Plaintiffs' Experts Can Testify at Xarelto Trial

With the first Xarelto bellwhether trial starting this week, several Daubert motion rulings by presiding Judge Fallon will surely have an impact on the outcome. Judge Fallon admitted four of the Plaintiff’s key expert witnesses in two of the upcoming bellwether trials.

Defendants Janssen and Bayer unsuccessfully tried to block the admission of key expert witnesses. The expert witnesses admitted to testify are Dr. Suzanne Parisian, an expert in the field of FDA regulation; Dr. Laura Plunkett, who will testify about drug pharmacology, general causation, regulatory matters and the adequacy of labels for both prescription and non-prescription drugs; Dr. David Kessler, who will be offering testimony in regards to the conduct of pharmaceutical companies; and Dr. Nathaniel Winstead, who will be called to support the Plaintiff’s position on the probable cause of the Plaintiff’s gastrointestinal bleed.

The Court also allowed the Plaintiffs’ expert witnesses to express opinions regarding the bleeding risk of Xarelto and how it would be reduced if a doctor monitored their patients. “Because of Xarelto’s short half-life and the variability in patients, some patients will retain more Xarelto in their system and will be subject to a greater bleeding risk,” Judge Fallon said.

Judge Fallon also excluded defense expert Dr. James A. Reiffel, who was going to offer the preposterous testimony that patients might have abruptly stopped taking Xarelto due to attorney-led advertising.

The Plaintiffs did not win every Daubert battle, however. Ruling for the pharmaceutical giants, the Judge said that their experts could testify about what might have happened to the Plaintiffs if they had taken a different anticoagulant. The court also will allow several other defense experts to testify, but did limit the extent of their opinions.

Farxiga MDL Created

The Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation established MDL No. 2776 in the Southern District of New York to hear claims of diabetic ketoacidosis and kidney damage caused by the Farxiga and Xigduo diabetes drugs. The cases were assigned to Judge Lorna G. Schofield.

The defendants are Bristol-Myers Squibb and AstraZeneca. The JPML stated that the 18 actions currently pending in six federal district courts share common questions of fact and would benefit from a centralized pre-trial MDL docket.

Farxiga, and its sister drug Xigduo XR, belong to a class of diabetes drugs known as Sodium Glucose Cotransporter 1 2 (SGLT2) inhibitors. Other SLGT2 inhibitors include Invokana (canagliflozin) and Jardiance (empagliflozin). The FDA approved Farxiga for treatment in type 2 daibetes on January 8, 2014. Xigduo XR was approved shortly after Farxiga, on October 29, 2014.

The actions share factual questions arising from allegations that taking Farxiga or Xigduo XR may result in patients suffering kidney-related injuries, such as diabetic ketoacidosis and kidney damage.

Plaintiffs are claiming the following injuries:

•           sudden onset of life-threatening diabetic ketoacidosis (often in the setting of normal blood glucose levels)
•       acute renal failure
•        pyelonephritis (kidney infection)
•        urosepsis (life-threatening blood infections)
•       death

Some of these injuries were the subject of recent FDA safety advisories. In fact, On December 4, 2015, the FDA issued a safety communication disclosing they had found 73 adverse events reported between March 2013 and May 2015 that required hospitalization due to ketoacidosis in SGLT2 inhibitor users.

Based on this disclosure, the FDA changed the label for Farxiga and Xigduo XR to include a warning “about the risks of too much acid in the blood” and urged patients taking SGLT2 inhibitors to stop taking the drug and seek immediate medical attention if they have any symptoms of ketoacidosis. The FDA also required a label change to warn of urosepsis and pyelonephritis.

On June 14, 2016, the FDA issued a safety announcement that advised that the existing warning about the risk of acute kidney injury on the Farxiga and Xigduo labels would be strengthened.

Pittman, Dutton & Hellums, P.C., is currently investigating claims against the manufacturers of Farxiga. If you or a loved one believe you were injured as a result of taking Farxiga, please contact Booth Samuels at booths@pittmandutton.com or call toll free 1-866-515-8880.

First Xarelto Trial To Begin April 24th

The first bellwether trial in the Xarelto MDL is about to begin and the Plaintiffs have won several import legal motions which will help bolster their claims. Judge Fallon, the Louisiana federal judge overseeing the litigation, denied partial summary judgments from the Defendants on some claims against Bayer AG and Janssen Pharmaceuticals Inc., saying they cannot necessarily blame or use FDA red tape for their lack of label updates or for any noncompliance with Louisiana law. The motions dealt with federal preemption of several of Plaintiffs’ claims.

The first MDL trial is set to begin April 24^th, which is one of four set to occur in the coming months. There are more than 16,000 cases pending in the Xarelto MDL, with other cases consolidated in Pennsylvania.

Xarelto (rivaroxaban) is an oral blood thinner medication used to reduce the risk of blood clots and strokes in patients with atrial fibrillation and to treat blood clots in the leg and lungs. However, unlike other blood thinners like Coumadin, Xarelto does not have reversal agents to counteract its anticoagulation effects, according to the FDA.

Plaintiffs who have filed suit have alleged the following injuries:

            Intracranial hemorrhages

            Abdominal hemorrhages

            Retinal hemorrhages

            Epidural hematoma

            Adrenal bleeding

            Excessive blood loss

            GI bleeds

            Death

Pittman, Dutton & Hellums, P.C., is currently investigating and filing Xarelto cases. If you or a loved one were prescribed Xarelto and suffered an irreversible internal bleeding that lead to hospitalization and/or death, contact Booth Samuels at toll free 1-866-515-8880 or by email at booths@pittmanudutton.com.

Xarelto Cases Consolidated

The Judicial Panel on Multi-District Litigation has consolidated nearly two dozen Xarelto cases. An MDL is now set up in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana with Judge Fallon presiding. Judge Eldon Fallon is very familiar with the MDL process as he is the presiding Judge over the Chinese Drywall MDL and presided over the Vioxx MDL.

Lawyers for the Plaintiffs argued that any consolidation should occur in either St. Louis under Judge Freda Wolfson, who is presiding over the Pradaxa MDL, or sent to New Jersey. The Defendants, Johnson & Johnson subsidiary Jannsen Pharmaceuticals and Bayer, argued against consolidation.

Xarelto (rivaroxaban) is an oral blood thinner medication used to reduce the risk of blood clots and strokes in patients with atrial fibrillation and to treat blood clots in the leg and lungs. However, unlike other blood thinners like Coumadin, Xarelto does not have reversal agents to counteract its anticoagulation effects, according to the FDA.

Pittman, Dutton & Hellums, P.C., is currently investigating Xarelto cases. If you or a loved one were prescribed Xarelto and suffered an irreversible internal bleeding that lead to hospitalization and/or death, contact Booth Samuels at toll free 1-866-515-8880 or by email at booths@pittmanudutton.com.

JPML To Hear Xarelto Arguments Today

The Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation (“JPML”), sitting in Charleston, South Carolina, will hear arguments today for and against the consolidation of Xarelto lawsuits. Lawyers for those injured by Xarelto are arguing for a Xarelto MDL, while Bayer and Johnson & Johnson, the manufacturers of Xarelto, are fighting consolidation.

Patients who took Xarelto, a blood-thinning drug, accuse the drugmakers of downplaying the medicine’s bleeding risks and asked that the cases be sent to U.S District Judge David Herndon in East St. Louis, Illinois. Judge Herndon is the same judge who is presiding over the Pradaxa MDL, which settled earlier this year. That settlement is estimated to reach $650 million.

Bayer’s lawyers are arguing that should an MDL be formed over their objections, that the cases  be consolidated in New Jersey under U.S. District Judge Freda Wolfson. Judge Wolfson is located in Trenton and is already presiding over two Xarelto case. Another argument for consolidation in New Jersey is that it is located near corporate headquarters.  

In court filings, it is claimed that 65 deaths have been linked to bleeding caused by the drug, which has no antidote. So far, there are 21 cases filed in 10 federal courts.

As I have posted many times on this blog, MDL’s are a great mechanism for consolidating cases and can save time and money on pretrial discovery, depositions and dispositive motions.

U.S. regulators originally approved Xarelto in 2011 to prevent blood clots in patients undergoing knee and hip surgeries. The drug’s use has been extended to patients with irregular heartbeats and potentially deadly leg and lung blood clots. It is similar to Coumadin, or warfarin, used to thin stroke victims’ blood for nearly 50 years.  Xarelto was marketed as more effective at preventing strokes than Coumadin and easier to use since Xarelto patients did not need frequent tests to monitor their blood-plasma levels.

