Document zdrXzvwjwajyb2dMxpBDzrNE7

FILE NAME: Metropolitan Life (ML) DATE: 1981 Dec 14 DOC#: ML257 DOCUMENT DESCRIPTION: Legal - Deposition of Dr. Gerritt Schepers 1 IN THE SUPERIOR COURT OP Till' STATE OK CALIFORNIA 2 IN AND FOR THE COUNTY OK CONTRA COSTA 3 BEFORE THE HONORABLE JUDGE COLEMAN K. FANNIN, DFPAKTMITIT ll 4 --0 O0 -- 5 BOB ALAN SPEAKE, 6 Plaintiff, COPY 7 vs. NO. 160993 8 JOHNS-MANVILLE CORPORATION, ;; et a1 ., 9 Defendants, 10 11 v o l u me ii J > r - S c h e p * r 5 12 REPORTERs 1 TRANSCRTPT_ 0|?_PROCKEDTNOS 13 MONDAY, DECEMBER 14, 198 1 - x-35 p.M. 14 APPEARANCES 15 FOR THE PLAINTIFF : 16 GEORGE W. KILBOURNE, STEVEN KAZAN, 17 Attorney at Law 620 Contra Costa Blvd. 18 Pleasant Bill, CA. 94523 Attorney ut Law 171 Twelfth Street, Suite 100 Oakland, Cali torni a 94607 19 FOR THE DEFENDANTS JOHNS-MANV ILL.E CORPORATIONS : 20 WEYMAN I. LUNDQUCST and ARTHUR J. MOORE, J.PHILIP MARTIN, Attys.at Law Attorney at Law 21 HELLER, EHRMAN, WHITE & McAULIFFE MOORE, CUFFORD, WOI.FE, LARSON , TKUTNKk 22 44 Montgomery Street San Francisco, CA. 94104 20 1 - 1.9th Street Oakland, CaJ Ltornia 94612 23 FOR THE DEFENDANT DR. KENT WISE: 24 MARRS A. CRADDTCK, 25 Attorney at haw CRADD rCK, CANDLAND & CONTI 26 1801 N. California Blvd. Walnut Creek, CA. 94596 ROBERT M. BROWN, Attorney at haw BROWN t. FINNEY Oho Mai 1t uto r lay.a , S iit 2 2 D San Fram: 1seo , eA . 9 1:l 27 28 --O O -- ------------------------------------------------------ . 8,6_____________________________________________________ 1 control devices, the disease could have been eliminated. 2 Q. Are you saying, Doctor, then that utilizing then avail 3 able techniques and technology factories such as the one shown 4 here could have been controlled in the 1940's so that someone 5 who went to work for the first time in the 1940's in an asbestos 6 -using facility could have been kept from developing asbestos 7 disease? 8 A. Absolutely. 9 Q. Let me move from the question of dust levels to some l 10 of your own experiences when you were in this country in the 11 1949 to 1950 period. 12 You said that you spent about three months all togethe 13 at Saranac. Can you tell us what, if anything, you learned 14 during that period about the existence of asbestos-related 15 diseases in the Johns-Manville Corporation? 16 A. There were two, really three, parameters of inquiry that 17 I pursued that incidentally involved the Johns-Manville Corpora 18 tion. I didn't single them out purposely. They were just 19 there to study. 20 The first was the availability in the laboratory !t . ' 21 of a large accumulation of lung tissues from diseased employees. 22 The company had been sending specimens to Dr. Gardner, the 23 former director, subsequently Dr. Vorwald, V-O-R-W-A-L-D, 24 the next director, and later when I came to be the director, 25 then to m e . 26 Those specimens had been arriving at the laboratory 27 from at least 1942, because a continuous index pf cases was 28 on file and all the specimens were promptly cataloged and Z A N O O N E L l >. R E P O R T I N G S E R V I C E 87 1 identified by names and numbers and source of origin. 2 It was that material which I particularly had an 3 opportunity to study. It was made available to me through 4 the courtesy of Dr. Vorwald who was then the director. 5 Q. Let me interrupt you for a moment, Doctor, and I would 6 like to show you a document, a photocopy, and ask you if you 7 recognize that document? 8 A. Oh, yes, sir. .. ` 9 Q. Can you tell us, please, what it is? 10 MR. LUNDQUIST: Could we have a copy of it? 11 MR. KAZAN: You can even see it. 12 MR. BROWN: Is that a marked exhibit? 13 MR. KAZAN: Not yet. 14 THE COURT: It should be. We will take time out 15 and mark it in front of the jury so they can watch our fascinat 16 ing experience. Any others that you want to use with this 17 witness, because they will be marked, too. 18 MR. KAZAN: Not at this*time, your Honor. 19 THE COURT: Any others that are not marked that 20 you wish to use with this witness? 21 MR. MOORE: This will be a while, your Honor, before 22 we -- 23 THE COURT: I would imagine. Any others that you 24 want marked to use with this witness? 