News In Brief

The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey has reached a settlement with lawyers for plaintiffs who allege they were injured or suffered illness in the response and cleanup of the 9/11 terror attacks. Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein yesterday signed an order giving preliminary approval to the $47.5 million settlement, which is separate and apart from the $712.5 million settlement reached earlier this year between plaintiffs, New York City and some of the contractors who were insured through the World Trade Center Captive Insurance Co. The Port Authority and a host of other contractors who remain in talks with the plaintiffs were not insured through Captive.

Yesterday’s settlement, filed by plaintiff’s liaison counsel Paul J. Napoli of Worby Groner Edelman & Napoli Bern and Port Authority lawyer Paul A. Scrudato of Schiff Hardin, must be approved by the Port Authority’s board of commissioners. Like the larger settlement, it calls for plaintiffs to be grouped into four tiers by the type and severity of their injuries. The agreement is another step forward in the effort to settle claims by some 10,000 plaintiffs. Those same plaintiffs have until Nov. 8 to opt into the $712.5 million settlement. – Mark Hamblett

Judge Dismisses Class Action Against Countrywide