The Big Three Removals - New Twist on an Old Lemon? by Al Brayton and Lloyd 'Butch' LeRoy

icOendicn Nov. 20, 2001, General Motors Corporation, Ford Motor Company, and DaimlerChrysler Corporation began a joint effort to draw asbestos third-party litigation from state trial courts all over the country into the Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware. On that date, the Big Three automakers started removing from state court to the local federal district courts, thousands of individual third party cases. The alleged basis for the removal action was the automakers' position that the cases were 'related to' the bankruptcy of Federal-Mogul Corporation, a theory which arguably gave jurisdiction to the federal courts.

photo-3The automakers premise their …