25 MR. KAZAN: Yes. We can do it at a recess. 26 THE COURT: We will indeed do it at a recess. 27 MR. KAZAN: Thank you, your Honor. 28 THE COURT: You are entirely welcome. You may ZANOQNELL a REPORTING SERVICE 88 1 question. 2 MR. KAZAN: Q. Okay. Let's go back, Doctor, to 3 the period that you were at Saranac in 1949 to 1950. You 4 indicated that there were accumulated cases available for 5 review? 6 A. Yes. 7 Q. And did you have any occasion to review any of those 8 old cases? 9 A. Yes, sir. 10 Q. Could you tell us what kinds of materials you looked 11 at and what you found? 12 A. These were examples of lung disease, asbestosis with 13 its complications, and there was a particular group of cases 14 of lung cancer, 11 of them with 2 mesothelioma cases that 15 was among that group that had come from the Canadian asbestos 16 mines and mills. 17 Those are the materials I reviewed during the time 18 I was there. I also reviewed mafiy of the specimens I obtained 19 from animals that had gone through asbestos dust exposure 20 studies of which there were many thousands that were on the 21 files of the laboratory. 22 Next I went to visit the Canadian asbestos mines 23 and mills to see there how dust was created, what steps they 24 had taken to control the dust, and what efforts were being 25 made by the medical staff to identify disease in the workers 26 in those mines and mills. 27 Q. Did you have occasion to meet with any physicians employed 28 by the Johns-Manville Company during your trips to Canada? z a n o d n e l u r epo r tin g serv ice 89 1 A. Yes. 2 Q. With whom did you meet? 3 A. Well, I met with Dr. Kenneth Smith. That's where I met 4 him first. He was at that time the Medical Director for the 5 Johns-Manville Canadian operation. I also met with other 6 management personnel. I have by now forgotten their names, 7 but I met with a whole series of persons, personages in the 8 management field at those mines and mills. 9 Q. Did you have occasion to discuss these 11 cancer cases 10 that you. mentioned with Dr. Smith? 11 A. Yes, sir. I discussed that with him for the particular 12 reason that one of the problems we had encountered in South 13 Africa v/as that we had received advices from the American 14 asbestos industry officials that cancer of the lung did not 15 occur here in this country, and it was therefore probably 16 a European or African invention. 17 We were of course astonished by that information, 18 and indeed held back our own legislation and recommendations 19 about making cancer a compensable disease in South Africa 20 by virtue of our respect for the American scientific judgments 21 on the subject. 22 So, prior to that the German government had already 23 determined it a compensable disease in 1943 and the Czechoslo 24 vakian government in 1947 and the British government in around 25 1949, but we held back because we felt the advice from America 26 was important from a scientific point of view. 27 (CONTINUED WITHOUT INTERRUPTION)_ 28 ZANDONELl A REPORTING SERVICE 90 1 Q. Are you talking now about -- 2 MR. LUNDQUIST: Excuse me. If that was the con 3 versation, I have no objection. If it wasn't the conversation, 4 I'd ask that the answer go out as nonresponsive. 5 He was asked what the conversation was, and then 6 we had a long description of something. 7 THE COURT: You can cross examine in the area 8 and find out whether or it was or wasn't. 9 MR. KAZAN: Q. In;your answer/ Doctor, you re 10 ferred to cancer as a compensable disease. 11 Were you speaking with reference to asbestos ex 12 posure? 13 A. Yes, sir. 14 Q. All right. And so one of the things you were interested 15 in finding out when you came to the United States for that year 16 was to look into the American experience with asbestos-related 17 cancer. 18 A. Yes, sir. * 19 Q. Did you, during your trips to Canada, discuss these 11 cases 20 and the question of asbestos and cancer with Dr. Smith? 21 A. Yes, I did, sir. 22 Q. What discussion did you have, please? 23 A. I told him of the existence of these cases. He was unaware 24 of the existence. 