materials that we sent out 21 to the media. It's a huge thing. 22 I went up to Manvilie's mine in Quebec, 23 the Jeffrey mine, and the entire top of the mill 24 was a bag house with 40,000 bags in it for 25 collecting dust out of the air. You can't do that Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 67 1 Swetoni c 2 on a work site. That was a fundamental 3 difference. 4 Q. sir, in fact, in truth, what the 5 Asbestos information Association, the a i a , 6 endeavored to do was assume and do whatever was 7 necessary to protect the interest of the asbestos 8 industry? Page 61 Egilllll02.txt 9 MS. STYPINSKI: Objection to form. 10 A. what we did was, originally it was 11 strictly designed to deal with information, okay, 12 but as time went on, it acquired a lot of other 13 objectives, when it started out, I don't think 14 EPA and OSHA even existed or if they existed, they 15 had just been approved by Congress. So that 16 became something that we had to be involved in, 17 quite obviously. That's not public relations. 18 That's dealing with regulatory agencies. 19 we ended up getting into sponsoring 20 some types of medical research, when the OSHA 21 regulations came out, in addition to putting out 22 as I mentioned before a copy of, which I don't 23 have, a booklet for employees on how to understand 24 the regulations and what the problems were, we 25 also worked on compliance manuals, technical Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 68 1 Swetoni c 2 compliance manuals, for dealing with OSHA, for 3 dealing with EPA standards. Telling companies -- 4 because there's a lot of small companies in the 5 asbestos industry that had nothing to do with our 6 trade association but we wanted to make sure that 7 they had technical information on how to deal with 8 those standards. 9 So, yes, we certainly got into an awful 10 lot of stuff other than just, you know, public Page 62 Egi1111102.txt 11 relations, so to speak. Because there was nobody 12 else to do it, we did it. 13 Q. I'm not sure that really answered my 14 question. 15 Would you agree with me or not that the 16 Asbestos Information Association endeavored to 17 assume whatever activities and responsibilities 18 that it deemed necessary to protect the interests 19 of the asbestos manufacturing industry? 20 A. Yes, and I gave you the examples, some 21 examples of how we did that. 22 You are protecting the interest of an 23 industry when you make sure that you can try and 24 help people in that industry comply with 25 standards, run a clean plant, not kill their Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 69 1 Swetonic 2 workers. I think that's helping the industry. 3 If you are doing research -- one of the 4 pieces of research we were working with was a 5 doctor in New Jersey who was treating a 6 mesothelioma patient from the Manville plant and 7 he had an idea for -- he tried some sort of 8 electronic type treatment and it seemed to be 9 shrinking the tumor, so we gave him money, we 10 looked at ways -- at Harvard school of Public 11 Health, for example, to see if there was a way 12 through chest sounds to determine very early 13 stages of asbestosis even before it would show up Page 63 Egilllll02.txt 14 on an X-ray. 15 I think we also provided funds as I 16 recall to a study -- you would know in a plant, 17 for example, that there was a problem, whether it 18 was asbestosis or lung cancer or mesothelioma or 19 whatever. But you didn't know where perhaps it 20 might be concentrated, whether certain portions of 21 the work force were more susceptible or more 22 likely to get these diseases. 23 So we got involved in a study in that 24 area. What we found out was that maintenance 25 workers were more likely to have these diseases Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 70 1 Swetonic 2 than the production workers in an asbestos plant. 3 That helps. That helps you to focus what you want 4 to do to protect people. 5 if that's helping the industry protect 6 the industry of course it is. 7 Q. Sir, that's not at all what you-all 8 were doing. 9 A. Yes, we were. 10 Q. Not with that motive. 11 MS. STYPINSKI: objection to form. 12 m s . ANTONUCCI: objection to form. 13 Q. Let's just take, for example, the money 14 you say you gave to try and cure mesothelioma. 15 Don't you know it takes millions and millions of Page 64 EgiH11102.txt 16 dollars to even remotely begin some type of a good 17 study of how to go about treating and curing such 18 a dreaded disease? 19 A. This doctor thought he had something 20 and we gave him a little bit of seed money. 21 Q. you gave him $5,000. 22 A. I don't remember what it was. 23 Q. I do. It was $5,000. 24 A. I will have to take your word for it. 25 Q. Do you know how much you were chargi ng Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017G 71 1 Swetoni c 2 your members just to be a member of the a i a at the 3 time for one year? 4 A. No. No, I don't. 5 Q. And you-all together, all the asbestos 6 industry, added up together through the AIA gave 7 $5,000. And you did it so that you could come 8 into depositions and other places and say, "Look 9 how much we're trying to cure the problem." 10 MS. STYPINSKI: Objection to form. 11 A. That's nonsense. 12 MS. ANTONUCCI: objection to form. 13 A. Let me tell you why it's nonsense. 14 in 1973 when I left the industry, there 15 was nothing like this. To the best of my 16 knowledge, not a single member of my trade 17 association was involved in any litigation 18 whatsoever, so how could we have planned Page 65 Egilllll02.txt 19 something to defend litigation which did not at 20 that point in time exist? 21 Q. Sir, you specifically in some of your 22 writings have referenced the fact that you-all 23 were putting together things in contemplation of 24 litigation. 25 MR. GINSBERG: Objection, if you have Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017a 72 1 Swetonic 2 a document to show the witness, please do. 3 A. Please do. 4 Q. You don't remember that? 5 A. No, I do not. when I left the 6 industry, as far as I know, the only lawsuits were 7 against Pittsburgh Corning down in Texas. 8 Q. Sir, those lawsuits wereagainst 9 Pittsburgh Corning who was buying Johns-Manville 10 asbestos to put in their products, weren't they? 11 A. I don't know where they got their 12 asbestos. 13 Q. They bought it from a number of sources 14 including Johns-Manvi11e ; did you know that? 15 A. But they were not a member of my trade 16 association. I don't know where they bought their 17 asbestos. 18 Q. Your trade association had a legal 19 affairs committee, didn't it? 20 A. It was only for the purpose of making Page 66 Egilllll02.txt 21 sure that we were trying to deal with the 22 regulatory agencies properly. That's all. 23 Q. Sir, that's not all it was because 24 you-all also filed briefs in lawsuits. 25 A. No, no, no, no. You are Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017Q 73 1 Swetonic 2 misrepresenting that. 3 Q. Sir, it specifically says in your 4 speech, "in the legal affairs area, the 5 association participated in an amicus curiae 6 capacity in the lawsuit brought by the industrial 7 union department of the AFL-CIO against OSHA on 8 asbestos standards. In our brief the association 9 supported OSHA against the industrial union 10 department." 11 You filed a brief in that case, didn't 12 you? 13 MR. GINSBERG: Can you show the witness 14 the document that you are reading from. 15 MR. LANIER: He's got it in front of 16 him. It's his Exhibit No. 4. He read the 17 whole thing. We took a ten-minute break for 18 him to. 19 A. I know precisely what we are talking 20 about. 21 Q. Okay, well, then answer. 