§ 90.055.Motion to Stay

The defendant's mechanism for enforcing the trust claim obligation, and it requires real work of the movant.

A defendant may move for a stay by the later of: the 60th day before trial; the 15th day after the defendant first obtains asbestos- or silica-exposure information that could support an additional trust claim; or a date set by court order.

The second trigger is the useful one. Exposure information often surfaces late — in a deposition, in employment records, in another claimant's discovery — and the deadline runs from when the defendant obtains it rather than from the calendar.

Subsection (b) sets what the motion must contain, and it is not a bare assertion.

A list of trusts not disclosed by the claimant against which the defendant in good faith believes the claimant may make a successful trust claim, and information supporting that additional claim, including information that may be used to meet the trust's claim requirements.

The defendant must effectively assemble the claimant's trust claim for them. Naming a trust is not enough; the motion must supply information capable of satisfying that trust's criteria.

That requirement keeps the provision from becoming a routine delay tactic. A defendant that has identified an unpursued exposure can show it; one that is guessing cannot.

The claimant then has fourteen days to respond, and the stay section governs whether it is granted.