25 And then we discovered the one possible explana 26 tion was that the manner in which those cases arrived at the 27 Saranac Laboratory. 28 Q. Let me interrupt you for a moment, Doctor, and-ask whether ZANDQNEU REPORTING SERVICE 91 1 the usual method that cases and tissue came to a laboratory 2 came for investigation was on referral from other physicians. 3 A. That was the normal way in which they came. "Normally" in 4 the sense of the majority way. There's no normality about it 5 in a judgmental way. 6 Q. That was the common practice, though. 7 A. That was the more common practice. 8 Q. All right. Was that the practice that you found had been 9 followed with respect to these cancer cases from Johns-Manville 10 in Canada? 11 A. No. They had not been referred to the laboratory by Dr. 12 Smith. He was not aware of them. 13 They had been brought physically into the country 14 from Canada by automobile by a Mr. Ivan Sabourin -- S-a-b-o-u-r- 15 i-n -- the chief attorney for the Quebec Asbestos Mining 16 Association. 17 Q. All right. And from your review of the Saranac files, 18 did you determine whether these c&ses had been examined and re 19 ported upon? 20 A. Oh, yes. They had been reported on back to Mr. Sabourin, 21 because we always reported back to the individual who presented 22 the material to the laboratory. 23 Q. Okay. Have we now covered your discussion with Dr. Smith 24 on the question of cancer and asbestos in the 1949-1950 period? 25 A. Yes. 26 Qi All right. Did you have occasion during that same period 27 to talk with him about the incidence of asbestos.or other kinds 28 of diseases related to asbestos exposure? ZANOONELi A r e p o r t in g se r v ic e 92 1 A. Yes, sir. 2 Q. Can you tell us, please, what the substance of those discus 3 sions was? 4 A. Yes. Dr. Smith presented examples to me in the form of X- 5 rays of the types of asbestosis that he had seen in the employees 6 of Johns-Manville Corporation. 7 At that point there were other cases also demon 8 strated to me by another .physiciah who was the medical director 9 of a clinic called the Thetford Cliriic -- T-h-e-t-f-o-r-d -- 10 Dr. Paul Carter, C-a-r-t-i-e-r. 11 THE COURT: Excuse me, sir, for just a moment. 12 You used the term "Johns-Manville Corporation." As you used 13 that term in your answer a moment ago, would you tell us what 14 you meant? 15 THE WITNESS: Yes, sir. The -- there was the 16 Johns-Manville Canada Corporation. And the mines and mills 17 were known and stationary, and people called themselves the 18 Johns-Manville Corporation. ' 19 THE COURT: All right. As you used the term, did 20 you mean Johns-Manville of Canada? 21 THE WITNESS: At that time, sir. 22 THE COURT: All right, sir. Thank you. 23 THE WITNESS: Uh-huh. 24 MR. KAZAN: Q. Had you finished the answer to the 25 question, Doctor? 26 A. I don't know where I stopped. 27 THE COURT: Well, that's my fault .for interrupting 28 you, but I did want to clear that point. _ ZANDQNE L t \ R EPO RTIN G SE R V IC E 93 1 So I'll have the court reporter read back the 2 question and the portion of your answer up until my interruption, 3 sir. And if you wish to add anything further, you may continue 4 on. 5 If you would, Ginger. 6 (Last question and answer read by the reporter.) 7 MR. KAZAN: Q. Had you completed your answer? 8 A. Well, sufficiently so that <pne can start anew. 9 Q. Okay. From your review o' f ji :he X-rays with Dr. Smith, were 10 you able to determine whether the kind of asbestosis being seen 11 in Canada was similar, on X-ray, to the kind you were experien 12 ced with from South Africa? 13 A. It was a somewhat different type of asbestosis characterized 14 by what one would call fine fibrosis of the lung versus coarse 15 fibrosis, as shown in the African-induced disease. 16 And it had a lesser component of pleural reaction. 17 It was there, but it was not as coarse and there was not as 18 much calcification in the pleura `as I had been accustomed to see 19 in Africa. 20 Q. Now, during that year that you spent on this commonwealth 21 fellowship, did you have occasion to visit any of the other 22 Johns-Manville facilities outside of Canada? 