In March 2008, a jury awarded Joan Mahoney of California a $20 million civil verdict in her asbestos lawsuit. One third of that award was attributed to defendant Georgia Pacific Corp.

Mrs. Mahoney's primary career was in real estate and show business but her part-time family construction business exposed her to Georgia Pacific's asbestos-containing joint compound in the late 1960's. Together with her husband, Mrs. Mahoney built or remodeled over 200 houses and this exposure to the asbestos in the compound led her to contract the debilitating and fatal lung cancer mesothelioma. The court ruled that Georgia Pacific knew about the disease but continued to making this asbestos-containing joint compound when all other companies had stopped.

Georgia Pacific made a business decision failing to warn of the dangers of exposure to the asbestos joint compound and continuing to sell the asbestos-containing joint compound until the government banned certain uses of asbestos in 1977, when the Consumer Product Safety Commission warned that exposure to asbestos-containing joint compound for six hours a day, four times per year could result in thousands of people developing cancer.

The diseases caused by asbestos exposure can take decades to surface. Mrs. Mahoney was diagnosed with mesothelioma 35 years after her first exposure the Georgia Pacific joint compound.