In court filings, Xarelto patients argue the companies did not properly test the blood thinner before putting it on the market, hid the fact the medicine had no antidote, and overstated the drug’s effectiveness.

The case is Xarelto Products Liability Litigation, MDL No. 2592, U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation. A decision by the JPML will be issued in the coming weeks.

Pittman, Dutton & Hellums, P.C., is currently investigating Xarelto cases. If you or a loved one were prescribed Xarelto and suffered an irreversible internal bleeding that lead to hospitalization and/or death, contact Booth Samuels at toll free 1-866-515-8880 or by email at booths@pittmanudutton.com.

Bellwether Fosamax Case Tossed From MDL

New Jersey U.S. District Judge Joel A. Pisano on Tuesday dismissed a suit brought against Merck & Co. Inc., in multidistrict litigation accusing the company of negligence over femur fractures allegedly caused by its osteoporosis drug Fosamax, finding the failure to warn claims fail because the drug's label is clear and accurate.

Judge Pisano granted Merck’s summary judgment motion on grounds that Plaintiff Barbara Gaynor’s claims fail because she took the drug after Merck revised its labeling in 2010 to fully convey the potential for fractures, and she did not set forth sufficient evidence that Merck did not give her doctor adequate notice.

The ruling comes a year after a defense verdict in another Fosamax suit, brought by a user of the drug before the labeling change. Following that decision, in Glynn v. Merck, Pisano dismissed roughly 650 similar cases. An appeal of the Glynn ruling on preemption is pending before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit. For more information on those topics, see my previous blog posts.

Another 215 cases pending in the MDL were brought by users of the drug after the label change.

It is expected that Judge Pisano will issue a show cause order as to why those cases should not be dismissed in light of the Gaynor ruling.

Gaynor, of Hicksville, New York, took Fosamax from 1996 until she fractured her right femur in September 2011. She claimed her long-term use of the drug made the relabeling immaterial, saying, “Merck has submitted no evidence that Mrs. Gaynor’s use of Fosamax in 2011 was a substantial factor in causing her femur fracture.”

Judge Pisano reasoned that that argument confused the proper analysis of a failure-to-warn claim by expecting that Merck first prove that no issue of fact concerning proximate cause existed.

Pisano called Gaynor’s contention that Merck should be liable for failing to warn of Fosamax’s dangers in the late 1990s and the early 2000s “baffling,” because he had ruled in Glynn that such claims are preempted. Merck maintained that it had sought FDA approval of a stronger warning but it was rejected.

Pisano wrote that Gaynor “re-characterized” her suit’s claim that Merck’s warnings about the side effects of Fosamax were inadequate when she later contended that the court should not decide that claim because it was not a proximate cause of her injury. He reasoned that she “cannot have it both ways.”

Merck has been named in 4,430 suits claiming Fosamax caused femur fractures. Of those, 2,785 are in state court in New Jersey, pending before Superior Court Judge Carol Higbee. Another 525 femur cases were filed in state court in California, and 1,120 went to the MDL.

There are approximately 1,150 suits pending over claims that Fosamax causes osteonecrosis of the jawbone. Many of those claims have settled.

NCAA Concussion Lawsuits Consolidated In MDL

Early last week, the Judicial Panel on Multi-District Litigation ordered nearly a dozen concussion-related lawsuits against the NCAA to be consolidated. All cases were sent to the Northern District of Illinois where the Arrington case has been pending for over two years. 

The JPML heard oral arguments for consolidation on December 5, 2013, in Las Vegas. A number of class action lawsuits have been filed since the Arrington case was filed, but the class definitions vary in terms of sport played, years played, and other differences. Almost all cases filed do however make claims for medical monitoring. 

In their Order, the Judges wrote, "Most of the actions now pending, however, involve nearly completely overlapping putative classes and claims." They went on to state, "Regardless of the scope of the putative classes alleged, all actions share common factual questions concerning the NCAA's knowledge of the risks of concussions in football players and its policies governing the protection of players from such injuries."

The Arrington case has been in mediation since November, and another case is set for mediation in February. It is unclear what will happen with those negotiations now that the Panel has consolidated all of these cases. 

