In The News

The Tinney Law Firm Successfully Defends the West Virginia Supreme Court at the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals

8/18/2003

On August 18, 2003, the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit issued its opinion in the case of Norfolk Southern Railway Co, et al. v. Chief Justice Warren McGraw, et al. No. 02- 2032. (PDF Link) In a per curiam opinion, the appellate court affirmed United States District Judge John Copenhaver Jr.'s decision to abstain from asserting jurisdiction over the constitutional claims brought by the railroads against the West Virginia Supreme Court and the State Court judges presiding over their cases.

The railroads brought this §1983 action in federal district court claiming the mass litigation rules promulgated by the West Virginia Supreme Court and applied in thousands of asbestos-related personal injury cases pending in West Virginia state courts, violated the due process clause of the 14th Amendment. The rule, created to manage the "elephantine mass" of mass tort claims, created an atmosphere in which defendants were forced to settle cases regardless of their merit, the railroads alleged.

The West Virginia Supreme Court's attorneys, John Tinney, Jack Tinney, Kimberley Fields and Jim Tinney successfully argued that the district court should abstain from asserting its jurisdiction over the railroads' claims pursuant to the abstention doctrine set forth in Younger v. Harris and its progeny. Our lawyers successfully defended that decision when the railroads appealed to the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals.