This introductory article is the first installment in our Complex Mass Tort Settlements Series on best practices for settlement administration.

Defining Complex Mass Tort Settlements

Complex settlement programs typically include personal injury (bodily injury or mental injury), property damage, business interruption, and/or toxic tort claims. The scope of these programs is further complicated by claim-related factors including: wide variability in individual awards, long latency periods between exposure and manifestation of injury, and the need to preserve funds for future claimants. These characteristics require sophisticated governance, monitoring, and controls well beyond routine claims administration.

Notable examples include the Dalkon Sheild Claimants Trust (medical device), various asbestos personal injury settlement trusts, the Settlement Facility-Dow Corning Trust (breast implants), the Flint Water Crisis Settlement (water contamination), the BP Deepwater Horizon Settlement (oil spill), and the 9/11 Victims Compensation Funds. Each illustrates the operational, financial, and ethical complexity inherent in administering complex programs at scale over long periods.

Foundational Principles of Early Mass Tort Settlements

Early mass tort settlements established important administrative goals that continue to shape best practices. Courts emphasized equitable treatment of claimants, procedural transparency, judicial oversight, and flexibility to address heterogeneous injuries and eligibility profiles. These principles are reflected in the Manual for Complex Litigation, ^[1] which underscores the importance of court-supervised claims processes, neutral administrators, and clearly articulated distribution criteria to safeguard claimant rights and public confidence.

The Agent Orange Settlement Fund ^[2] is frequently cited as a formative example. Faced with an unprecedented claimant population and limited proof of claim, the court-approved distribution plan balanced administrative efficiency with equity by prioritizing those most severely harmed and by employing robust assistance programs. This approach showed that fairness and settlement goals must take priority over operational efficiency.

Modern Mass Tort Litigation

Mass tort litigation has evolved significantly since the asbestos and medical device cases of the 1970s and 1980s. Today’s mass torts involve far greater claim volumes, and cases are developed quicker and at lower cost, largely due to AI‑enabled tools. Claims now span nearly every industry, extending well beyond traditional product liability industries and with increased scope and complexity. In turn, this makes accurate adjudication more challenging for settlement programs.

Settlement administration has likewise been transformed by technology. Automated claims processing, digital submission, and algorithmic scoring have improved speed and scalability, but they have also introduced new risks, including system errors, model bias, data integrity concerns, and diminished human oversight at critical decision points.

At the same time, financial and reputational stakes have risen. Settlement programs face heightened scrutiny from courts, regulators, the media, and claimants themselves. Any perception of unfairness, mismanagement, or abuse can undermine the credibility of the entire process.

Together, these trends have intensified pressure on fiduciaries and third‑party administrators to operate faster and at lower cost. That pressure, combined with the diminishing availability of professionals with early mass tort experience, has led to departures from core principles.

Core Principles From the Center for Claims Resolution

The Center for Claims Resolution (CCR) was formed on October 6, 1988, to manage and resolve asbestos‑related personal injury claims asserted against its member companies. At the time, asbestos litigation had reached unprecedented scale, threatening to overwhelm the judicial system and imposing significant uncertainty on defendants, insurers, and claimants alike. The CCR was created as a centralized, cooperative solution designed to bring order, consistency, and efficiency to the resolution of these claims.

The primary purpose of the CCR was to process, evaluate, and pay very high volumes of asbestos‑related claims in a fair, timely, and cost‑effective manner. To achieve this, the CCR developed structured procedures, standardized evaluation criteria, and disciplined governance practices intended to balance both efficiency with equity, and speed with accuracy. While the tools and scale of mass tort administration have evolved, the foundational principles underlying the CCR’s model remain relevant benchmarks for sound settlement administration. These core principles ^[3] are detailed by the CCR president and chief executive officer, Lawrence Fitzpatrick:

1. Early resolution of meritorious claims 
2. Resistance and, if necessary, litigation of nonmeritorious claims 
3. Establishment and maintenance of credibility with the judiciary, claimants, members of the plaintiffs' bar, and the public
4. Development of appropriate short-term and long-term strategic plans to fulfill the mission of the CCR while maintaining the flexibility to respond to changing circumstances
5. Reduction of allocated legal expenses through internalization of functions currently performed by outside counsel, while maintaining quality representation
6. Reduction of unallocated operating expenses through increased efficiency and productivity within the CCR
7. Attraction, development, and retention of high-quality professional and support staff

In establishing its operations, the CCR set goals and objectives that remain highly instructive today. These core principles provide a durable framework for evaluating modern complex settlement funds, particularly in an era of increased claim volume, automation, and heightened scrutiny. 

Importantly, the CCR’s approach recognized that large‑scale settlement programs must function not merely as administrative mechanisms, but as quasi‑fiduciary systems whose legitimacy depends on trust, consistency, and adherence to clearly articulated principles. These principles form a practical and time‑tested framework against which modern settlement programs can and should be measured.

Conclusion

The goals and objectives established in the earliest complex mass tort settlements remain central to the design of effective and efficient settlement administration programs today. In recent years, however, emerging practices have at times departed from these foundational principles, underscoring the need to revisit and reaffirm them. Concurrently, mass litigation has expanded dramatically in both scale and complexity. Fiduciaries and third-party administrators now face intense pressure to process claims more quickly and at lower cost, often through the adoption of AI-enabled automation. As pressure to automate grows, the foundational principles developed in early programs continue to offer critical guidance and should be revisited to ensure the equitable and efficient distribution of settlement funds.