Lawyer Profile

Phyllis M. Potterfield

Bowles Rice McDavid Graff & Love LLP

Website for Phyllis M. Potterfield

600 Quarrier Street
Charleston, WV 25301
Phone: 304-347-1100
Firm Website: http://www.bowlesrice.com

Listed in Best Lawyers since 1995.

Attorney Bio
Practices extensively in chemical, asbestos and other toxic tort litigation and related workers’ compensation claims. Has developed substantial medical knowledge in occupational diseases and in the selection and preparation of expert medical, industrial hygiene and toxicological witnesses. Regularly represents chemical and other manufacturing companies in premise, products and employer liability claims.  

Past chair of the Workers’ Compensation Committee of the West Virginia State Bar Association.  Helped draft the 2003 Business Coalition Workers’ Compensation reform legislation.  Assists with organizing and presenting at seminars on workers’ compensation law and related issues.  Currently a member of both the Defense Trial Counsel of West Virginia and DRI, the Voice of the Defense Bar.

Community activities include Rotary, West Virginia Special Olympics and Clumber Spaniel Club of America.  Past President and Director of the Association for Retarded Citizens in Kanawha-Putnam Counties, Inc. (now the ARC of Three Rivers, Inc.). 

Phi Beta Kappa undergraduate from Newcomb College of Tulane University. Served on the Law Review prior to graduating from Tulane University College of Law in 1975 as a member of the Order of Coif.  Former law clerk to Justice Pascal F. Calagero of the Louisiana Supreme Court and Administrative counsel to the Louisiana Supreme Court before returning home to West Virginia in 1981.

Practice Areas

  • Workers' Compensation Law - Employers (Agent Orange, Litigation, Occupational Disease, Workers' Compensation Fund)

Case History

  • West Virginia Occupational Pneumoconiosis Claims — Represented coal companies, manufacturing companies and contractors in over 2500 claims for occupational pneumoniosis benefits before the West Virgina Workers'' Compensation Office of Judges, Board of Review and Supreme Court of Appeals from 1986 until about 2005.  Participated in the drafting of amendments to the West Virginia workers'' compensation law, adopted in  2003, which have significantly controlled the numbers of these claims now filed against companies doing business in West Virginia.
  • Boggess et al v. Monsanto (USDC S.D. W.VA), 1984-85 — Member of defense team representing Monsanto in actions brought by employees and former employees alleging injuries as the result of exposure to 2,4,5-T, dioxin (TCDD), para-aminobiphenol (PAB) and other chemicals at a manufactuting plant in Nitro, West Virginis from the 1940s to the 1980s.  Trial last almost 11 months and resulted in a defense verdict with the exception of a single plaintiff''''s claim related to PAB.  Case involved a multitude of complex issues based on  the passage of time, the 40 year time span, numbers of chemicals involved,  exceptions to workers'''' compensation immunity and the difuculty of presenting technical scientific evidence.     

Education

  • Tulane University (BA) (1972)
  • Tulane University (J.D.) (1975)

Bar Admissions

  • West Virginia, United States

Organizations & Affiliations

  • West Virginia State Bar — Member; Past Chair, Workers'' Compensation Committee
  • American Bar Association — Member
  • Defense Trial Counsel of West Virginia — Member
  • West Virginia Special Olympics — State Summer Games Committee Member
  • Clumber Spaniel Club of America — Chair, Public Education
  • Rotary — Member
  • Order of the Coif — Member
  • DRI - The Voice of the Defense — Member Toxic Torts & Environmenal Law
  • Omicron Delta Kappa — Member
  • Phi Beta Kappa — Member

Clerkships

  • Louisiana Supreme Court