Welding Fume MDL Judge Grants Plaintiff's Motion for Transfer of Venue

CLEVELAND - U.S. District Judge Kathleen M. O'Malley has granted a welding fume plaintiff's motion to remand his case from the Northern District of Ohio to Minnesota for retrial and has suggested to the Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation that such a transfer be made. Mann v. Lincoln Electric Co., No. 1:06-CV-17288 (N.D. Ohio).

Judge O'Malley rejected alternative options proposed by defendant Lincoln Electric in her July 28 order, saying that a waiver signed by the plaintiff to allow his first trial to take place in Ohio was no longer in effect, and that the MDL court had no authority …