Opinion
2014-11-6
Richard ROST & Joyce Rost, Respondent v. FORD MOTOR COMPANY, Petitioner.
Petition for Allowance of Appeal from the Order of the Superior Court, No. 309 EAL 2014.
Prior report: Pa.Super., 104 A.3d 51, 2014 WL 4929073.
ORDER
PER CURIAM.
AND NOW, this 6th day of November, 2014, the Petition for Allowance of Appeal is GRANTED, LIMITED TO the issues set forth below. Allocatur is DENIED as to all remaining issues. The issues, as stated by Petitioner, are:
(1) Whether—contrary to Howard, Betz, and Gregg—a plaintiff in an asbestos action may satisfy the burden of establishing substantial-factor causation by an expert's “cumulative-exposure” theory that the expert concedes is simply an “any-exposure” theory by a different name[?]
(2) Whether the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas' mandatory practice of consolidating unrelated asbestos cases—even where the defendants suffer severe prejudice as a result—is consistent with the Pennsylvania Rules of Civil Procedure and Due Process; whether consolidation in this case was proper; and whether the Superior Court has the authority to review a trial court's case-consolidation decisions in asbestos cases[?]