23 A. Yes. 24 Q. Which ones were they? 25 A. I went to see another manufacturing plant, of the now United 26 States Johns-Manville Corporation, in a place called Waukegan, 27 in Illinois. It's the bottom of Wisconsin. It could be 28 Wisconsin or Illinois. It's over there north of Chicago. ZANDQNELl , *Hf , \ REPORTING SERVICE M l i* I . . . V f . ' M ' M l . * * . 94 1 And I saw there how they manufactured cement 2 asbestos products, and reviewed with the medical director of 3 that company the health problems that he had seen, and reviewed 4 with the engineers their methods of identifying the dust problem 5 in their factory. 6 Q. Did you visit other Johns-Manville facilities as well? 7 A. The third one that I visited was here in this state, at a 8 place called Lompoc, California. That was not an asbestos in 9 dustry, it was a diatomaceous-earth industry at that time. 10 Q. And were you accompanied by anybody from either Saranac 11 or New York University on any of these visits to Johns-Manville 12 facilities? 13 A. My visits to Canadian Johns-Manville were alone. My visit 14 to Waukegan was by myself. My visit to Lompoc was in the com 15 pany of Dr. Lanza of the New York Institute, and also a Dr. 16 Reginald Smart, of Los Angeles, and who was an internist physicia 17 who had done research on the Lompoc type of lung disease caused 18 by flux calcined diatomaceous earth. 19 Q. Now, I gather that your course of study was somewhat informaL 20 during that year period. 21 A. Oh, yes, sir. 22 Q. Were there any written requirements, papers, examinations, 23 anything of that sort? 24 A. Well, that was sprung on me in May or June of the year, and 25 I was told that I had to write an examination and write a thesis , 26 both of which I didn't want to do because I hadn't come for any 27 degree purposes. I'd merely come to study and learn things. 28 But Dr. Lanza insisted on it, that I* had to do ZANDQNELi a r e p o r t in g se r v ic e 95 1 these two chores. 2 Q. What did you do when he insisted? 3 A. Well, reluctantly complied. 4 Q. Okay. And did you find a relatively painless way to comply 5 with his directive? 6 A. Well, the main reward of doing so was not having him angry 7 with me or perhaps pleased with me that I did what he asked me 8 to do. 9 But they also awarded me' a diploma to say thah 10 I'm the first graduate of the institute, etcetera. 11 Q. All right. Can you tell us, Doctor, how did you comply 12 with this writing requirement that you discovered at the end of 13 your year? 14 A. Well, I -- economically, I'd say. I'd been required by the 15 South African government to write a technical appraisal for 16 them of my visit in the United States, because although the 17 fellowship paid me my additional expenses for studying here, I 18 had a family back in South Africa 'that had to be supported.- 19 And so the government continued my salary back 20 there. And in exchange for that form of kindness to me, the 21 government required that I should report back to them what I 22 had learned during the year of study. 23 So as I went along during my months of study here, 24 I made notes and observations and organized these into the form 25 of a technical report. 26 And that is why I say I did it economically, and 27 I offered that same report to Dr. Lanza for the thesis that he'd 28 asked me to write. ZANDONEL.UA .IEPORTING SfH V lC K 96 1 Q. Kind of like using the same term paper in three courses. 2 A. Carbon copy, yes, sir. 3 Q. Did you turn in this written document to Dr. Lanza? 4 A. Yes, I did, sir. 5 Q. Did you ever hear anything about that written document again? 6 A. Oh, yes, definitely. 7 Q. Would you tell us, please, what happened next? 8 A. Well, the next I heard of it, a little, while later, was 9 that Dr. Lanza told me that t^ere were officials -- 10 MR. LUNDQUIST: I'm going to object to the hearsay 11 conversation. Also, unless he can produce this report, which 12 I don't believe he has any record of, I think all of this 13 conversation about the report itself violates the best-evidence 14 rule, and I think he's made no endeavors to obtain the report 15 from wherever he left it, your Honor. 