22 A. That was not litigation of the type you 23 are involved in. Page 67 Egilllll02.txt Let me finish. what happened was when the OSHA Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 74 1 Swetonic 2 standards came out in 1972, AFL-CIO went to court 3 to say that they were not sufficient. That's 4 different than going after money. It had to do 5 all strictly with the regulation. 6 So we submitted -- because it was the 7 a f l versus the occupational safety and Health 8 Administration. That was the lawsuit, it was not 9 a personal injury lawsuit. That's what I am 10 referring to. it was not a liability lawsuit. 11 And we put in an amicus brief, we were not a 12 party of the case because it was them versus them 13 but we put in an amicus briefing saying in our 14 view the OSHA standards were sufficient. 15 Q. This is a case where you-all weren't 16 even involved as a party and you-all were still 17 trying to file briefs trying to influence the 18 court outcome, weren't you? 19 A. Of course, but it was not litigation 20 from a liability standpoint. It's totally 21 di fferent. 22 Q. Sir, you know and everybody knew that 23 litigation from a liability standpoint was started 24 and was going to get bigger, right? 25 A. No. One of the reasons I left the Page 68 EgiU11102.txt Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 75 1 Swetoni c 2 industry in 1973 was because I was frankly bored, 3 we had gotten our OSHA standards, we had gotten 4 our EPA standards, our booklets were pretty much 5 done, we had a situation -- we dealt with FDA on 6 the use of asbestos in filters for clarifying 7 wines and types of beer, and the horizon frankly 8 looked pretty cheery. So I wanted to try 9 something else. 10 Q. Sir, what happened back then was there 11 was a lot of bad news about all of the hazards of 12 asbestos but you felt that there was good news in 13 that the public by and large didn't know about it 14 and you tried to -15 MS. STYPINSKI: objection to form. 16 MR. GINSBERG: Objection. 17 A. No. That's not true. That's not true. 18 Q. Look at your paper. 19 MR. GINSBERG: Let him point to where 20 he wants to have you focus your attention and 21 take a minute and look at it. 22 THE w i t n e s s : All right. 23 Q. sir, when you get to page 80, your 24 paper, and you get down to this paragraph, you 25 specifically said, "At this point and now having Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D Page 69 Eg-nilll02.txt 76 1 Swetonic 2 heard the bad side of the public relations 3 problems, it's time for some good news." 4 Did I read that right? 5 A. Yes. 6 Q. The very next sentence, "And the good 7 news is that despite all the negative articles on 8 asbestos health that have appeared in the press 9 over the past half dozen years, very few people 10 have been paying attention." Did I read that 11 correctly? 12 A. You read that correctly. 13 Q. So there's bad news of all this PR 14 problem and all of these articles about how 15 asbestos can hurt you and kill you but the good 16 news is people aren't paying attention. That's 17 what you said? 18 A. Why don't I put it in perspective for 19 you so perhaps you will understand a little bit 20 more about it. 21 We were concerned that the general 22 public might think that they were at risk from 23 asbestos. Basically we had been focusing intently 24 on the occupational side of the problem, and so we 25 decided we needed to take a look at this thing to Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 77 1 Swetoni c Page 70 EgiU11102.txt 2 see if the general public was concerned about its 3 own health in this thing. 4 so we did this general public survey. 5 What we found out was, much to our surprise, and I 6 will explain that in a second as to why I think 7 that happened, that a mere -- and I think the 8 numbers are in here (indicating) -- 3 percent of 9 the people who were aware of the issue thought it 10 was a problem of the general public. 11 The fact of the matter is, it wasn't a 12 problem to the general public so we didn't have to 13 change the focus of our efforts on solving the 14 occupational issue and push it off on to trying to 15 address the issue in terms of what the general 16 public perceived. Okay? 17 n o w , the problem - - w e were mystified 18 obviously by the fact that so few people seemed to 19 be aware of the issue. And then we thought about 20 it. I think we had our nose a little too close to 21 the mirror, meaning that the association was in 22 New York City. Manville had been in New York City 23 and it just moved to Denver. Selikoff was in 24 New York City. The insulation workers were in 25 New York City that he studied. Elisa Dreier Reporting corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 78 1 Swetoni c 2 The issue of sprayed asbestos was 3 pretty much a New York City issue, and they were 4 finding asbestos fibers in the lungs of people Page 71 Egilllll02.txt 5 coming to autopsy. So we just thought naturally 6 that the rest of the world was as aware of all 7 this stuff as we were in New York city, we found 8 out that wasn't true. 9 Q. Sir, I appreciate you giving that 10 answer but that's not really telling the whole 11 truth to the jury, is it? 12 MR. GINSBERG: Objection. 13 m s . a n t o n u c c i : objection. 14 A. Why don't you explain to me what you 15 think the whole truth is. 16 Q. Let's look at your paper, first of all. 17 You-all's concern was, and the reason 18 this bad news/good news stuff is being said is, 19 "These results should be reassuring to those 20 industry customers who fear the general public 21 will stop buying their products because they 22 contain asbestos." That's the reason it's good 23 news, is people will keep buying the stuff because 24 they don't know any better, right? 25 A. No, no. Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 79 1 Swetoni c 2 MS. ANTONUCCI: Objection to form. 3 Q. Isn't it also true -4 MR. GINSBERG: Objection. The witness 5 hadn't finished his answer. 6 MR. LANIER: That was his answer, "No, Page 72 Egilllll02.txt 7 no." it's a yes/no question. 8 MR. GINSBERG: Did you finish your 9 answer? 10 THE WITNESS: No, I did not finish my 11 answer. 12 Q. I said was it true, is your answer 13 "no" or "yes"? 14 A. My answer is that what is said here, if 15 those products were a hazard to the general public 16 but they are not a hazard to the general public. 17 Q. oh, sir, isn't it true you-all were 18 just dreading the day that you were going to get 19 the news that there was going to be a household 20 exposure mesothelioma because you knew it was 21 coming? 22 A. of course, I say that in my paper, in 23 fact, I mentioned the woman who had it. 24 MS. s t y p i n s k i : objection. 25 Q. You knew for a fact not only a Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017a 80 1 Swetonic 2 household case of mesothelioma but you were also 3 dreading the inevitable discovery of the first 4 neighborhood case of mesothelioma, right? 5 A. Did I say that? 6 Q. Yes, sir, you did on page 300. 7 A. I don't recall mentioning the 8 neighborhood. 9 Q. Yes. "The first neighborhood." You Page 73 EgiU11102.txt 10 even put "neighborhood" in quotation marks, didn't 11 you? 12 A. No, no. I said the first -- you 13 misrepresented it again. 14 We had ail been dreading the inevitable 15 discovery of the first neighborhood or household 16 case of mesothelioma in the United states. 17 Q. That's exactly what I said. You were 18 concerned about the discovery of both -- either 19 one or the other? 