Doctor's Family Awarded $20 Million Over Fatal Talc-Linked Mesothelioma
After trial: Johnson & Johnson announced immediately after the verdict that it would appeal, arguing the result rests on what it calls junk science and that its talc does not contain asbestos and does not cause cancer. As of this research (September 2026) we could not confirm from public records whether a notice of appeal has been filed, no appellate court has ruled, and there is no public record of the verdict being paid or reduced, so the result is treated as not yet final. The reporting also conflicts on the length of the trial (six to nearly seven weeks) and on the year of Dr. Casaretto's death, where two sources say 2022 and one says 2019; this file follows the majority on the death year and states the trial dates rather than a duration.
Won by Kelley | Uustal Trial Attorneys.
Dr. Alberto A. Casaretto, Sr., a Fort Lauderdale nephrologist, used Johnson & Johnson's Baby Powder daily for close to five decades and was diagnosed with malignant pleural mesothelioma in October 2017. He and his wife sued Johnson & Johnson in Broward County Circuit Court in 2018, alleging the company's talc was contaminated with asbestos; he died of the disease in 2022 at 79, and his son continued the case as a wrongful death claim. After a trial that opened in late September 2025, a Broward County jury found Johnson & Johnson liable on design defect and manufacturing defect claims and awarded the family $20,000,000 in compensatory damages on October 28, 2025. Johnson & Johnson has said it will appeal, arguing its talc does not contain asbestos or cause cancer; no appellate ruling has been reported.
What happened
Dr. Alberto A. Casaretto, Sr. immigrated from Argentina in 1969 and practiced medicine as a nephrologist in the Fort Lauderdale area for decades and led Florida's first kidney transplant team. Evidence at trial showed he applied Johnson & Johnson's Baby Powder liberally after showering, every day, for 49 years, from 1969 until 2018. On October 30, 2017, he was diagnosed with malignant pleural mesothelioma, a cancer of the lining of the lungs caused by asbestos exposure. He had never worked as a mechanic, cut floor tile or repaired brakes, and no other source of asbestos contact was documented. When his lawyers had one of his bottles of Baby Powder tested, it came back positive for asbestos.
Casaretto and his wife, Irene, sued Johnson & Johnson in the Seventeenth Judicial Circuit Court in Broward County in December 2018, alleging the company's talc was contaminated with asbestos and that the contamination caused his cancer. He died of the disease in 2022 at the age of 79. His son, Alberto Casaretto Jr., took the case forward on behalf of the family as a wrongful death claim.
The case was tried in Fort Lauderdale before Broward Circuit Judge Martin J. Bidwill, opening on September 24, 2025 and running until the jury returned its verdict on October 28. John Uustal of Kelley | Uustal and Christopher Tisi of Levin Papantonio represented the family. They argued Johnson & Johnson had known for decades that its talc could carry asbestos, used testing methods unlikely to detect it, and never switched to cornstarch as a safer and readily available substitute. 'There is no known safe level of asbestos,' Uustal told the jury. 'It's an easy conclusion that, if there's no known safe level, you have to use the most sensitive test.' The jury also heard that in 2019 the FDA tested two bottles of Johnson's Baby Powder and detected asbestos in one of them.
Scott Richman of Nelson Mullins, for Johnson & Johnson, argued the company's talc never contained asbestos. 'When you look at the body of the evidence, when you look at all the testing, when you look at all the science, it makes very clear that the products do not contain asbestos,' he told the jury.
On October 28, 2025, the jury found Johnson & Johnson liable on design defect and manufacturing defect claims for Casaretto's fatal mesothelioma and returned a verdict of $20,000,000 in compensatory damages.
Johnson & Johnson said it would appeal. 'This decision is predicated on junk science that is refuted by decades of studies that demonstrate Johnson's Baby Powder is safe, does not contain asbestos and does not cause cancer,' the company said in a statement. As of this writing, no appellate ruling has been reported, and there is no public record of the verdict being paid, reduced or reversed.
Sources
This account is drawn from contemporaneous public reporting and the court record.
- 1.Daily Business Review (Law.com), staffed article by Lisa Willis, 10/28/2025: independently reports the $20 million Broward County jury award, names John Uustal of Kelley | Uustal as co-counsel for the plaintiff and Chris Tisi of Levin Papantonio as lead counsel, identifies Judge Martin J. Bidwill, and sources the wrongful death posture, Casaretto's death in 2022 at age 79, his career as a Fort Lauderdale nephrologist, the 49 years of daily Baby Powder use beginning in 1969, and the 2019 FDA bottle testing
- 2.Courtroom View Network, staffed trial coverage, 10/2025: independently reports the $20 million verdict, the design defect and manufacturing defect findings, names John Uustal of Kelley | Uustal and Christopher Tisi of Levin Papantonio for the plaintiff and Scott Richman of Nelson Mullins for Johnson & Johnson, and quotes both sides' closing arguments and J&J's statement that it will appeal
- 3.Courtroom View Network proceedings record: sources the trial dates, September 24, 2025 through October 28, 2025
- 4.ExLitem verdict database entry: sources the December 2018 filing date naming Dr. Casaretto and his wife Irene as original plaintiffs, the October 30, 2017 mesothelioma diagnosis date, the son Alberto Casaretto Jr. continuing the case after his father's 2022 death, the exposure period from the late 1960s to 2018, that the $20 million was compensatory, and the docket attorney lists for both sides
- 5.MesoWatch, 1/2026: corroborates the $20 million verdict, the October 28, 2025 date, the Seventeenth Judicial Circuit venue and case number CACE18028502, and the roughly 50 years of daily product use
- 6.Kelley | Uustal Trial Attorneys (firm)
More proven verdicts from Kelley | Uustal Trial Attorneys
All Kelley | Uustal Trial Attorneys proven verdicts →A Broward County jury awarded Robert and Connie McGee and their daughter $60 million in 1998 after the fuel tank of the station wagon they were riding in was punctured and exploded in a low speed collision, killing the couple's 13 year old son and severely burning the three of them. General Motors defended the tank as safe. The jury found the automaker liable for the burns caused by the fire and declined to award punitive damages. A trial court setoff briefly cut the family's recovery to about $33 million for the fault the jury assigned to the driver whose trailer broke loose, but Florida's Fourth District Court of Appeal vacated that reduction, holding that comparative fault does not reduce damages for the enhanced injuries caused by a defective fuel tank, and the full verdict was entered by amended final judgment in 2003. A second appeal, decided in 2004, confirmed that interest runs from the May 18, 1998 verdict date.
Marc Laspes, a 26-year-old Navy veteran, was driving near Sheridan Street and North 35th Avenue in Broward County on August 2, 2017 when his vehicle collided with a car driven by Talena Castillo. He woke in a hospital bed three days later unable to feel his legs, paralyzed from the chest down by a burst fracture in one of his vertebrae. He sued Castillo for negligence in Broward County Circuit Court, case CACE-17-017741, and on July 13, 2021 the jury returned a verdict of $35 million. No appeal, remittitur or reduction of the verdict has surfaced in Florida's appellate record or in later coverage of the case.
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