Michael H. Wetmore

Mike has decades of experience across multiple areas of the law. He has led teams of attorneys handling major litigation in federal and state courts throughout the United States.

In the environmental and insurance recovery field, Mike co-chaired multiple jury trials in federal court in New York City, securing verdicts exceeding $200 million for a Fortune 500 chemical manufacturer against numerous insurance companies. Mike also regularly handles Superfund environmental litigation for chemical manufacturers, including leading trial teams in two multi-month CERCLA allocation cases in California and New York.

Mike has defended manufacturers in state and federal courts in multi-plaintiff personal injury cases involving claims of injuries from exposure to hazardous substances, including mercury and volatile organics.

Mike’s approach to litigation is straightforward: get to know the company’s business, understand its manufacturing processes and the people behind them, explore and question every allegation, and—when representing a defendant—thoroughly probe every claim of breach of duty and injury. His formula for litigation demands in-depth analysis and commitment, and it has proven to be a formula for success.

Experience

• Represented a Fortune 500 manufacturer as a plaintiff in multiple jury trials in the federal court in the Southern District of New York, obtaining jury verdicts against multiple insurance companies in excess of $200 Million for reimbursement of costs incurred in remediating environmental contaminants
• Successfully obtained dismissal of all of plaintiffs’ experts in a 200+ plaintiffs case that alleged property damage from exposure to chemicals from a manufacturing plant.  After the court struck the plaintiffs’ experts, a very favorable settlement was reached at a small fraction of the plaintiffs’ demand
• Defeated class certification in a multi-plaintiff environmental property damage case in federal court in Alabama, which led to a favorable settlement for the client
• Obtained a defendant’s verdict after only 45 minutes of jury deliberation in a case in state court in the south that alleged damage to 13 plaintiffs’ properties from odors from a manufacturing plant
• Represented a Fortune 500 defendant in two separate multi-month CERCLA (Superfund) cases – one in New York and one in California – where the plaintiff chemical manufacturers were seeking substantial recoveries from the client for costs the plaintiff had incurred in remediating environmental contaminants.  Both cases were decided favorably by the trial judge for a small fraction of the costs the plaintiff was seeking
• Currently representing a Fortune 500 chemical manufacturer in a Superfund cost allocation matter at a complex site in the Midwest that has been operated by multiple entities since the 1940s.  Potential investigative and remediation costs are in the hundreds of millions of dollars
• Represented a Fortune 200 company in a multi-plaintiff personal injury case in state court in the south where the damages centered on alleged injuries from exposure to mercury vapors.  The case was settled on the eve of trial for less than 10% of the plaintiffs’ demands