20 A. And it happened to be a household case. 21 Q. Sir, I'm not talking about which one it 22 happened to be when you first found out. My point 23 was, you-all were concerned about the 24 inevitability of either a neighborhood or a 25 household, and you knew it was coming, you knew it Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 81 1 Swetoni c 2 was inevitable, didn't you? 3 A. The household cases, yes. The 4 neighborhood cases, I don't know still if there 5 have been any. But then again, let's don't forget 6 that I left that industry 28 years ago. 7 Q. Sir, you wrote this article in 1991, 8 didn't you? 9 A. Yes, but -10 Q. You wrote this as a chapter in a book? 11 A. I wrote this based on what we were Page 74 Egilllll02.txt 12 thinking in 1970 or T71, which was 20 years before 13 I wrote the article. 14 Q. Were you making it up or was it 15 truthful? 16 MR. GINSBERG: Objection. 17 MS. ANTONUCCI: Objection. 18 di MR. GINSBERG: it's abusive and i'll 19 instruct you not to answer the question. 20 He already answered the question, 21 Mr. Lanier. He said that he's wrote an 22 article in '90 about his experiences in the 23 '70s. 24 Q. Was it the truth when you wrote it? 25 A. Yes. Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 82 1 swetoni c 2 Q. So the jury can believe what it says as 3 opposed to what you're saying today? 4 A. I am saying exactly the same thing. 5 Q. You said in your speech about good news 6 and bad news on the same page as "The good news is 7 people aren't paying attention," down at the 8 bottom paragraph: "Before going on to describe 9 our activities in the government relations area, I 10 think it might be interesting at this point to 11 take a very brief look at the manner in which 12 Dr. selikoff and his supporters have used his 13 research results to dramatize and exaggerate the 14 seriousness of the asbestos problem." Page 75 EgiUlll02.txt 15 You think Dr. selikoff was exaggerating 16 the seriousness of the problem? 17 A. Not with regard to his workers. I 18 discussed this before. The insulation workers 19 that he studied, those were the only people to the 20 best of my knowledge that he had personal 21 knowledge of their health experience. And as I 22 said before, you cannot translate that work 23 experience. And I gave you a whole bunch of 24 reasons why to everybody in the industry, it just 25 doesn't work that way. Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 83 1 Swetoni c 2 I talked to you about the fact that you 3 couldn't control the dust in the way they handled 4 insulations, which was a world apart from what 5 happens in factories. He just refused to 6 recognize that. He was especially negative on the 7 results that were coming out of the Canadian 8 mining study. He just refused to accept that 9 those were the real results, because he just 10 believed that everybody had the same health 11 experience as the people that he studied, and that 12 just wasn't true. 13 Q. I thought when you left the Asbestos 14 Information Institute you went to Hill & Knowlton. 15 A. That's correct. 16 Q. Did you not know Hill & Knowlton Page 76 Egilllll02.txt 17 continued to do work for the asbestos industry? 18 A. I said that. I said earlier in the 19 deposition that they followed me to the -- the 20 trade group came to Hill & Knowlton to retain my 21 services so that I could train my successor, and 22 they stayed there with us for roughly a year, I 23 guess. 24 Q. When was it that you truly had nothing 25 else to do with asbestos other than writing Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 84 1 swetoni c 2 chapters in books? 3 A. With regard to the trade association, 4 it would be sometime in 1974. 5 Q. Period. Anything to do with asbestos, 6 period, not just in regard to the trade 7 association. 8 A. The only thing else that I did that I 9 can recall after that time, after 1974, was for 10 U.S. Gypsum, which was a client in our Chicago 11 office, and they asked me to write a background 12 paper on asbestos in schools which was -- it took 13 me -- it was about a two- or three-week project. 14 That's the -- to the best of my recollection, 15 that's the only other thing on asbestos I did when 16 I was at Hill & Knowlton. 17 Q. when was that? 18 A. I'm not sure. In the early '80s 19 sometime. Page 77 Egilllll02.txt 20 Q. when you say you got out of asbestos in 21 the '70s, you were doing something in the '80s? 22 A. I said I was no longer working for the 23 trade association as a group in 1974. 24 Q. So you are still doing asbestos work 25 for the asbestos industry in the '80s? Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 85 1 Swetonic 2 MR. GINSBERG: Objection. That's a 3 mi scharacteri zati on. 4 Q. Is that what you are saying? 5 A. No, I'm not saying that. I am saying I 6 did a small project for one company. 7 Q. when? 8 A. in the '80s. But from 1974 to whenever 9 that was, a period of ten years, I did nothing. 10 Q. For you it's a small project to write a 11 paper on asbestos in schools? 12 A. Yes. 13 Q. why did they come to you instead of to 14 a scientist? 15 A. Because it was supposed to be used with 16 the media. 17 Q. It was a PR paper? 18 A. Yes. I am a PRman. 19 Q. It took you two weeks to write a paper? 20 A. it may have taken me a month. I'm not 21 sure. It's a long time ago. Page 78 Egilllll02.txt 22 Q. How does it take a month to write a 23 paper? How long was this thing, a few hundred 24 pages? 25 A. Oh, hell, no. Ten, 12 pages. Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 86 1 swetonic 2 Q. i'll bet instead of just writing it you 3 did a bunch of research first, didn't you? 4 A. Certainly I looked at what was 5 available. I think they sent me stuff because I 6 had not brought any materials with me from the 7 trade association, so I was not up to date on what 8 was going on at all. 9 Q. so in the 1980s before you wrote this 10 paper you got all up to date on the scientific 11 literature? 12 A. Just on the school side of it. 13 Q. Just enough to write your paper for PR 14 purposes, right? 15 A. That's correct. 16 Q. i'll bet your paper was one that said, 17 "Leave the asbestos in the schools, it's not 18 hurting our kids." Am I right? 19 MR. g i n s b e r g : Objection. Abusive. 20 A. I think the conclusion was, which I 21 think -- that unless the asbestos in a school or 22 in any public building for that matter is fraying 23 and releasing free asbestos fibers, that if you 24 don't know what the hell you are doing and you rip Page 79 Egilllll02.txt 25 it out, you can create a greater hazard than Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017G 87 1 Swetonic 2 existed before you started. 3 Q. Did your paper say, "Let's get it out 4 of the schools but use only certified asbestos 5 abatement people"? 6 A. No. Again, this was quite a while ago. 7 The conclusion would have been unless it's damaged 8 and unless there's fibers coming from asbestos 9 from whatever source it might be in a school, it's 10 best to leave it alone. 11 Q. You wanted to keep asbestos in our 12 schools back in the '80s when you were writing 13 this PR paper? 14 MR. GINSBERG: Objection, it's a 15 mischaracterization. It's abusive. 16 DI Don't answer the question. 17 You want to move on to your next 18 question, Mr. Lanier? Please do. 19 MS. STYPINSKI: Objection. 20 MR. LANIER: Yes. I think this would 21 be a good time to ask this series of 22 questions. 23 Q. Have you ever been in Texas before? 24 A. Yes. 25 Q. Tell me when. Page 80 Egilllll02.txt Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 88 1 Swetoni c 2 A. Let me think. 