Attorney Gary DiMuzio is of counsel in the asbestos department at Simmons Hanly Conroy. He joined the firm in 2019, bringing 25 years of experience in helping victims of mesothelioma and other environmental and workplace hazards. During his career, Gary has represented plaintiffs in cases involving mesothelioma, lung cancer, leukemia, liver cancer, silicosis, plant explosions and environmental contamination.
Fighting for Those Poisoned by Pollution
Gary entered law school with the goal of helping those poisoned by pollution, concentrating his studies on environmental and occupational contamination law. As a law student and legal intern for the Environmental Defense Fund, he drafted the fund’s first successful lawsuit in Texas.
“My early experience seeing law, science and policy interface created the impetus to understand sciences such as toxicology, epidemiology, biostatics, environmental studies, risk assessment, and exposure assessment in order to be the best advocate for my clients,” he said.
With this underlying objective, Gary undertook environmental public health studies at the University of Texas School of Public Health concurrently with his law degree. He also worked on environmental issues with the Harris County Attorney’s Office Environmental Division/Harris County Pollution Controls lawyers and experts, as well as researching how the courts judged causation science and toxic tort experts for the University of Houston Environmental Liability Law Program.
Broad Toxic Litigation Experience
Gary’s primary area of practice since 1998 has been litigating mesothelioma cases. He has represented individuals suffering from mesothelioma due to exposure from machinery, automobiles, insulators, sheetrock, refineries, industrial workplaces, and respirators. He has also handled cases involving secondary/household exposure. Gary has fought for the spouses and children of workers who were exposed to the deadly dust brought home by the workers and diagnosed decades later.
“Many mesothelioma victims have never filed a lawsuit and thought they would never do so,” he said. “In the process of dealing with a diagnosis of mesothelioma and its impact on every aspect of their lives, these men and women learn for the first time that, not only could their past work have been the source of asbestos exposure, the dangers of such exposure were widely known among experts and industry since at least 1930. But rather than risk profits, workers were put at risk.”
In addition to asbestos, Gary has experience litigating cases involving hydrofluoric acid, PAHs, crude oil wastes, TCE, vinyl chloride, styrene tars, creosote and silica.
A Proven History of Success
Before joining the firm, Gary served as of counsel at a Virginia firm while also managing his own Texas-based firm.
His standout results include:
- Prosecuting large environmental Superfund, chemical, and explosion cases, as well as silicosis, benzene, hard metal disease, and other toxic exposure injuries.
- Serving as first and second chair during trials that resulted in multi-million-dollar results.
- Drafting successful amicus briefs to various state supreme courts on causation methodology.
- Designing and coordinating the execution of a large environmental epidemiology study.
- Spearheading the statewide Utah MDL causation hearing, leading to a denial of the defendants’ motion to adopt the Borg-Warner v. Flores Texas decision requiring quantification of exposure.
- Successfully defending asbestos experts in the first State of Georgia Daubert challenge hearing.
Gary received a B.M. in Classical Guitar Performance from Texas A&M University in 1986. He received his J.D. from University of Houston Law Center in 1992.