Midlothian is an unincorporated community in Chesterfield County, Virginia, United States. Founded over 300 years ago as a coal mining village, it is now an outlying suburban community located well beyond the city limits in the Southside area of Richmond in the Richmond-Petersburg region. It was named for the early 18th century coal mining enterprises of the Wooldridge brothers who came from mining villages in East Lothian and West Lothian near Edinburgh, Scotland. In a compromise, the new venture was called Mid-Lothian. It produced the first commercially mined coal in the Virginia Colony and in what became the United States. By 1700, several mines were in development by French Huguenots and others. Shipment of coal began in the 1730s. Midlothian-area coal heated the U.S. White House for President Thomas Jefferson. Related transportation needs and innovations resulted in construction of an early toll road, the Manchester Turnpike in 1807 and the Chesterfield Railroad, the state's first in 1831, each to travel the 13 miles to the port of Manchester, just below the fall line of the James River. (Manchester, the original county seat of Chesterfield County, became an independent city and merged with Richmond in 1910). Near the mines, Coalfield Station was built in the early 1850s on the Richmond and Danville Railroad. The small village of shops, churches, and schools established nearby came to be called Midlothian. In the 1920s, Midlothian's commercial village area along the Old Buckingham Road was sited on the new east-west U.S. Route 60. A few decades later, communities grew up near Midlothian, including the large Salisbury community, named for the colonial-era home of Thomas Mann Randolph and later Virginia Governor Patrick Henry (1784-1786), and the massive Brandermill planned development sited on Swift Creek Reservoir. In the 21st century, widespread Midlothian extends many miles beyond the former village area.. It is located along the semi-circumferential limited access State Route 288 which links Interstate 64 with the State Route 76 toll road and Interstate 95 in the Richmond area's southwestern quadrant. Midlothian was ranked #37 in CNNMoney's list of "The Best Places to Live" in 2005 and #99 in 2008. Recognized by the U.S. Census Bureau as a census-designated place (CDP), the community had a total population of 35,427 as of the 2000 census. There are several wealthy individuals in Midlothian, so it is considered a hotbed by Virginia's investment firms. With the addition of the multi-million dollar Bon Secours Hospital, St. Francis, Midlothian now has a major hospital within five minutes of Midlothian's highest concentration of residents, the planned community of Brandermill.

What is toxic tort law?

Toxic Tort cases involve people who have been injured through exposure to dangerous pharmaceuticals or chemical substances in the environment, on the job, or in consumer products -- including carcinogenic agents, lead, benzene, silica, harmful solvents, hazardous waste, and pesticides to name a few.

Most toxic tort cases have arisen either from exposure to pharmaceutical drugs or occupational exposures. Most pharmaceutical toxic injury cases are mass tort cases, because drugs are consumed by thousands of people, many of whom become ill from a toxic drug. There have also been many occupational toxic tort cases, because industrial and other workers are often chronically exposed to toxic chemicals - more so than consumers and residents. Most of the law in this area arises from asbestos exposure, but thousands of toxic chemicals are used in industry and workers in these areas can experience a variety of toxic injuries. Unlike the general population, which is exposed to trace amounts of thousands of different chemicals in the environment, industrial workers are regularly exposed to much higher levels of chemicals and therefore have a greater risk of developing disease from particular chemical exposures than the general population. The home has recently become the subject of toxic tort litigation, mostly due to mold contamination, but also due to construction materials such as formaldehyde-treated wood and carpet. Toxic tort cases also arise when people are exposed to consumer products such as pesticides and suffer injury. Lastly, people can also be injured from environmental toxins in the air or in drinking water.

Answers to toxic tort law issues in Virginia

In certain kinds of cases, lawyers charge what is called a contingency fee. Instead of billing by the hour, the...

Because of the health problems caused by lead poisoning, the federal Residential Lead-Based Paint Hazard Reduction...

Property owners may be liable for tenant health problems caused by exposure to environmental hazards, such as...

In general, mass tort cases involve a large number of individual claimants with claims associated with a single...