3 I went down to Texas the first time 4 when I was working for Manville. I went down to 5 the Johnson Space Center because this was before I 6 started working on asbestos, and there were -- I 7 don't know if they were asbestos but Manville had 8 insulations on the Mercury spacecraft and I went 9 down there to gather material, take pictures for a 10 story for that employee publication that I 11 mentioned I worked for. 12 The next time that I can recall going 13 to Texas would have been probably again in the 14 1980s, and I went down there with DuPont to travel 15 around and look at their various plants that had 16 deep wells for disposal of hazardous waste. The 17 E. Bruce Harrison company had a Dallas office and 18 I remember I went down there to visit that office 19 a couple of times. 20 Then I was down there a couple of years 21 ago. we had a client, a pharmaceutical client, 22 who was located outside of Houston. 23 Those are the times that I can remember 24 off the top of my head. 25 Q. Ever do any Hill & Knowlton work in Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017Q 89 Page 81 Egilllll02.txt 1 2 Texas? Swetoni c 3 A. Not that I can remember. 4 Q. Ever visit any asbestos companies in 5 Texas or have any meetings related to asbestos? 6 A. in Texas? 7 Q. Yes. 8 A. I don't think so. The only plants or 9 mines I ever visited were Manvilie's and they 10 didn't have any mines in Texas. I don't think 11 there were any mines there at all. 12 Q. You didn't do anything at the 13 Certain-Teed, Hillsboro plant or anything like 14 that? 15 A. No. 16 Q. When you were at Hill & Knowlton, were 17 you an office holder? 18 A. You mean in thecompany? 19 Q. Yes. 20 A. when i left I was a senior 21 vice-president. 22 Q. Did Hill & Knowlton have an office in 23 Texas at the time? 24 A. Yes. 25 Q. what kind oflegal structure was the Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 90 1 Swetoni c 2 company Hill & Knowlton? Page 82 EgiU11102.txt 3 A. I don't understand the question. 4 Q. was it a corporation, a professional 5 corporation, a partnership? 6 A. i assume it was a corporation. 7 Q. Did you share in the profits of it or 8 were you strictly paid on a salary basis? 9 A. I was paid on a salary basis. They had 10 a profitsharing program but it was a percentage of 11 salary, so secretaries got it as well as 12 everybody else. 13 Q. Are you comfortable working through 14 lunch? 15 A. Sure. 16 MR. g i n s b e r g : What is your plan there? 17 MR. LANIER: My plan is to finish 18 around 4 o'clock today if we work through 19 lunch. 20 MR. GINSBERG: I don't think I could 21 make it through 4 o'clock without lunch, we 22 are going to need a lunch break then, I 23 think. 24 MR. LANIER: There's a Pax right 25 downstairs. Could we do it in 30 minutes and Elisa Dreier Reporting corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 91 1 Swetoni c 2 do it quickly so I can try to get this 3 deposition over with. 4 MR. g i n s b e r g : Yes, that's fine. 5 MR. LANIER: Let's take a 30-minute Page 83 EgiU11102.txt 6 lunch break then. 7 (Broke for lunch at 12:33 and resumed 8 at 1:20) 9 (Luncheon recess taken at 12:33 p.m.) 10 A F T E R N O O N S E S S I O N 11 (Time noted: 1:20 p.m.) 12 M A T T H E W S W E T O N I C resumed and 13 testified as follows: 14 CONTINUED EXAMINATION 15 BY MR. LANIER: 16 Q. Sir, in the PR work you have done over 17 the last almost 40 years, have you ever done any 18 PR work related to litigation and lawsuits? 19 A. Yes. 20 Q. Fill me in on what you've done in that 21 regard. 22 A. well, the Agent Orange work for Dow 23 Chemical was related to litigation. I think the 24 next thing would probably be breast implants. 25 After that, litigation related to accusations of Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 92 1 Swetoni c 2 nonpayment of Holocaust insurance policies. 3 There was another Holocaust-related 4 thing with regard to accusations of an American 5 company whose plant was taken over by the Germans 6 and somehow they were tying that to the use of not 7 slave labor but forced labor, so there was a Page 84 Egilllll02.txt 8 lawsuit on that. 9 And as I think I mentioned earlier, 10 lead paint. 11 Q. Have you ever done any work or have the 12 companies you have been with done any work on 13 campaigns about lawsuit abuse or jury verdicts or 14 things like that? 15 MR. GINSBERG: Objection to the extent 16 that the witness knows what any particular 17 company has done. 18 Q. within your frame of knowledge, 19 obviously. 20 A. Not really. 21 Q. why do you say "not really" instead of 22 a flat no? 23 A. Because everybody -- you know, given 24 the opportunity we will, you know, say something 25 about it but you said the word "campaign." That's Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 93 1 Swetoni c 2 something different. 3 Q. There are some organizational groups 4 like Citizens Against Lawsuit Abuse? 5 A. I am familiar with them but I don't 6 know anybody there. I only know the name. 7 Q. Have you or any of the companies you've 8 worked with, to your knowledge, been involved in 9 those organizations? 10 A. No. Page 85 Egi1111102.txt 11 Q. Been involved in developing the 12 organizations or suggesting them? 13 A. No. 14 Q. Do you know of any links between the 15 tobacco industry and, for example, Citizens 16 Against Lawsuit Abuse? 17 A. No, I don't. 18 Q. As part of the work that you have done, 19 have you ever done or seen to the training of 20 folks who are going to be making media 21 presentations or talking to the media? 22 A. Absolutely. 23 Q. Tell us about that, please. 24 A. Well, I don't personally do training 25 but I think probably every PR firm in the Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 94 1 swetonic 2 United States has a relationship with somebody who 3 is a former person with the media who helps people 4 be trained for TV appearances, it's totally 5 different than what they do in their normal lives. 6 If it's a health issue, it could be a 7 doctor, i mentioned that about Agent orange. Or 8 even somebody at the top of a company, if not a 9 customer talking to the media. 10 Q. what have you seen that you-all have 11 done before? 12 MR. GINSBERG: when you say "you-all," Page 86 Egilllll02.txt 13 who are you referring to? 14 Q. You and your co-workers. 15 MR. GINSBERG: objection to the form. 16 He's testified as to a number of companies 17 he's worked for. 18 Q. You can specify which one. what did 19 you-all do at Hill & Know!ton? what did you do -20 A. Oh, no. I mean, Hill & Know!ton would 21 do it the same as anybody else. There's no real 22 difference. 23 in other words, obviously if there's an 24 issue at stake, you make sure that the person can 25 discuss the issue in a clear fashion and be able Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 95 1 Swetoni c 2 to do it succinctly. Those are the most important 3 things. Not use jargon that the viewer would not 4 understand. You know, stuff like that, it's 5 pretty standard. 6 Q. Have you had any of that training 7 yourself? 8 A. NO. 9 Q. Have you been observing when the 10 training is going on? 11 A. Many times. 12 Q. something that you obviously absorbed 13 some of? 14 A. I guess. It's not something I would 15 like to do. I was always very uncomfortable when Page 87 Egilllll02.txt 16 I had to do media stuff when I was working for the 17 trade association. 18 Q. How did you get your job at the a i a ? 19 A. Well, as I mentioned or maybe I didn't 20 mention, Hill & Knowlton -- I am sorry. 21 lohns-Manville had approached these other 22 companies in I believe 1970 and asked them to join 23 this group and offered to pay for the first year 24 of the organization to see if they would consider 25 it to be a worthwhile thing they wanted to join, Elisa Dreier Reporting corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 96 1 Swetoni c 2 and then at the end of the first year they were 3 supposed to somehow allocate expenses. 