Settlement Reached in California ASR Trial

Johnson & Johnson subsidiary DePuy Orthopaedics has agreed to settle a DePuy ASR hip lawsuit on the eve of trial. The case would have been the first “bellwether” trial in a California state court consolidation of ASR cases.  The Plaintiff, Mr. Robert Eugene Ottman, was set to begin presenting his case in less than two weeks in San Francisco. (Ottman v. Johnson & Johnson Services, et al., No. CGC-12-517391; Calif. Super. Ct., San Francisco Cty.)

 

The details of the settlement, including what the amount of the settlement is, are not yet available but have been confirmed in a statement by the Mr. Ottman’s attorneys. The Court has given the parties two months to file the necessary dismissal of the complaint.

 

Depending on the amount and terms of the settlement, including medical subrogation and future costs, this development appears to be a good thing. In the consolidated cases in California alone, there appears to be approximately 2,000 cases filed. This does not include the Federal MDL, in which there are close to 8,000 cases pending. The Federal MDL docket, which is centralized in the Northern District of Ohio, is still awaiting its first bellwether trial. That bellwether has been postponed twice already and will commence sometime before January 2014. The California settlement will most likely have some impact on that bellwether trial.

 

Two other trials involving DePuy ASR lawsuits have already concluded at the state court level. In March, a plaintiff was awarded more than $8 million after a Los Angeles Superior Court jury found that the hip implant was defectively designed. (Kransky v. DePuy, BC456086, California Superior Court, Los Angeles County). This case was not a part of the consolidated California docket. However, a jury in Chicago found for Johnson & Johnson in a second trial just one month later. (Strum v. DePuy, 2011-L-9352, Circuit Court of Cook County). Both of these results have been covered on my blog and you can read my earlier posts regarding these outcomes.

 

Trials also are scheduled in state courts in San Francisco in October; in Hackensack, New Jersey, in October and January; in West Palm Beach, Florida, in November; in Chicago in December; and in Los Angeles in January 2014.

If you or a loved one have had hip replacement surgery and have been implanted with a defective DePuy hip, you may be entitled to compensation for medical bills, pain and suffering, lost wages and other injuries. Our firm is currently investigating claims for those people who have been implanted with DePuy hip replacement devices, both ASR and Pinnacle. If you would like a free case evaluation, please contact Booth Samuels at toll free 1-866-515-8880 or at booths@pittmandutton.com.

Bellwether MDL ASR Case Postponed Again

The first bellwether case to be tried in the MDL out of Ohio has been postponed again.

The trial was to begin today, September 24, after it was continued from a setting of September 9th. Judge Katz issued an Order yesterday citing reasons such as the difficulty in the scheduling of expert witnesses for appearance at trial and the need to conduct more discovery. Judge Katz did not reset the date for the trial to begin, but instead left it open for commencement within 90 days.

Two state court trials are still set to proceed. One is set for October 15 in California and the other is set for October 21 in New Jersey. We will be monitoring these cases closely.

ASR Bellwether Trial Delayed

The first bellwether trial to come out of the MDL has been postponed by Judge Katz for two weeks. The trial was supposed to start today, Monday, September 9 in Cleveland, Ohio.

 

The reason for the continuance is that there remain outstanding issues that must be resolved by the Court.

 

For instance, the Defendants filed a Daubert motion last Wednesday on one of the Plaintiff's key expert witnesses.  Also, the Court had not yet ruled on the critical choice of law issue that impacts punitive damages (DePuy arguing Indiana or for United Kingdom law to apply).  Defendants also just objected to 600 of the 700 exhibits identified by the Plaintiff for which the Court has yet to even begun to review.  DePuy served a rebuttal expert report  yesterday that the Plaintiff has not had a chance to address.

 

These and other pending motions must be resolved before either side can open its case and therefore the Court is opting to adjourn the trial for two weeks.

 

 

 

Rumor of Global Settlement in DePuy ASR Cases

 

It is rumored that Johnson & Johnson, the world’s biggest seller of health-care products, has discussed paying more than $3 billion to settle lawsuits over its recalled hip implants. However, any comment relating to settlement that does not come from the plaintiff’s leadership committee, the court, or from the company itself remains premature, uninformed and a guess. Despite this, major news sources such as Bloomberg News has reported on the rumor.

