Toxic Torts

• LuLu served as lead trial counsel for a major company in toxic tort litigation pending in federal court in the Northern District of Mississippi arising out of a former hubcap manufacturing facility that was designated as a Superfund site. Neighboring property owners filed numerous property damage, personal injury, and wrongful death claims relating to what their experts claimed was a “cancer cluster” resulting from exposure to trichloroethylene (TCE) in the air and groundwater. LuLu convinced the trial court to enter a Lone Pine order to phase discovery so that the plaintiffs’ experts were required to establish general causation prior to conducting any factual or expert discovery related to specific causation. She later served as one of two lead counsel for the defendants during a “Science Day” at which numerous experts from throughout the country made presentations to the federal court judge and magistrate judge relative to air modeling, epidemiology, oncology, and toxicology. Shortly thereafter, LuLu secured a favorable settlement for her client following a multi-day settlement conference.
• LuLu represented a Louisiana chemical plant operator facing serious personal injury claims involving brain damage due to alleged toxic encephalopathy resulting from exposure to organic tin compounds. Not only were compensatory damages at issue, but LuLu’s client faced liability for exemplary damages. “We decided to try one of these cases in front of a jury,” LuLu explained, “which resulted in the longest civil jury trial in the history of the parish.” LuLu obtained a zero verdict for her client.
• LuLu represented an oil and gas company following the deaths of two workers overcome by hydrogen sulfide while capping and abandoning old oil wells. LuLu was one of the first on the scene along with her client representative during the Coast Guard investigation of the matter and subsequently handled the litigation in the Eastern District of Louisiana.
• Following a fire and explosion at a chemical manufacturing site located across the Mississippi River from downtown New Orleans, LuLu represented the chemical company at a three-day class action certification hearing.
• LuLu represented former executives of a company that provided cleaning services to ships in the port of New Orleans who were sued when a longshoreman died of mesothelioma and his heirs claimed long-term occupational exposure to benzene. In their defense, LuLu argued the plaintiff did not have the legal right to sue the executives, because the Longshore and Harbor Workers’ Compensation Act preempts Louisiana law. The claim was favorably settled.
• LuLu handled a case involving alleged exposure to toxic mold in a home arising from an impropertly installed HVAC system. Following extensive depositions of numerous experts, the matter was favorably settled.

Intellectual Property

• LuLu served as lead trial counsel for a major baby products manufacturer in a matter in federal court in the Western District of Louisiana. LuLu’s client was accused of breaching a competitor’s design and utility patents. LuLu’s team secured a summary judgment declaring the utility patent invalid due to obviousness.
• Following an eight day trial, LuLu and her team established by clear and convincing evidence that a patentee and her patent agent were grossly negligent during their prosecution of the patent and that the opposing party had engaged in deceit and “reprehensible” conduct during the litigation, resulting in the dismissal of all claims against her clients based on unclean hands.
• LuLu served as lead counsel at an evidentiary bench hearing in the Western District of Louisiana at which she secured a key victory for her client in litigation involving soft silicone spout and straw sippy cups used by young children.
• LuLu served as appellate counsel before the Fifth Circuit and secured a key reversal for her client relating to its ability to obtain patent-like protection through an exclusive distributorship contract that obligated the former distributor to pay royalties for copying or colorably imitating the designs of LuLu’s client.
• LuLu is a member of the Federal Circuit and argued an appeal involving issues of inequitable conduct and entitlement to attorneys’ fees based on the exceptional case standard.

Products Liability and Breach of Warranty

• In a case giving rise to litigation in both the Eastern District of Louisiana and the Southern District of Texas, LuLu represented a major oil and gas company after a drilling rig slid off her client’s offshore platform during hurricane conditions following the failure of parking brakes provided by a Norwegian manufacturer. “The products liability and breach of contract case,” according to LuLu, “involved complex engineering, oceanography and meteorology with damages sought from both the drilling contractor and the manufacturer of the brake.” After written discovery and extensive motion practice to overcome the defendant’s Act of God defense, the matter was mediated successfully.
• LuLu has represented the manufacturer of aerial manlifts in numerous personal injury matters. In one in the Southern District of Texas involving significant injuries, LuLu arranged and conducted a mock trial before several mock juries in Houston, Texas following which she secured a favorable settlement for her client.
• LuLu was involved in a serious personal injury matter arising from an allegedly defective rotary drilling tool. Following a week of intensive depositions of engineers in Oslo, Norway, the matter was ultimately settled.
• LuLu represents a chemical manufacturer in a products liability and breach of warranty matter involving an allegedly defective heater that exploded causing a fire in one of the chemical processing units.
• LuLu represented a major offshore construction company in a lawsuit involving a defectively installed marine crane on a work barge.
• LuLu helped secure a favorable defense verdict for her client following a two-week jury trial in the Eastern District of Louisiana involving a vacuum truck that exploded at an industrial facility.

Maritime

• LuLu was a member of the team that handled litigation arising from the largest peacetime maritime disaster in history involving the collision between an oil tanker and a passenger ferry in the Philippines.
• In one of the first cases to address OPA 90 claims, LuLu was a member of the trial team that obtained a factual finding of no liability for their client following a bench trial in federal court in the Eastern District of Louisiana.
• LuLu and others at the firm handled a matter involving a semi-submersible drilling rig that broke lose during a hurricane causing extensive damage to a pipeline owned and operated by LuLu’s clients. After extensive pre-trial work up of the matter, it was successfully settled.
• LuLu has handled numerous Jones Act wrongful death and personal injury trials in the Eastern District of Louisiana and the Southern District of Alabama.
• LuLu has handled numerous cargo disputes and barge breakaways for various clients.

Construction

• LuLu represented a sugar company following the collapse of its storage warehouse near Baton Rouge. LuLu sued the manufacturer of the building materials, the contractor who built the warehouse and their insurers through the Louisiana direct action procedure. After LuLu defeated several motions to dismiss regarding insurance and warranty/contract issues, the matter was mediated, and the parties reached a unique two phased Gasquet settlement in which LuLu’s client first settled with the primary insurer reserving its rights against the excess insurer. Settlement was subsequently entered with the excess insurer as well.
• LuLu represented numerous homeowners in suits against an elevation contractor, the company that issued the surety bond, and its insurers for fraudulent conduct and faulty workmanship. After many years of extensive motion practice in Civil District Court in New Orleans involving various insurance coverage issues relating to when the damages manifested and claims by the insurers that the “work product” exclusion applied to bar coverage, the matters were ultimately settled.
• LuLu represented a spray foam installation contractor in a defective construction suit brought by the homeowner against the general contractor and numerous subcontractors. After obtaining an expert witness and inspecting the home, LuLu’s team obtained a favorable settlement for her client.

Commercial Litigation

• LuLu served as lead trial counsel for a mass tort administration company based in California in a contractual dispute with a local law firm relating to services rendered and fees due under the commercial contract negotiated by the parties.
• LuLu served as lead trial counsel in an unfair trade practices and anti-trust lawsuit filed by a local distributor against LuLu’s client and a major retailer. LuLu and her team obtained an early dismissal of the matter, which was pending in the Eastern District of Louisiana.
• LuLu represented a landlord in a lease dispute filed by the tenant involving complex contractual and insurance issues.
• LuLu asserted bad faith claims against a property insurer who denied coverage and wrongfully invoked a mold exclusion. Following a week-long jury trial, a verdict was entered against the insurer for property damages, mental anguish damages, and penalties based on bad faith denial of insurance coverage.