Attorney Profile: Patrick J. Bartels

My name is Patrick Bartels, and I have been practicing law for almost 26 years. I was born in Glendale, West Virginia, and grew up in a small community outside of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania called Moon Township. Of course, growing up in the Pittsburgh area during the seventies, I became a huge Pittsburgh sports fan, especially of the Pirates and Steelers. I graduated from Moon Area High School in 1975, and attended the University of Dayton in Dayton, Ohio, completing my undergraduate degree in 1979. Prior to my senior year in college, I had never considered law as a profession, but a friend of mine persuaded me to take the law school admission exam. Surprisingly, I did better than I had expected. I applied to the University of Dayton School of Law and was accepted. My law career was about to begin.

After graduating from the University of Dayton School of Law in 1982, and passing the Pennsylvania Bar exam, I decided to begin my legal career by serving my country as a Judge Advocate in the U.S. Air Force. I served at McGuire Air Force Base in New Jersey as a Captain in the JAG department from December of 1982 through September of 1987. I was selected as an Area Defense Counsel in 1984, and served in that capacity until I received my Honorable Discharge in 1987. As an ADC, a position similar to a Public Defender, I represented military members facing both administrative and criminal charges. I participated in numerous Courts Martial, and represented military members at bases throughout the eastern United States, Lajes Field, Azores, Keflavik Naval Air Station, Iceland and Madrid, Spain. My time in the Air Force was exciting, and I am proud I was given the opportunity to serve my country. One of my many Air Force highlights was briefing and arguing an interlocutory appeal before the military's equivalent of the Supreme Court, the Court of Military Appeals.

After leaving the Air Force in 1987, I spent a brief period of time practicing plaintiffs' personal injury law in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania before taking a position as an assistant prosecutor with the Middlesex County Prosecutor's Office in New Brunswick, New Jersey. I tried numerous criminal trials during my three years as an assistant prosecutor, most before the Honorable George Nicola J.S.C. (Ret.). I credit Judge Nicola with providing me invaluable advice on how to try a case, advice I still follow to this day. In addition, I briefed and argued several interesting search and seizure issues before the New Jersey Appellate Division involving the legality of student searches by teachers, and searches by police officers in emergency situations. The Appellate Court opinions can be found at State v. Castro, 238 N.J.Super. 482 (App. Div. 1990) and State v. Moore, 254 N.J.Super. 295 (App. Div. 1992).

As all good things must come to an end, my time as an Assistant Prosecutor ended in 1992 and I left to take a position with the law firm Garruto Galex & Cantor in the firm's asbestos litigation department. Although I had, from time to time, read about "asbestos" I really had no knowledge about it until I began working for GG&C. What I learned shocked me.

I learned that asbestos is a mineral that is mined from ore deposits throughout the world. Countries such as the United States, Australia and South Africa at one time maintained large working asbestos mines. Canada is apparently the only country today that still actively mines asbestos. There are several different types of asbestos fiber including chrysotile, amosite, crocidilite and tremolite. All types of asbestos fiber are capable of causing damage to the lung, and can lead to asbestosis, lung cancer and a rare form of lung cancer called mesothelioma. For many years, asbestos was incorporated in many different kinds of products because of its heat-resistant properties. Raw asbestos was mined and milled into very small particles and shipped in burlap or paper bags to manufacturing facilities such as the Johns Manville plant in Manville, New Jersey. At these manufacturing plants, the asbestos particles, or fibers, were mixed into various recipes that were then made into products such as pipe insulation, insulating cement, gaskets, firewalls, electrical wire insulation, brake linings, brake clutches, aprons, ironing board covers, mailbags, heating elements in hair dryers, roofing shingles, siding, floor tiles, ceiling tiles, Christmas decorations such as artificial snow as well as many, many more every day products. For many years, these finished asbestos products were sold to the public without appropriate labels warning the ultimate consumer about the hazards of breathing in asbestos-containing dust. You see, the problem with asbestos fiber was, and is, if the product is used in such a way as to create dust, the asbestos fibers, millions of them, are released into the breathing zone of the worker where these fibers will remain for an extended period of time. Because the asbestos dust is virtually invisible, the worker is unaware that he is breathing into his lungs millions of asbestos fibers. Once the asbestos fibers get into the lung, the body begins to attack the asbestos fibers causing scar tissue to develop in and around the areas where the asbestos fibers have been deposited. Over time, diseases such as asbestosis, lung cancer and mesothelioma may develop.

For decades, the Asbestos industry was aware that breathing in asbestos-containing dust was harmful to the well-being of the workers. In England, government officials recognized the potential problem related to the inhalation of asbestos dust as early as the late 1800's. By the 1930's, it was well recognized that breathing in asbestos dust caused asbestosis. Several states, including New Jersey, listed asbestosis as a compensable injury as early as the mid-1930's. By the late 1930's, the link between asbestos exposure and lung cancer was recognized. However, most amazing was the successful efforts of the asbestos industry to suppress the then developing medical evidence establishing the harmful nature of asbestos dust. It is clear that had industry acted responsibly, hundreds of thousands of working men and their families would have been spared the horrors of asbestos disease. Anyone interested in learning more about the history of asbestos should read Castleman, Barry. Asbestos: Medical and Legal Aspects. 5^th Ed. New York: Aspen Publishers, Inc. 2005.

It is because of the Asbestos Industry's attempt to suppress this information that I have devoted a large part of my legal career to representing victims of asbestos disease. Since 1992 I have represented hundreds of individuals, from boilermakers to brake mechanics, from wives who were exposed to asbestos dust on their husband's clothing, to most tragically, children whose fathers unknowingly exposed them to asbestos dust. My clients worked at numerous sites throughout New Jersey, New York and Pennsylvania, including the Johns Manville Plant in Manville, New Jersey; American Cyanamid in Bound Brook, New Jersey; National Lead in Sayreville, New Jersey; the PSE&G sites, refineries such as Hess, Exxon and Chevron, GAF, Penske in Linden, New Jersey, the World Trade Center, the Prudential Building, JFK Airport, LaGuardia Airport, Bristol Myers Squibb in New Brunswick, New Jersey; Ciba Geigy in Toms River, New Jersey, J.T. Baker in Phillipsburgh, New Jersey and countless more sites. My clients suffered from asbestosis, lung cancer and mesothelioma. Although my staff is not as large as some of the bigger, out-of-state firms that pursue asbestos cases in New Jersey, what we lack in numbers we make up for in quality and tenacity.

It is projected that the incidence of mesothelioma will continue to rise over the next twenty years. I have and will continue to help victims of asbestos disease in any way I can. I am happy to speak to anyone who has a question about this topic. Please don't hesitate to contact me. And if you are in the unfortunate position of needing a lawyer to represent you, it would be my privilege to do whatever can be done on your behalf.