 

According to the news bulletins, New Brunswick-based J&J seeks to resolve as many as 11,500 lawsuits in the U.S. and has considered paying more than $300,000 per case. Such a settlement would exceed $3 billion if most plaintiffs accept the terms, an amount 50 percent larger than that proposed in previous discussions last January. Five people familiar with the talks had said J&J officials were willing to pay about $2 billion to resolve the cases. Lawyers for plaintiffs rejected that amount as too little, the people said.

 

Any proposed global settlement would be affected by the outcome of seven bellwether trials set between September and January. There have already been two cases tried to a jury on the defective hips. J&J lost an $8.3 million verdict in the first trial over the ASR device and won the second. In the first case, a California jury in the spring of this year awarded damages to a retired Montana prison guard. But the jury did not find exclusively for the plaintiff, finding that although the device was defectively designed, DePuy did properly warn of the risks. Also, the jury did not find that DePuy was liable for punitive damages. DePuy is appealing that verdict.

 

Six weeks later, in the second ASR case tried in the country, a Chicago jury ruled for DePuy in rejecting a defective design claim by an Illinois nurse. Both of those cases have been extensively covered on this blog.

 

Seven other similar trials are coming up that will help lawyers for both sides realize the strengths and weaknesses over damages and liability. This will help in negotiating any global settlement. The first trial is scheduled to begin September 9th in federal court in Cleveland. U.S. District Judge David Katz is overseeing that lawsuit by Ann McCracken, 58, a resident of Rochester, New York, who needed two replacement surgeries, known as revisions, after her ASR implant. This case was originally set to begin in June, but was continued until September. See my previous blog posts for more information on that case.

 

Judge Katz is the presiding judge in the MDL, and is overseeing about 8,000 cases. About 2,000 cases are pending in the California Judicial Council Coordinated Proceeding before Judge Richard Kramer in San Francisco. The remaining cases have been filed throughout the United States in various jurisdictions.

 

Trials also are scheduled in state courts in San Francisco in October; in Hackensack, New Jersey, in October and January; in West Palm Beach, Florida, in November; in Chicago in December; and in Los Angeles in January 2014.

 

The corporation is pushing to resolve U.S. cases by early next year, according to the unnamed sources. J&J’s DePuy unit recalled 93,000 implants in 2010, including 37,000 in the U.S., after more than 12 percent failed within five years. That rate appears to be climbing, along with lawsuits brought by patients blaming the chromium and cobalt devices for pain, metal debris and replacement surgeries.

 

It is estimated that J&J has spent about $993 million on medical costs and informing patients and surgeons about the ASR recall. J&J has also set aside an undisclosed amount for litigation, which it increased before June 30. For more information on that side of the story, see some of my previous blog posts.

 

Lawyers for hip recipients are still reviewing more than 50 million pages of J&J documents and conducting pre-trial depositions of company officials and experts to prepare for those cases. While settlement talks continue, J&J and lawyers for hip claimants have agreed on the broad outline of a so-called “global settlement” covering all U.S. cases, the sources said.

 

According to the unnamed sources, any proposed global settlement would compensate patients on a sliding scale. This sliding scale is best referred to as a matrix or grid. A plaintiff would be placed into a grid or matrix category on such factors as age, extent of injuries, and if they were bilateral. This system would be very similar to the Total Body Formula global settlement negotiated by Pittman, Dutton & Hellums managing partner Chris Hellums.

 

Any chance at a global settlement will still have to overcome several obstacles. One includes the number of years that J&J may potentially have to pay future claims. Another is whether the settlement would include reimbursing Medicare and other health insurance companies such as Blue Cross Blue Shield for claims paid. A third is the amount of compensation for outlier cases, which would include dual hip surgeries, cases where infection prompted long hospital stays, and claimants who are unable to undergo a revision surgery because of their health.

 

If you or a loved one have had hip replacement surgery and have been implanted with a defective DePuy hip, you may be entitled to compensation for medical bills, pain and suffering, lost wages and other injuries. Our firm is currently investigating claims for those people who have been implanted with DePuy hip replacement devices, both ASR and Pinnacle. If you would like a free case evaluation, please contact Booth Samuels at toll free 1-866-515-8880 or at booths@pittmandutton.com.

 

Judge Katz Rules Evidence of Recall Not Allowable In ASR Bellwether Case

In what was a major ruling, Judge Katz of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Ohio, the presiding Judge of the DePuy ASR MDL, ruled that evidence of the recall of the DePuy ASR metal-on-metal hip implant can be excluded from a bellwether trial over the device.