4 So I had been working, as I have 5 testified, I believe, on the issue since about 6 '68. So in addition to the fact that the 7 organization was put together, for all practical 8 purposes, at least from the communication 9 standpoint, Bill Raines, who was my boss, and 10 myself were the staff, so when Manville moved to 11 Denver at the end of '71, which happened to be 12 also the time when the trade association was going 13 to sort of go on its own financially, Raines left 14 to go to a different company. 15 I opted not to go to Denver, and so 16 they offered me the job to take it over at that 17 point in time as an employee of the trade Page 88 Egilllll02.txt 18 association as opposed to an employee of Manville. 19 Q. who is the "they" in your sentence, 20 > offered me a job"? 21 A. The trade association. 22 Q. who? 23 A. Specifi cally? 24 Q- Yes, sir. 25 A. A fellow named Al Fay from National Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017G 97 1 Swetonic 2 Gypsum who was president of it at that time. 3 Q. Fay is F-a-y? 4 A. I believe so. 5 Q. when the tradeassociation first 6 started, where did it office out of? where was it 7 headquartered? 8 a . Basically since most of the staff 9 really at that point was Manville, it was in our 10 offices, really. 11 in fact, I think if you harken back to 12 this thing (indicating), which I believe was put 13 together early on because it's got a much smaller 14 number of members than -- 15 Q. i don't mean to interrupt. But when 16 you say harken back to "this" thing, you are 17 talking about Swetonic Exhibit 2-a ? 18 A. Right. 19 q . Thank you. Please continue. 20 A. The address given is 22 East 40th, Page 89 EgiH11102.txt 21 which is where Manville was located. 22 Q. Swetonic Exhibit 2-A was actually 23 written during the first year or so? 24 A. Yes. Just based on the number of 25 companies. Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 98 1 Swetoni c 2 Q. who were the companies that took a 3 leadership role in the early going of the AIA? 4 A. i would say -- I am looking at the list 5 now. GAF, Johns-Manville, National Gypsum and 6 Raybestos-Manhattan. The first president was from 7 Certain-Teed. I don't remember his name. But I 8 don't remember them being frightfully active. 9 Q. There are a couple of other companies 10 that are listed? 11 A. Yes, I know. 12 Q. who are they? 13 A. Atlas Asbestos, CementAsbestos 14 Products company, Flintkote, Panacon. I don't 15 remember them at all. I don't know who the hell 16 they are. 17 Q. Before the AIA wouldsend out a paper, 18 was it approved by any certain board members or 19 people or did they just trust if you wrote it, it 20 had to be right? 21 A. You got to remember I was 29 or 30 22 years old at the time. Nobody was going to trust Page 90 EgiHlll02.txt 23 me to -- you know, on a document that was going 24 out on behalf of the company. 25 I don't truly remember the approval Elisa Dreier Reporting corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017G 99 1 Swetoni c 2 process but there was one. It would go to the 3 companies. I don't remember whether it would go 4 to all of them. I think probably something like 5 this would have gone to all of them. Then they 6 would run it by their outside consultants, whether 7 they might be medical or technical or inside 8 people, and, you know, so that was sort of the 9 process. 10 Q. New subject. 11 As i was reading through your documents 12 I noticed, for example, the incident with the 13 Italian asbestos coats, do you remember that? 14 A. Oh, sure. 15 Q. I know historically therewere other 16 companies that would -- I don't know if they were 17 a company, but there were other attempts to put 18 asbestos into some products where it was deemed 19 later, "Let's don't do this." I want to ask you 20 about some of those and see if you have any 21 memories of them. 22 A . Okay. 23 Q. First of all, youremember the Italian 24 guy who tried to beat the import tariffs on coats 25 by putting asbestos in the coat and claiming it Page 91 Egilllll02.txt Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 100 1 Swetoni c 2 was an asbestos product? 3 A. That's the one that's in my paper. 4 Q. A second one, i know from Selikoff's 5 writings that for a year or two there were some 6 paper companies that put asbestos in facial 7 tissues. Do you know anything about that? 8 A. NO. 9 Q. I read in your chapter in your book -- 10 By the way, who approached you to write 11 that chapter? 12 A. The editor. 13 Q. who is that? 14 A. Jack Gotschalk, I believe. 15 Q. what is the name of the book? 16 A. i think it's called "crisis Management 17 Case Histories and crisis Managers" -18 "crisis Response: case Histories in 19 Crisis Management." 20 Q. "crisis Response: case Histories" -21 A. "in Crisis Management." I believe 22 that's what it is. 23 I can get it for you. I have got a 24 copy of the book. 25 Q. were you specifically asked to write on Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D Page 92 EgiH11102.txt 101 1 swetoni c 2 asbestos or is that a topic you chose? 3 A. what happened was, originally I was 4 going to write a chapter on Agent Orange. Then 5 the fellow who was going to write the chapter on 6 asbestos couldn't do it because of litigation, so 7 I found a friend of mine who had worked with me on 8 the Agent Orange thing and I approached him and I 9 said "i can do an early history of the asbestos 10 situation because I'm not," you know -11 There was no litigation at the time so 12 that's not going to be a problem. If he would do 13 the Agent Orange thing, and he did. But he never 14 finished the chapter so there was never one on 15 Agent orange in that book. 16 Q. who was the author originally scheduled 17 to write the asbestos chapter? 18 A. it was a guy who was working for the 19 company in public relations I think at the time. 20 I don't remember his name. 21 Q. When you say "the company," you mean 22 Manville? 23 A. Manville, yes. I don't remember his 24 name. 25 Q. in that article, you make a reference Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 102 1 Swetonic Page 93 Egilllll02.txt 2 to the request for industry that sprayed asbestos 3 to try and get into the AIA or at least get 4 you-all's help. 5 A. Get our support, correct. 6 Q. Let's look at that together. 7 A. If you can tell me where it is. 8 Q. I didn't memorize the page numbers. 9 Starting on page 301, bottom right-hand 10 paragraph, it says, "The head of the local 11 asbestos sprayers trade group came to us for 12 assistance." 13 A. Right. 14 Q. As it continues, it says basically you 15 were holding the meeting on 40th Street in 16 New York overlooking Bryant Park. 17 A. correct. 18 Q. The Grace Building was under 19 construction. From the tarpaulined floor 20 10 stories up there was a virtual snow shower of 21 sprayed asbestos drifting down to the street. You 22 viewed it a visual demonstration of the public 23 relations nightmare that would be faced if you-all 24 lent your support to the asbestos sprayers. 25 You called everyone to the window. Elisa Dreier Reporting corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017Q 103 1 Swetoni c 2 "That," you said pointing across the street, "is 3 why we have to take a walk on those people. We Page 94 Egilllll02.txt 4 quietly informed Dr. Selikoff, the City of 5 New York and the epa which was also looking into 6 asbestos spraying that while we wouldn't attack 7 the practice on health grounds, neither would we 8 defend it. The practice was shortly banned by the 9 City and later by the EPA nationally with our 10 concurrence." 11 Is that the way you remember it? 12 A. Yes, basically, I think. I mean, it 13 happened -- you know, I wrote this 20 years after 14 when it happened. 15 Q. A lot of cities and states did wind up 16 banning spraying asbestos? 