16 But the first question right now is hearsay, and 17 I object to what he's talking about as hearsay. 18 THE COURT: I can't, tell. It's clearly hearsay; 19 I mean, that goes without saying. 20 MR. LUNDQUIST: But the conversation with Dr. 21 Lanza is hearsay. 22 THE COURT: Obviously. I mean, certainly it is. 23 MR. LUNDQUIST: And it's objectionable. I object 24 to it. 25 THE COURT: Well, I don't know whether it is or 26 it isn't objectionable. I mean, there are hearsay -- there's 27 hearsay and then there's hearsay, and I'in not looking for an 28 exception right now. ZANDONELl ^ REPORTING SERVICE 5Hu' <i l l A ... UVui l I l > 97 1 I don't know whether or not this goes to this 2 gentleman's qualifications; I don't know whether it goes to 3 his expertise. I have no way of knowing the direction of im 4 port of the question at this juncture. 5 MR. LUNDQUIST: If it's to the latter, then I 6 don't have an objection. 7 THE COURT: Well, I don't know. 8 MR. KAZAN: My turn? 9 THE COURT: Uh-huh. 10 MR. KAZAN: We don't need to talk about what 11 Dr. Lanza told Dr. Schepers at that time at all. 12 THE COURT: That took care of the problem. 13 MR. KAZAN: Q. Let me ask you this, Doctor. 14 After you turned the report in to Dr. Lanza, did you receive 15 any communication from the Johns-Manville Corporation or any 16 of its officers? 17 A. I ended up in the office of the chief counsel of the Johns- 18 Manville Corporation in New York City. 19 Q. What was that gentleman's name? 20 A. Mr. Vandiver Brown. 21 Q. Did anyone accompany you to his office? 22 A. Dr. Lanza. 23 Q. Whose idea was this visit? 24 A. Mr. Vandiver Brown's idea. 25 Q. And do you recall your conversation with Mr. Brown on that 26 date? 27 A. He had a copy of my thesis on his desk. 28 Q. Do you know where he got that copy? IA N D Q N E L U REPORTING SERVICE 98 1 A. Well, the only source could have been Dr. Lanza/ 2 Q. Was the only copy that you distributed to anyone the copy 3 you gave Dr. Lanza? 4 A. Yes, sir. 5 Q. And was that the copy that was on Mr. Brown's desk? 6 A. Yes, sir. 7 Q. All right. And what, if anything, did Mr. Brown tell you 8 with respect to that report? 9 A. He asked me to suppress it and not publish the information 10 in it. 11 (CONTINUED WITHOUT INTERRUPTION) 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 ZANDONELl REPORTING SERVICE 99 1 Q. 2 A. Did he explain to you why? He said it would be harmful to the economic interests 3 of his company. 4 Q. Can you be more specific with respect to what portions 5 of the report he found objectionable? 6 A. He did not wish to have the fact revealed that cancer 7 had been reported in the Canadian asbestos miners and millers. 8 MR. LUNDQUIST: Could we have,that date of that 9 conversation, Doctor? 10 THE WITNESS: That was in August of 1950. 11 MR. LUNDQUIST: August of 1950? 12 THE WITNESS: Yes, sir. 13 MR. LUNDQUIST: Thank you. 14 MR. KAZAN: Q. What did Mr. Brown tell you with 15 respect to that report? 16 A. Well, I can -- I think I would be told that I am telling 17 hearsay if I told you what he said, but I can tell you what 18 I said. 19 Q. That's the Judge's job to tell you if you can't answer. 20 So, would you tell us please as best as you can recall what 21 Mr. Brown told you that he found objectionable or inappropriate 22 with respect to your publishing this information? 23 A. Well, the one was the cancer issue which he did not want 24 to have revealed. The other was the fact that I had mentioned 25 the extreme severity of the asbestotic disease which I had 26 seen in the cases from Saranac, and also the extreme dustiness 27 of the working environment of the men at the Waukegan Plant 28 and at the Lompoc Plant. J Z A N D O N E L l > 'r e p o r t i n g S E R V I C E 100 1 Q. Did Mr. Brown in any way tell you that this was confiden 2 tial or privileged information? 3 A. He suggested that I had been their guest, their privileged 4 guest, and therefore should respect the confidence of the 5 company and not mention what I had seen. 6 Q. And what, Doctor, was your response? 