The first bellwether trial, Ann McCracken v. DePuy Orthopaedics, is slated for trial beginning September 9th.

Katz ruled last month on a number of pre-trial motions from both plaintiffs and defendants, granting DePuy's bid to keep evidence about the recall out of the trial. McCracken had argued that the recall should not count as a "subsequent remedial measure" following the 2009 implantation of a DePuy ASR LX model.

Katz disagreed, and ruled for DePuy. McCracken had a revision surgery performed in January 2011. Judge Katz noted in his order that evidence relating to the voluntary recall by DePuy of the ASR hip implant was inadmissible in this case because the Plaintiff’s original hip replacement surgery took place prior to when the recall was issued. Judge Katz determined the recall to be a “subsequent remedial measure,” which would have prevented harm if it had occurred prior to the plaintiff’s initial surgery.

Judge Katz also denied a motion by McCracken to exclude evidence of the FDA’s 510(k) clearance process of the device. Although  stated in her motion that the evidence was “irrelevant and prejudicial,” Judge Katz noted that the 510(k) process was the way in which this particular device arrived on the market. He ruled the defendants should be allowed to present the 510(k) process as evidence, as all parties involved would understand this is a clearance process based on an equivalency standard and not just a rubber stamp by the FDA.

We are not sure what this means for the first bellwether trial but I do not think it is a good sign of things to come. We are still confident that the bellwether jury will see the facts in a reasonable light and weigh the evidence accordingly.

Chinese Drywall Deadline Monday July 8th

The registration deadline for all Chinese drywall settlements administered through Judge Fallon's MDL Court in New Orleans is Monday July 8th. All claimants who wish to participate in any of the various settlements must register their claims by this date or they will be prohibited from receiving settlement monies or remediation. Claim forms are not due at this time, but to file a claim form you must register.

Stryker Hip Cases Consolidated in MDL

A federal judicial panel has created a consolidated docket for all lawsuits alleging injury caused by the Stryker Rejuvenate and ABG II hip implant devices. The makers of the hip replacement system is a company named Howmedica Osteonics Corporation.

The Order from the Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation (JPML) agreed to transfer nearly four dozen cases and all future Stryker hip claims to a single federal judge in Minnesota for coordinated pretrial proceedings. The Order came out today, June 12.

 

A consent order signed by the Minnesota court’s Chief Judge Michael James Davis indicated that the docket will be presided over by Judge Donovan W. Frank.

 

This just happens to be one more consolidated action in a long line of MDL’s concerning metal on metal hip defects. See my blog post from March of this year to learn more about the Stryker hips involved in this latest MDL.

 

The attorneys at Pittman, Dutton & Hellums, P.C., are investigating claims against Stryker for the Rejuvenate and ABG II hips. If you or a loved one have been implanted with a Stryker Rejuvenate Hip or the ABG II Modular Hip, contact Booth Samuels at booths@pittmandutton.com or toll free at 1-866-515-8880.

California Judge Denies DePuy's Motion to Toss Out $8.3M Verdict

 

 

A California Superior Court judge has denied DePuy Orthopaedics’ motions for new trial or judgment notwithstanding the verdict, upholding the $8.3 million judgment that resulted from the state’s first trial of a DePuy ASR hip implant case. The case is Kransky v. DePuy, BC456086, California Superior Court, Los Angeles County.

 

In March, the jury hearing the DePuy ASR recall lawsuit in California found the ASR hip was defectively designed, and awarded more than $8.3 million to the Plaintiff, Loren Kransky. Mr. Kransky sued the company under the theory that the ASR was defectively designed as well as DePuy's failure to warn his doctors that its product was dangerous. He claimed that the ASR hip caused him to suffer severe side effects, including metal poisoning. The jury found in favor of Mr. Kransky on the design defect claim and in favor of DePuy on the failure-to-warn claim.

 

During that trial, evidence was introduced which indicated Johnson & Johnson and its subsidiary, DePuy Orthopaedics, had knowledge that the ASR hip product was defective years before the recall was announced. The recall occurred in August 2010. However, that information was not shared with the public at large or the medical community. According to a New York Times report published on April 16th, much of the same evidence was introduced in a second trial that concluded last month in Illinois state court. However, the jury hearing that case found for Johnson & Johnson. For more information on that case, see my previous blog posts.

