Through its representation of a wide array of constituencies in recent mass tort and business tort-driven bankruptcies and class action litigation raising similar issues, Kramer Levin Naftalis & Frankel LLP has become expert at navigating these particularly complex and challenging types of chapter 11 cases.  Whether representing debtors in possession, acquirors, bank lenders, bondholders, shareholders or tort claimants, Kramer Levin is adept at identifying issues and implementing negotiation and litigation strategies to reach practical solutions.  The firm’s efforts — drawing on the expertise of Creditors’ Rights, Litigation, Corporate and other department attorneys — have enabled its clients to acquire businesses free and clear of successor liability issues, maximize value by selling business lines free from the taint of mass tort liabilities, coordinate the resolution of mass tort claims through plans of reorganization and realize substantial recoveries on tort claims for present and future injuries. Among other notable cases:

• Dow Corning — After extensive litigation, including a contested plan process in which we blocked Dow Corning’s plan of reorganization at the disclosure statement stage, we achieved a $3.17 billion settlement that paid above-market awards to breast implant and other tort plaintiffs. This case implicated virtually every issue presented in modern mass tort bankruptcy practice, from jurisdictional questions involving transfer of claims and abstention to estimation, valuation and scientific evidence disputes to battles over withdrawal of the reference, the disclosure and plan processes, and even the appropriate composition of creditors’ committees.
• Owens Corning — We have played a central role in the asbestos-driven bankruptcy of Owens Corning, representing Credit Suisse First Boston, as Agent for a group of 47 bank lenders with guarantee claims of more than $1.6 billion against several Owens Corning subsidiaries with no asbestos liability. The firm helped defeat efforts by asbestos claimants and other creditors of the parent company to set aside those guarantees through substantive consolidation, and opposed efforts to achieve the same result through fraudulent conveyance claims. Kramer Levin also has been involved on behalf of the Owens Corning bank group in active litigation over tort claims estimation, exclusivity, constructive trust and appointment of a trustee.
• W.R. Grace — We are working with the company to fairly value the present and future asbestos claims against W.R. Grace.
• Twinlab — The firm represented the purchaser of substantially all the assets of Twinlab as a going concern free and clear of actions for alleged injuries arising out of Ephedra use.
• Elite Model Management — In the bankruptcy of Elite Model Management, we represent a debtor besieged with class action litigation arising out of alleged anti-competitive behavior. We developed a plan that resolves class action litigation and claims pending simultaneously in the federal court, state court and bankruptcy court.
• SGL Carbon Corporation — We represented the official creditors’ committee, obtaining dismissal on bad-faith grounds of a bankruptcy commenced in response to civil antitrust actions arising out of a worldwide conspiracy to fix prices.
• Kramer Levin represented the principal group of plaintiffs objecting to the MDL class action settlement in the Diet Drug (“Fen-Phen”) litigation, leading to dramatically enhanced settlements for opt-out plaintiffs, and has represented other groups of opt-out plaintiffs in connection with select issues in federal court in the on-going related litigation.
• Kramer Levin worked with lawyers for injured plaintiffs to restructure an enhanced settlement of claims arising out of hip implant products manufactured by Sulzer Medica.