7 A. I told him that I would release the information to the 8 South African Government, because that was my duty. 9 Q. Did you in fact do so? 10 A. Yes. 11 Q. Do you know what happened to your report once it was 12 delivered by you to the South African officials? 13 MR. LUNDQUIST: I am going to object if he's going 14 to give us any hearsay in response to this unless he knows 15 of his own knowledge, your Honor, 16 THE COURT: Well, I think that's what it calls for. 17 Do you know of your own knowledge what occurred? 18 THE WITNESS: Yes. My'-- there had been communica 19 tion between our -- 20 MR. LUNDQUIST: Excuse me, Doctor. Was this told 21 to you or did you observe it and determine it by yourself? 22 THE WITNESS: I was told by the Director of the 23 Pneumoconiosis Bureau. 24 MR. LUNDQUIST: Okay. That's as far as it goes. 25 It's hearsay, and I object to it. 26 THE COURT: It sounds like it. 27 MR. KAZAN: Q. Doctor, did your report ever see 28 the light of day once it got into the South African ZANOC1N L L > iI E P Q R T I N G S E R V I C E 101 1 Government? 2 A. No, it was suppressed. 3 MR. LUNDQUIST: May the last go out? 4 THE COURT: Yes. The "no" may stay in. The "it 5 was suppressed" will go out, and the jury will be admonished 6 to disregard it. 7 MR. KAZAN: Q. Now, when you came to Saranac in 8 '54, did you become acquainted with a radiologist in Saranac 9 by the name of Leonard Bristol?: 10 A. Yes, sir. 11 Q. And what was his connection, if any, with the laboratory 12 or the hospital? 13 A. He was a radiologist, practicing radiologist in the City 14 of Saranac Lake, and Dr. Vorwald had signed him on for the 15 purpose of interpreting some of the X-rays that were being 16 referred to Saranac Laboratory during Dr. Vorwald's time. 17 So, I inherited Dr. Bristol in that capacity. 18 Q. Was one of your responsibilities as Director of the labora 19 tory to exercise some sort of quality control or supervision 20 over the work of staff members? 21 A. Yes, sir. 22 Q. Did you have occasion to exercise that function with 23 respect to Dr. Bristol? 24 A. Yes, sir. 25 Q. Would you tell us, please, what conclusions you reached 26 with respect to the quality of Dr. Bristol's work? 27 A. I made the determination that it would be better for 28 the industry if I reviewed all the X-rays myself .and released ZA ND Q NEUj- r e p o r t in g SERVICE 102 1 them over my signature. 2 Q. Did you review X-rays that Dr. Bristol had interpreted 3 before you saw them? 4 A. Yes, sir. 5 Q. And were you able to form any appraisal as to the adequacy 6 or appropriateness of his interpretation of those films? 7 A. The reason why I made the change and gave myself the 8 extra work was because I was pot satisfied that he knew suf 9 ficient about this subject to be able to give appropriate 10 reports. 11 Q. All right. Did you find that his reports were inaccurate 12 or erroneous in any particular direction? 13 A. They were consistently under-reporting the existence 14 of disease. 15 Q. Will you explain to us, please, what you mean by under 16 -reporting the existence of disease? 17 A. Well, simply that if disease is visible and evident on 18 an X-ray, it is the duty of the radiologist to say so. And 19 if the radiologist says he does not see it, and this occurs 20 in a regularly occurring pattern, then you would have to come 21 to the conclusion that that is not the best way of reporting 22 the X-rays. 23 Q. Did you find such pattern to be the case with Dr. Bristol? 24 A. Yes, sir. 25 Q. Did Dr. Bristol continue to interpret X-rays at the reques 26 of the industry during the years that you were the Director 27 of Saranac? 28 A. What he did privately, I don't know, sir. lie was a ZANO O NEUA REPORTING SERVICE 5 103 1 privately practicing doctor, so I don't know what he did pri 2 vately. I could only control what he did for the laboratory. 3 Q. And once you intervened in these reports, did Dr. Bristol 4 continue to send out written X-ray interpretations on stationery 5 or report forms of the laboratory? 6 A. No, the report's during that period were on stationery t 7 with my counter-signature. ' 3 . ' ` * i 8 Q. Going back to, staying in the period of '54 to '57, di$ 9 you have occasion during that time period to discuss with, 10 anyone from Johns-Manville the question of labeling any kind 11 of dust-producing substances or products with respect to 12 their potential health hazards? 