 

Los Angeles Superior Court Judge J. Stephen Czuleger issued his decision from the bench following a hearing May 24 and has scheduled a hearing in June on the plaintiff’s attorneys’ request for approximately $1.2 million in costs. DePuy submitted its motion for JNOV April 17^th in the corporation’s bid to persuade Judge Czuleger to throw out the verdict. In their motion, Depuy argued that the jury had erred and its verdict was inconsistent.Thus far, there has been no written order.

 

Judge Czuleger ruled that although there was a "legitimate conflict" in the evidence at trial as to when DePuy knew that its ASR hip implants were dangerous, this did not bar Mr. Kransky's ability to hold DePuy liable for a defectively designed product. The judge also rejected DePuy's claim that the overall body of evidence was insufficient to support Mr. Kransky's verdict, noting that there was "strong evidence" in support of his claim.

Court records indicate that there are more than 11,000 DePuy ASR hip lawsuits currently pending throughout the United States, most of which have been filed in a multidistrict litigation underway in U.S. District Court, Northern District of Ohio. The first trials in the MDL are expected to begin in September 2013. That date is subject to change as the first bellwether case has been continued already this year. The ASR MDL is titled In re: DePuy Orthopaedics, Inc. ASR Hip Implant Products Liability Litigation – MDL 2197.

Our firm is currently investigating claims for those people who have been implanted with the DePuy hip replacement devices, both ASR and Pinnacles. If you would like a free case evaluation, please contact Booth Samuels toll free 1-866-515-8880 or by email at booths@pittmandutton.com.



 

 

 

First DePuy ASR Case in MDL Rescheduled

The first bellwether trial for thousands of DePuy ASR hip lawsuits pending before the U.S. District Court, Northern District of Ohio, has been rescheduled. Originally slated to begin on June 3rd, the trial will now begin on September 9th, as per an order issued by U.S. District Judge David A. Katz on May 7th. Judge Katz continued the setting to allow time for further briefing and possible oral arguments on pre-trial motions. The next status conference in the federal DePuy ASR litigation will be held on May 14th, according to the Order.

There are about 10,750 lawsuits filed over the recalled all-metal hip implant. Approximately three-quarters of them are pending in the MDL.

$6.5 Million Verdict Against Actos Maker Thrown Out

Actos users who were harmed by the drug suffered a major setback after Takeda Pharmaceutical Co., persuaded a judge to throw out a $6.5 million jury verdict against it. The mega-corporation’s lawyers argued that the Plaintiff did not produce sufficient evidence to show his cancer was caused by the medication. The Los Angeles case is Cooper v. Takeda Pharmaceuticals America Inc., CGC-12-518535, California Superior Court (Los Angeles).

The trial lasted nearly two months and the jury deliberated for almost five days.

Judge Kenneth Freeman ruled that the Plaintiff’s, Jack Cooper, attorneys were not able to properly link his bladder cancer to his Actos use and jurors should not have had a chance to return their verdict against Asia’s largest drugmaker. It was the first of more than 3,000 lawsuits over the medication to go to trial.

 

The Plaintiff in this case took the drug for more than four years before being diagnosed with bladder cancer in 2011. Takeda’s lawyers argued during the almost two-month trial that Cooper was more likely to develop bladder cancer because he was an elderly male former smoker who suffered from diabetes. That placed him in high-risk categories for the disease regardless of his Actos use, the company’s attorneys argued to jurors.

However, Judge Freeman’s ruling hinged on an expert doctor who concluded Cooper’s Actos use caused his bladder cancer turned out to be “inherently unreliable” and that justified throwing the case out. Freeman issued a 27-page ruling.

It is believed that Cooper’s lawyers will appeal Freeman’s post-verdict ruling throwing out the case.

It is estimated that Actos sales peaked in the year ended March 2011 at $4.5 billion, or 27 percent of Takeda’s revenue at the time.

More than 1,200 suits have been consolidated into an MDL in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Louisiana. The first federal case is set for trial in January and Mark Lanier, who won a $253 million verdict against Merck in 2005 in the first trial over the company’s withdrawn Vioxx painkiller, is slated to try the case for plaintiff Ida St. John.

Former Actos users contend in court filings Takeda researchers ignored or downplayed concerns about the drug’s cancer-causing potential before it went on sale in the U.S. in 1999, and misled U.S. regulators about the medicine’s risks.