17 A. I think New York was the first, I 18 believe. 19 Q. But you tried to get the a i a to 20 petition them to change their standards on banning 21 it? 22 A. No, I didn't. That's not what this 23 says. 24 Q. That's not what that says but that's 25 what this says. It's a different document, sir. Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 104 1 swetoni c 2 we will label it as Exhibit No. 5. 3 (Swetonic Exhibit 5, a i a meeting 4 minutes, marked for identification, as of 5 this date.) 6 Q. If you will look at Exhibit No. 5, Page 95 Egilllll02.txt 7 "Minutes of the Board of Directors Meeting" for 8 the a i a , May 10th of 1973. You see that on the 9 front page? 10 A. Yes. 11 Q. if you look at the also presents, 12 you'll see M.M. Swetonic, Executive Secretary. 13 That's you, isn't it? 14 A. Yes. 15 Q. if you will turn to page 328. The page 16 numbers are in the lower right-hand corner. 17 A. Okay. 18 Q. Under the section where it says 19 "Petitions on Spraying," read along with me. 20 "Mr. Swetonic recommended that the a i a 21 petition each city and state which has a universal 22 ban on asbestos spraying to change their standards 23 to conform with the epa regulations." 24 Did I read that right? 25 a . Yes. Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 105 1 Swetoni c 2 MR. GINSBERG: You read it right. Can 3 we give the witness a minute to look through 4 this document? He hasn't seen it today, yet. 5 (witness reviewed document.) 6 THE WITNESS: Okay, I have read this. 7 MR. GINSBERG: if you need to look at 8 the document from front to back, take the Page 96 Egilllll02.txt 9 time, whatever you need. 10 THE WITNESS: The problem is, I don't 11 know what the EPA regulation said anymore, so 12 it's tough to understand -- for me to comment 13 on what we recommended to conform with the 14 Environmental Protection Agency regulations. 15 I have no recollection what those EPA 16 regulations said with regard to spraying. I 17 thought it was a ban. So I am confused by 18 this whole thing. 19 Q. Let's just look at it and see if it 20 doesn't clear up your confusion. 21 First of all, it says that you 22 recommended that any city or state which has a 23 universal ban on asbestos spraying ought to be 24 petitioned to change their standards. That much 25 is clear, isn't it? Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 106 1 Swetonic 2 MR. GINSBERG: what is clear is you 3 have read half of a sentence. 4 A. To conform with the EPA regulations. 5 Q. I agree, we are going to break it 6 apart statement by statement to make sure you 7 understand each statement so you can't say, "I am 8 confused." 9 The first part is pretty clear: You 10 wanted the a i a , your institute, to petition each 11 city and state which had a universal ban on Page 97 Egilllll02.txt 12 asbestos spraying to change their standards. 13 Right? 14 MR. GINSBERG: Objection, it's asked 15 and answered. 16 A. You can't break a sentence up into 16 17 parts and ask me to comment on each of them. 18 Q. Why can't I? All I am going to do is 19 get you to agree you wanted them to change their 20 standards. 21 A. To conform with the EPA regulations. 22 Q. That's exactly right. That's how you 23 wanted them to change the standards, right? 24 A. To conform with the EPA regulations, 25 whatever they may have said. I don't know what Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 107 1 Swetoni c 2 they said. 3 Q. well, if you look at the next paragraph 4 it will set out some information from which you 5 can infer what the EPA regs said: "Mr. Molino 6 reported the Environmental Defense Fund has filed 7 a petition challenging the EPA asbestos standard. 8 The main points are, first, the 1 percent 9 permissible level for asbestos content in spraying 10 materials should be eliminated." 11 A. okay. So that's what the EPA 12 regulation must have said. 13 Q. it must have said there's a 1 percent Page 98 EgiUlll02.txt 14 permissible level for asbestos content in 15 spraying, right? 16 A. Yes. 17 Q. So what you wanted to do is take these 18 cities and states that had a universal ban on 19 asbestos spraying and petition them to change it 20 to where you were allowed to have 1 percent, 21 right? 22 MR. GINSBERG: You are basing this on 23 the witness's saying he assumes that the epa 24 regulation must have been what you say it is 25 based on what's in this document? is that Elisa Dreier Reporting corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 108 1 Swetonic 2 what you -- 3 MR. LANIER: I am basing this on 4 black-and-white of what this document says 5 and what this witness is sworn to under oath 6 and what anybody with common sense 7 understands reading this. 8 A. Frankly, I have no recollection of 9 anything with regard to this here. 10 Q. it sure reads different than what you 11 were telling everybody in that book that got 12 published, doesn't it? 13 A. No. If you would have seen how 14 asbestos was sprayed, as opposed to whatever 15 this is in reference to, the asbestos spraying 16 that I was referring to in my article was like Page 99 EgiUlll02.txt 17 100 percent asbestos. 18 Q. sir, it was asbestos mixed with 19 concrete that was being sprayed on there, wasn't 20 it? 21 A. However, but it was a lot of asbestos 22 in it, if you had ever seen it done. I have seen 23 it done. 24 Q. They use an Olympic gun to do it? 25 A. okay, well, you know a lot about it, Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 109 1 swetoni c 2 too. 3 Q. sir, that's not what you said in your 4 book, in your book you said, "The practice was 5 shortly banned by the city with our concurrence." 6 Sir, what you-all were trying to do was 7 take any city that had a universal ban and 8 petition them -- at least your recommendation was 9 that they ought to change their standards to IO conform with e pa ? 11 MS. STYPINSKI: objection to form. 12 Q. You weren't urging them to ban it, 13 right? 14 MS. STYPINSKI: Objection to form. 15 A. Yes, we were. We did. I don't recall 16 why this -- why if we did this, we did this. I 17 just don't recall. 18 Q. What we've got here in Exhibit No. 5 Page 100 EgiH11102.txt 19 are some minutes to a meeting of the Board of 20 Directors at some private club where you-all had 21 the meeting. The williams Club, where is that? 22 A. Here in New York City. 23 Q. You-all have this meeting, it's got 24 you there, it's got a number of other companies it 25 looks like. Do you know any of these fellows? Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 110 1 Swetoni c 2 A. I am sure I knew them quite well in the 3 day. 4 Q. William Thurber from Union carbide, do 5 you know him? 6 A. I do not remember him at all. 7 Q. You knew Solon from lohns-Manvi11e ; 8 that was your old boss? 9 A. That's right, yes. 10 Q. You got Flintkote. They had an 11 asbestos mine. Did you know about that? 12 A. No, I did not know they had a mine. 13 Did they? 14 MR. LANIER: Yes. 15 Q. You've got Atlas Asbestos, you've 16 got -17 A. These are mostly the members of the 18 trade association, I believe. 19 Q. So all of these folks are there and it 20 looks like you were making some kind of 21 recommendations or presentations, doesn't it? Page 101 Egilllll02.txt 22 A. Yes, but the fact of the matter is, as 23 I say, I don't recall doing this nor could I give 24 you a reason as to, if I did it, why I did it. 25 Q. Looking at this attendance, you got a Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 111 1 Swetoni c 2 Joseph Burnes, Esquire, a counsel, a lawyer. What 3 is a lawyer doing at you-all's meeting of the 4 Board of Directors? 5 A. Lawyers would be -- lawyers would 6 always be at meetings. 7 Q. The trade association's board meetings, 8 you-all had a lawyer always there? 