13 A. Yes, sir. 14 Q. With whom did you discuss these questions? 15 A. I discussed it with Dr. Kenneth Smith in his capacity 16 as Corporate Medical Director, and with Mr. Hugh Jackson, 17 the Chief Industrial Hygienist of the Johns-Manville Corpora 18 tion. 19 Q. And what dust-producing substances did you discuss with 20 them? 21 A. The first discussion pertained to the labeling of the 22 product produced at Lompoc, California, and that was a sub 23 stance known as ceelite, C-E-E-L-I-T-E. 24 MR. LUNDQUIST: I'm going to object to the Lompoc 25 conversations as irrelevant to this case. 26 THE COURT: Do you wish to be heard? They appear 27 to be. I don't know. 28 MR. KAZAN: Yes. It is relevant by way of ZANOONELLX REPORTING SERVICE 104 1 foundation and comparison, your Honor. It's a foundational 2 question. Let me go on a little further, if I may, from another 3 direction. 4 THE COURT: All right. Fine. 5 MR. KAZAN: Q. All right. Did you discuss any 6 substances other than Ceelitq? ,, . ' * > * 7 A. Yes, sir. The Johns-Marjyille chrysqtile product, the 8 material produced in Canada. 9 Q. All right. And were these separate discussions where 10 you would discuss one product at one time and the other product 11 at another time? 12 A. No, they were comparisons. 13 Q. All right. Can you tell us in a general sense what rele 14 vance the comparison between the two substances would have? 15 A. They both could cause lung disease. If brought together 16 in the same lung, they could produce a far worse type of disease 17 a more difficult disease to diagnose and treat, and it there 18 fore -- and thirdly, the Ceelite 'was not clearly differentiated 19 in external appearance from asbestos. 20 And what I did with Dr. Smith and Mr. Jackson was 21 to place two jars of the material which we had sampled in 22 our museum alongside of one another and said, "now here are 23 two products that can equally cause disease in human beings. 24 Your company make them both. Why do you bother to put labels 25 on the Ceelite as their harmfulness and not on the chrysotile 26 and the asbestos which is used in a much more diversified 27 manner and less easily identified microscopically?" 28 Q. Now, you said that they were both capable of* ZANOONELLA DEPORTING SERVICE ------------------------- -----------------------UL5________ ________________ 1 producing disease. Based on what was known to you at that 2 time and to medical science in general, can you compare the 3 relative health hazards in the 1950's of Ceelite and asbestos? 4 A. They were separate types of effects. They were both 5 harmful. The purpose of comparing them is that Ceelite and 6 asbestos are often used together in certain industries. There 7 was also a question of contaminating the Ceelite by shipping 8 it in bags which had previously been used for shipping asbestos 9 so that when the Ceelite was delivered to a point of use, 10 it might be Ceelite plus asbestos, because some of the old 11 asbestos from the inside of the empty bag could be mixed with 12 it. 13 Those were the issues we discussed. Now, from 14 the point of view of their relative harmfulness, the Ceelite 15 could cause harm in the lungs in certain ways, and it had 16 a propensity for scarring, causing massive fibrosis in the 17 lungs which was different from the manner in which the asbestos 18 did its harm. Both did harm. Both were about equally harmful. 19 Q. All right. And what if anything was the resolution of 20 your discussions with Dr. Smith and Mr. Jackson with respect 21 . . \ P ' to the labeling of asbestos? 4 * 22 A. Well, just Simply that.we discussed the need for it. ' :; \ I ] \ l ' 23 They seemed to aijirefe;i/ith me that it was necessary, but of 24 course they were not doing the labeling and they weren't makinc 25 those decisions. Other people in the company would be making 26 those decisions. 27 They were only the technically qualified people 28 to make the recommendations. They said they would recommend ZANDQNEU A REPORTING SERVICE