Contaminants & Toxic Materials

Amundsen Davis offers experienced counsel to defend a wide array of claims involving toxic substances.   

Toxic Tort  

We are a proven leader in toxic tort litigation.  From the landmark case of McClure v. Owens Corning Fiberglas Corporation in the 1990s and continuing through the present, we have worked with clients to manage thousands of toxic tort claims, innovate solutions, and take cases to trial.  

We start by listening to and partnering with our clients.  Out of this collaborative process, we design strategies and processes to manage data, control cost, and provide stability.  Our clients regularly call upon us to coordinate and direct the many facets of ongoing asbestos litigation.  We serve as liaison to our clients’ corporate counsel and manage myriad relationships—experts, client witnesses, courts, opposing counsel, e-discovery vendors, discovery and trial teams—that are critical parts of modern toxic torts.  

We defend every type of toxic tort, including claims for exposure to asbestos, benzene, lead, carbon monoxide, mold, silica, coal, vinyl chloride, diacytl, and welding fumes. We have also represented every type of defendant:  manufacturers, suppliers, contractors, employers, and premises defendants. Our clients include national and international corporations facing hundreds of simultaneous lawsuits, as well as small to mid-size businesses facing isolated claims. Our firm is centered within three of the nation’s busiest and most dangerous venues: Cook County and Madison County, Illinois; and the City of St. Louis.  

Finally, our clients benefit from our well-earned reputation as seasoned trial attorneys. Members of our group have tried over 100 jury trials to verdict and taken many more to the eve of trial before reaching settlement terms favorable to our clients.  

Environmental Law  

We have a robust environmental law group representing owners, operators, generators, manufacturers, farmers, building developers, oil and gas companies and transporters of hazardous materials. We have worked with clients, large and small, to defend and advise them on allocation of costs associated with remediation of properties and matters brought pursuant to CERCLA (Superfund), the Resource Conversation Recovery Act (RCRA), the Clean Water Act, the Oil Pollution Prevention Act, the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA), the Consumer Product Safety Commission’s labeling requirements for certain products, and with the state agencies enforcing those federal requirements.  

Our attorneys have experience defending environmental claims arising from chlorinated solvents, PCBs, diesel gasoline, MTBE, volatile organic compounds, and hazardous materials. We have regularly represented clients in regulatory enforcement actions brought by the United States Environmental Protection Agency and state environmental agencies and have defended clients, including a building developer, oil and gas company, and large-scale agricultural operation, in regulatory enforcement actions asserting violations of various provisions of the Clean Water Act. We have experience in defending lawsuits, administrative claims, and notices alleging contaminated soil/groundwater, a need for medical monitoring, vapor intrusion and natural resource damages.