9 A. sure. 10 Q. Because you-all were worried about 11 claims, weren't you? 12 A. No. 13 Q. Sir -14 A. NO. 15 Q. Sir, I want toshow you another AIA 16 executive committee meeting and we will mark this 17 as Exhibit No. 6. 18 (Swetonic Exhibit 6, AIA meeting 19 minutes, marked for identification, as of 20 this date.) 21 Q. See if itdoesn't sayspecifically that 22 you were worried about claims on page 2, the 23 paragraph that starts out -- Page 102 Egilllll02.txt 24 A. Just a second. Just a second. 25 (witness read document.) Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 112 1 Swetoni c 2 MS. s t y p i n s k i : can you identify the 3 exhibit? 4 MR. LANIER: Yes. This is an AIA 5 letter to the executive committee from 6 Mr. Swetonic dated October 24th, 1972. He 7 just turned 30 about a week and a half 8 earlier. 9 MS. STYPINSKI: Thank you. 10 THE w i t n e s s : what are you referring 11 to? 12 Q. I am referring to the paragraph that 13 says, "I" -- Matthew Swetonic -- "am fully aware 14 one of the major industry fears with regard to 15 providing employees with facts on asbestos health 16 is that this would result in a great increase in 17 workers' Compensation claims, while there may be 18 some validity in this argument, think for a moment 19 how many claims there would be if the IUD and 20 Dr. Selikoff were permitted to present their 21 estimate of the health situation to employees 22 without any refutation by the industry." 23 a . Yes. okay. 24 Q. You-all were concerned about claims? 25 A. Let's back up for a second here. Page 103 Egilllll02.txt Elisa Dreier Reporting corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 113 1 Swetoni c 2 There's a difference between a 3 workmen's compensation claim and a lawsuit. 4 Workmen's compensation claim is for -- let's say, 5 Manville, for their employees, saying that they 6 should be compensated for illnesses. It's 7 different than a product liability lawsuit which 8 is what I was referring to earlier. 9 Q. Sir, when you were saying "n o , no, 10 no" -- the court reporter can go back and read it, 11 but I specifically said you-all were concerned 12 about claims. You were concerned about claims. 13 A. But not of the type that I thought you 14 were referring to. 15 Q. Well, sir, you understand at least in 16 the state of Texas back then a workers' 17 Compensation claim could result in a lawsuit 18 against the company and if the company were 19 intentionally responsible for the conduct and it 20 resulted in the death, could be punitive damages, 21 it is a lawsuit. 22 MS. STYPINSKI: Objection to form. 23 MS. a n t o n u c c i : Objection. 24 A. It might be in the state of Texas but 25 it wasn't in the state of New York or the state of Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017Q Page 104 114 Egi1111102.txt 1 Swetoni c 2 New lersey to the best of my knowledge at those 3 times. 4 Q. y o u understand a bunch of your clients 5 and a bunch of the AIA executive committee had a 6 bunch of facilities and plants in Texas that they 7 were concerned about? 8 MS. STYPINSKl: Objection to form. 9 A. They never raised an issue along those 10 lines with us. 11 Q. Even still, sir, as you-all were doing 12 this work, you're doing it with a concern that 13 there was going to be a bunch of new Workers' Comp 14 claims that are going to cost you-all money and 15 you are trying to minimize those, aren't you? 16 A. if those claims were based on poor 17 information, I think if you will go through this 18 thing, what this is is a recommendation that they 19 start to put together information for their 20 employees on the asbestos health issue, which I 21 think would be a fine thing to do. 22 Once again, I go back to what I said 23 before, that I do not equate workmen's 24 Compensation claims -- 25 I mean, Manville had many, many Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017Q 115 1 swetoni c 2 workmen's Compensation claims that I was aware of Page 105 Egilllll02.txt 3 and they were paying compensation to a lot of 4 people at the Manville plant. I was certainly 5 aware of that. That's not in the same category 6 that I was talking about when I talked about 7 product liability claims. I make a distinction 8 between the two. 9 Q. Because you've got to admit when the 10 document's in front of you that you-all were 11 concerned about legal claims. True? 12 MR. GINSBERG: Objection. It's been 13 asked and answered. If there is any problem, 14 it was with the question being ambiguous. 15 m s . s t y p i n s k i : objection to form. 16 Q. Answer it, please. That's true, isn't 17 it? 18 Di MR. GINSBERG: Objection. It's been 19 asked and answered. The question is abusive 20 and i am instructing the witness not to 21 answer. 22 MR. LANIER: what you are doing is -- 23 okay. 24 Sir, i'll bet you I get to ask you that 25 question again one day. In the not far too Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017Q 116 1 Swetoni c 2 distant future. 3 Q. Do you believe there was ever a need 4 for government regulation on asbestos? Page 106 Egilllll02.txt 5 A. Yes. 6 Q. why wouldn't the industry do it on its 7 own? 8 A. I think some of the companies had 9 pretty good things in place. Manville did 10 certainly. 11 Q. so why did the government need to 12 intervene? 13 A. The government didn't intervene. It's 14 part of what OSHA was set up to do, was to create 15 regulations on various things. 16 Q. would the industry have done it on its 17 own without OSHA? 18 A. i can't say. 19 Q. why not? 20 A. I can't say. How would I know? 21 Manville was doing it. 22 Q. Did you ever do any work with the Jones 23 Day 1aw fi rm? 24 A. Yes. 25 Q. what kind of work didyou do with them? Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 117 1 Swetoni c 2 And if they gave you legal counsel, I 3 don't want to know about it, what it was. I just 4 need to know that that's what it was. 5 what kind of work did you do with them? 6 A. Go back on that again. You kind of 7 said two or three things. Page 107 EgiU11102.txt 8 Q. I'm not allowed to ask you what legal 9 counsel, a lawyer, may have given you, so I'm not 10 looking for that. I want to know what kind of 11 work you did with them because I suspect you-all 12 had a common client that you-all did some work 13 for, and in that regard I would like to know what 14 the work was. 15 But I don't want -- if they came to you 16 and you went to them and said, "Hey, I perjured 17 myself, what should I do?" and they gave you legal 18 counsel, then you shouldn't be telling me that 19 stuff. Okay? 20 A. They were counsel for R.3. Reynolds. 21 Q. How were you involved with Jones Day in 22 that regard? 23 A. well, very, very seldom. 24 Actually the only time that I can 25 remember is when we were working on premiere, the Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 118 1 Swetonic 2 smokeless cigarette, and there would be normally a 3 lot of lawyers there to make sure that as we were 4 preparing for a city council meeting or whatever, 5 that, you know, we were saying the right thing or 6 saying it in a fashion that wasn't going to get us 7 in trouble, whatever. 8 Q. How would a lawyer need to be there to 9 make sure you were saying something that wouldn't Page 108 Egilllll02.txt 10 get you in trouble? 11 MR. g i n s b e r g : Objection. I think in 12 this instance if the lawyers from Jones Day 13 were present representing their client 14 Reynolds and if Mr. swetonic was also acting 15 as an agent of Reynolds, then those 16 communications would be protected by the 17 attorney-client privilege. 18 Di we don't have anyone here from Reynolds 19 present so I think out of safety here, given 20 Mr. Swetonic's responsibility to any former 21 client, that he shouldn't answer the 22 question. 23 Q. Did you ever see the 400-page paper 24 that Jones Day put out about Reynolds and the 25 tobacco approach being used in PR efforts? Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 119 1 Swetonic 2 A. No. 3 Q. Beryllium, did you ever do any work 4 with the beryllium industry? 5 A. Not that I recall. 6 MR. l a n i e r : in Texas we have a rule 7 that says I'm allowed to ask you up to six 8 hours worth of questions. 9 I have made a provision, I understand, 10 through one of the lawyers that I work with 11 that other lawyers obviously in the room can 12 ask you questions, but if it can be arranged Page 109 Egilllll02.txt IB with you and your lawyer that those lawyers 14 on the telephone can look at these documents 15 and ask you questions at some point. I am 16 going to reserve the rest of my time in case 17 someone does, and I suspect I will be getting 18 to depose you later anyway. So at this point 19 I will pass the witness. 20 MR. GINSBERG: Mr. Lanier, does that 21 mean you have no further questions at this 22 poi nt? 23 MR. LANIER: At this point I will pass 24 the witness. 25 MR. HENDERSON: I have no questions. Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 120 1 Swetoni c 2 MS. WILLIAMS: I have no questions. 3 MR. GARDNER: I have no questions at 4 thi s time. 5 MS. STYPINSK3:: I have no questions at 6 this time. 7 MR. BART: I have no questions at this 8 time, 9 MR. HARVARD : Me either. 10 MR. LANIER: Anybody on the phone want 11 to ask questions now before they see the 12 documents? 13 MS. STUART: I don't have any 14 questions. Page 110 Egi1111102.txt 15 MR. WEBB: I have no questions. 16 MR. WHARTON: I have no questions at 17 this time. 18 MS. ZIVKOVIC: I have no questions. 19 MR. DePHlLLlPS: No questions at this 20 time. 21 MR. MONAHAN: No questions. 22 MR. HUMPHREY: No questions at this 23 time. 24 MS. LUKE: I have no questions at this 25 time. Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 121 1 Swetoni c 2 MS. w a r d : No questions at this time. 3 MS. ANTONUCCI: No questions. 4 MR. WESTBERG: No questions. 5 MR. GINSBERG: I would like to know, 6 Mark, what are you talking about, some 7 agreement with regard to other lawyers here 8 reviewing documents? 9 MR. LANIER: The lawyers -- at least 10 some lawyers who are on the phone said that 11 while they wanted to attend by phone, they 12 specifically want to have a chance to look at 13 the documents to make sure they have no 14 questions before they pass the witness and 15 there's no way for them to do that until they 16 get a copy of the depo, and I assume what 17 they will have to do is come up here and get Page 111 Egilllll02.txt 18 hold of you two and either do it by agreement 19 or petition a court to allow them to then ask 20 their questions. 21 MR. GINSBERG: Yes, because it wouldn't 22 be subject to -- 23 As far as I am concerned, today's 24 proceeding is over. 25 And then also with regard to your Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017G 122 1 swetonic 2 procedure for the witness reviewing the 3 transcript, the witness will provide, I 4 guess, what is it, the original to Mr. 5 Swetonic or through me? 6 MR. LANIER: The witness won't but what 7 will happen is the court reporter will 8 provide the original and we'll have an 9 agreement, which exists under the rules 10 anyway, that if for some reason a signed 11 original is not available for time of hearing 12 or trial, then an unsigned copy can be used. 13 Mr. Swetonic, you need to know that you 14 are assured the rights, at least under Texas, 15 to review the transcript and make sure that 16 this young lady has not messed up and changed 17 one of your yes's to no's or something like 18 that. If you perceive that there is an error 19 either because she's messed up, or some Page 112 Egi1111102.txt 20 witnesses, just because they think they 21 messed up and misunderstood something, that 22 you have an opportunity to correct that and 23 put the reason for your correction and supply 24 that with the deposition transcript. 25 MR. GINSBERG: With regard to the Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 123 1 Swetonic 2 procedure you just mentioned, something about 3 if there will be a hearing or whatever before 4 Mr. Swetonic can have responded within the 5 period he is allowed by the rules, then you 6 can go ahead and used an unsigned copy? 7 MR. LANIER: Correct. 8 MR. GINSBERG: Your office had told me 9 that the trial in this case was supposed to 10 start this coming Monday. Is that correct? 11 MR. LANIER: I suspect -- well, the 12 answer to your question is yes, it is 13 supposed to. I suspect that it may not start 14 immediately this coming Monday, but I may be 15 wrong. 16 MR. GINSBERG: The witness will be 17 given the opportunity to review the 18 transcript then to respond to it within what 19 is allowed under the Texas rules, correct? 20 MR. LANIER: Yes. We will use an 21 unsigned copy if you have not done so by the 22 time we are needed at trial. Page 113 Egilllll02.txt 23 MR. GINSBERG: will the witness get 24 through me notice of that fact? 25 MR. LANIER: No. Elisa Dreier Reporting corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 124 1 Swetonic 2 MR. GINSBERG: will a copy of the 3 transcript be provided nevertheless for the 4 witness to review? 5 MR. LANIER: Yes. 6 MR. GINSBERG: Thank you. 7 MR. LANIER: Certainly. 8 As a practical matter, we will try and 9 call you if we are going to do it, but in the 10 heat of battle I may forget. So I don't want 11 to tell you for certain that I will. 12 MR. GINSBERG: But we'll be getting a 13 copy from the reporter regardless? 14 MR. LANIER: Yes. 15 MR. GINSBERG: Thank you. 16 (Time noted: 1:56 p.m.) 17 18 19 MATTHEW SWETONIC 20 21 Subscribed and sworn to before me this 22 _____ day of____________________ 23 24 Page 114 Egilllll02.txt 25 NOTARY PUBLIC Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017D 125 1 2 CERTIFICATE 3 4 STATE OF NEW YORK ) 5 ) ss. : 6 COUNTY OF NEW YORK ) 7 8 I, LINDA DEVECKA, a Notary Public 9 within and for the state of New York, do 10 hereby certify: 11 That MATTHEW s w e t o n i c , the witness 12 whose deposition is hereinbefore set forth, 13 was duly sworn by me and that such deposition 14 is a true record of the testimony given by 15 such witness. 16 I further certify that I am not related 17 to any of the parties to this action by blood 18 or marriage; and that I am in no way 19 interested in the outcome of this matter. 20 IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set 21 my hand this 18th day of November, 22 2002. 23 24 LINDA DEVECKA 25 Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 Page 115 Egi1111102.txt 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 100170 126 1 2 ----------------- I N D E X ------------------- 3 WITNESS EXAMINATION BY PAGE 4 MATTHEW SWETONIC MR. LANIER 7 5 6 ---------- INFORMATION REQUESTS ------------- 7 DIRECTIONS: 24, 81, 87, 115, 118 8 RULINGS: None 9 TO BE f u r n i s h e d : None 10 REQUESTS: None 11 MOTIONS: None 12 ----------------- EXHIBITS ------------------ 13 SWETONIC EXHIBIT NO. FOR ID. 14 1 Deposition subpoena 12 15 2-A Laminated card called "Asbestos 13 16 and Health Questions and Answers" 17 2-B Brochure entitled "Asbestos in the 13 Atmosphere, a Hazard to Health?" 18 2-C Polyvinyl chloride brochure 13 19 2-D Asbestos and health information 13 20 fi 1e 21 3 22 Crisis Management book chapter entitled "Death of the Asbestos industry" 13 23 4 24 5 25 6 ATI meeting minutes and speaker introduction page a i a meeting minutes AIA meeting minutes 27 104 111 Elisa Dreier Reporting Corp. (212) 557-5558 780 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017 Page 116